Grasping these fundamentals in conversion tracking can prevent you from bidding too high or too low on traffic and misallocating your budget.

A successful PPC campaign relies heavily on robust conversion tracking. This tracking influences reporting, bidding algorithms, and ensures transparency. Without conversion tracking, you’re withholding vital data from ad platforms, potentially leading to overbidding or underbidding on traffic and misallocation of budget. In the era of privacy-first web, conversion tracking can seem intimidating due to its reliance on modeling and consumer consent. Let’s delve into the various forms of conversion tracking and how they can be utilized to enhance your campaigns.

Native Conversion Tracking Vs. Analytics Conversion Tracking

First, you need to determine whether to employ native conversion tracking – that is, setting up website conversions, phone conversions, etc. – or depend on GA4 or another analytics platform. Your decision here will subtly modify your data and its presentation. Employing native conversion tracking will likely yield more credit for various actions but may not align with your SEO counterparts using analytics. If consistent reporting across teams is necessary, you might need to import your GA4 conversion events. Regardless of the path you choose, ensure to verify your conversions for accurate tracking. Bear in mind, conversions can either track every visitor action or just unique conversions associated with each individual; opt for what best suits your needs. For GA4, ensure to link your Google Ads to your GA4 account and only toggle events you wish to track as conversions. If you prefer native tracking, you’ll find the setup more straightforward. However, remember to allocate space for uploading offline conversions to enrich your dataset and take advantage of the seed audience.

Interpreting Primary and Secondary Conversions

After selecting your tracking approach, the next step is to establish your primary and secondary conversion actions. These are indicators that instruct Google on what to focus on for bidding and what to include in reports. Keep in mind, not everything should be classified as primary. Conduct a thorough audit of your conversions and categorize them appropriately. Actions hosted by Google, such as location visits and directions, are typically considered primary, but their value can be adjusted. It’s worth noting that both primary and secondary conversions can have a conversion value. This implies that you can still assign values to actions of lesser interest, which can guide your value-based bidding. If you wish to view all conversions (primary and secondary), you can do so under all conversions.

Utilizing Enhanced Conversion Customer Lists

One of the significant updates from Google Marketing Live 2023 is the capability to create audiences from enhanced conversions. This is a revolutionary change, as customer match has traditionally been challenging for most brands, particularly if you struggle to reach the minimum target of 1,000. This update allows you to construct audience lists based on conversion data. This is beneficial for all campaigns, but especially for PMax campaigns, which require audience signals in the initial stages and perform best when they have conversion values to utilize.

Final Insights

Conversion tracking is not a universal solution, but understanding these fundamentals will provide you with a strong foundation to build upon. Remember, the most efficient conversion tracking method will be determined by your business and stakeholders’ specific needs.