Using GTM To Add Google Ads Conversion Tracking To A Site

Before you start

To follow this SOP, you will need to have Google Tag Manager (GTM) installed on your site. If you haven’t done so and you are using WordPress, you can follow SOP 004 (web version). You will also need a Google Ads account. If you don’t have one yet, you can follow SOP 014 (web version)

Key steps 40 steps

1. 1 Log into your Google Ads account at Google Ads
2. 2 Go to Goals > Measurement > + Create conversion action.
3. 3 Select the action you want to track:
4. 4 Enter the URL for the website you want to measure your conversions. Click “Scan”.
5. 5 Once successfully scanned, you will have the option to create conversion actions manually using code. Click “+ Add a conversion action manually”.
6. 6 Inside the “Conversion action details” panel, you will need to select the goal category when creating a conversion action for your website:
7. 7 Finally, click “Done”.
8. 8 To proceed, click "Save and continue".
9. 9 You will then reach the “Tag Setup” panel, where you are given 3 choices:
10. 10 Go to Google Tag Manager and select the account you want to work on.
11. 11 You will now need to define what kind of action you want to track. This SOP covers two of the most popular tracking needs:
12. 12 Under “Triggers”, click on the “New” button:
13. 13 Rename your Trigger and then click “Choose a trigger type to begin setup..." and select “Page View”:
14. 14 Under the trigger firing rule, select “All Page Views”. This is recommended for most cases unless you only want to track specific pages, which you then select “Some Page Views”. This option will only fire when the Page URL contains a certain word (e.g. products).
15. 15 Click the blue “Save” button to save your trigger.
16. 16 The next steps correspond to setting up a “Click” event. Skip to the “Setting up your conversion tag in Google Tag Manager” section of this SOP.
17. 17 Under “Triggers”, click on the “New” button:
18. 18 Rename your trigger, click “Choose a trigger type to begin setup..." and then select “Form Submission”:
19. 19 Next, check “Check Validation” and select "All Forms". This will ensure this tag will only fire if the form has successfully been submitted.
20. 20 Under the trigger firing rule, select “Page URL”. This tells Google Tag Manager to fire this tag on a certain page. You can then specify which URL to fire this tag. In this example, it is set to fire when the user is on the sign-up page.
21. 21 Click the blue “Save” button to save your trigger.
22. 22 On the sidebar, click “Tags” and then “New”:
23. 23 Rename your tag:
24. 24 Under “Tag Configuration”, rename the tag and then click on the tag icon.
25. 25 From the dropdown list under “Featured”, select “Google Ads” followed by “Google Ads Conversion Tracking”.
26. 26 You’ll be asked to create a conversion linker tag. If you haven’t created it, click “Create”.
27. 27 Enter your conversion details:
28. 28 Scroll down to the “Triggering” section > Click “Choose a trigger to make this trigger fire...” > Select the trigger you have just created in the previous chapter of this SOP > Click “Save”.
29. 29 If you click “Overview” on the sidebar, Google Tag Manager will display an overview of your changes. If everything looks ok, you are now ready to hit “Submit”
30. 30 In the Submission Configuration panel, you will be given a chance to add a name and description to this version. After you have done so, hit “Publish”.
31. 31 That’s it! You will now be taken to see the summary of the changes you have just made.
32. 32 Open your website where you've set up the conversion tag e.g. thank you page, submit your form page, add to cart button page etc.
33. 33 Now go to the [NEW] Google Tag Assistant Companion Chrome extension and add it to Chrome.
34. 34 After adding the extension, click on the Tag Assistant Companion icon on your browser.
35. 35 Click on “Add domain”
36. 36 Enter your website’s URL and click “Connect”:
37. 37 Check if the Tag Assistant is connected to your site. You should be able to see the below pop-up on your site when it is connected. Click “Finish”.
38. 38 Next, you will directed to another page from your website browser. In the list of tags fired, look for the one corresponding to the conversion you’ve set up (in our example, “GAds_Conversions_FriendRef”).
39. 39 By clicking on the tab, you will see that all settings we configured are the correct Conversion Value, Conversion ID, Conversion Label, Currency Code, and even the trigger:
40. 40 Ensure your conversion is not firing when you don’t want it to be performing an unrelated non-conversion action and check if the tag has been triggered.

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