Cross domain tracking on right click

Question

Is there a way to pass GA cookies for cross domain tracking when user uses right click (instead of a left click) to hop domains?

Answer 1

It would seem that reliance is on autoLink, which decorates links automatically on left click and does not directly provide for alternative events.

Since I'm working on assumptions I'm not providing complete solutions.

Per autoLink in GA's analytics.js devguide:

// Loads the Linker plugin
ga('require', 'linker');

// Instructs the Linker plugin to automatically add linker parameters
// to all links and forms pointing to the domain "destination.com".
ga('linker:autoLink', ['destination.com'], false, true);

This will also operate on oncontextmenu so if the visitor right-clicks and selects "Open in new tab", the link is still decorated and will have the data appended.

Where decoration is required on other events, autoLinking needs to be extended by manually adding linker parameters using:

ga('linker:decorate', destinationLink);

Such a function call decorates a link based on the domains listed in the 'linker:autoLink` array above. It can be adapted to apply to all cross-domain links.

Assuming the context menu needs to be disabled: From Andy E's answer

destinationLink.oncontextmenu = function ()
{
    ga('linker:decorate', destinationLink);
    console.log(destinationLink.href);
    document.location = destinationLink.href;
    return false;
}

That will decorate the link on right click and direct the browser to the decorated URL.

If the context menu is already disabled, abbreviating Andy E's code:

destinationLink.addEventListener('mousedown', function (e) {
    console.log('mousedown', e);
    if (3 == e.which) { // is it a right click
        ga('linker:decorate', destinationLink)
        document.location = destinationLink.href;
    }
})

Note that decoration must occur as soon as possible before the visitor clicks since the parameters expire after 2 minutes.

Analytics Ninja, adapt your code to your specific requirements and if you run into further issues, please follow Philip Walton's advice