If you read our post about metrics Marketing should care about and you use Salesforce here are some easy to follow instructions for putting lead source tracking into place.

Lead Source (the field with the big red arrow next to it), is a standard field in Salesforce, so it’s easy enough to locate and use, the important thing is to put your own custom sources into the pick-list and to use them.

1. To add custom values to the pick-list, you’ll need administrative privileges.
2. Click on ‘Setup,’ then under ‘App Setup’ you’ll want to click on Leads.
3. Next select ‘Fields’ and you’ll get a listing of all of the fields in your CRM.  Click next to ‘Lead Source’ on the ‘Edit’ link.
   
4. Once you are in the edit interface, you’ll be able to add items to the pick-list by selecting ‘New.’
   
5. From there you’ll be given an easy, step-by-step way to insert a new value into the list.

As you can see, we have a variety of different lead sources, you’ll want to make sure your list matches the places that you gather leads from.   Now when you import leads you can select to attribute them to one of these values, thus helping you better track where things come from.

Now you’ll be able to run  reports on these fields, luckily, lead source is a standard field on the Contact record in Salesforce as well and it’s mapped so that the lead source transfers over to the Contact record when you convert Leads.