Google Ads Connector

The Google Ads Connector sends your conversions to Google Ads through the Data Manager API or the Google Ads API, and from the browser through the Google tag. This way, Google Ads can measure and optimize your campaigns.

Watch a Video Walkthrough

Prerequisites

You will need the following to complete the setup of the connector successfully:

• A Google Ads account and your Google Ads Customer ID (format 123-123-1234, shown in the top right corner of Google Ads)
• Admin access to that Google Ads account, to accept Tracklution's access request
• For Enhanced Conversions: Tracklution's ContactInfo tag on your site (see Enhanced Conversions)

Google Ads Connector Setup

1. Open your Tracking Container, go to the Connectors section and choose Google Ads.
2. Enter your Google Ads Customer ID and press Send Permission Request. Tracklution sends an access request (manager link request) to that account.
3. Accept the request in Google Ads under Admin > Access and security > Managers. Only an admin of the Google Ads account can accept it. If your account is under a manager account (MCC) that has already accepted a Tracklution request, skip this step: access works through the manager account and there is nothing to accept.
4. In Tracklution, the connector shows Tracklution has access to this account. While it shows Waiting for approval in Google Ads, the page updates by itself for the first 10 minutes. After that, press Check again. If it shows that the request was declined, cancelled or not found, press Send new request.
5. For each event you want to send to Google Ads, press Create Conversion Action, choose Primary or Secondary and press Submit. Tracklution creates two conversion actions in your Google Ads account (see Two conversion actions per event). The connector goes live when the first conversion action is created. Before that, remove or pause any other tag that sends the same conversion to this account, or choose Secondary.
6. Check that Set to live at the bottom of the connector page is on. To pause the connector, turn it off and press Save.

It can take up to 6 hours before Google Ads accepts conversions to a newly created conversion action. When conversions are sent through the Google Ads API, conversions Google turns down because the action is too new are sent again automatically after 6 hours.

Two conversion actions per event

For every event, Tracklution creates a pair of conversion actions in Google Ads:

• Treat the pair as one conversion action. The two actions use different methods to upload the same conversion, but each conversion is recorded in only one of them, there are no double conversion counts.

Which action receives the conversion

Tracklution decides per conversion, based on what is known about the visitor:

• The visitor came from a Google Ads click (click ID available): the conversion is sent from Tracklution's server to the Click action. The Google tag does not send these conversions, so they are not counted twice.
• No click ID, conversion happens in the browser: the Google tag sends the conversion to the Booster action. If ContactInfo was collected, Tracklution's server adds the hashed email and phone number to that conversion (Enhanced Conversions), so Google can connect it to an ad view or engagement.
• No click ID, conversion only reaches Tracklution's server (for example an offline or backend event, or Client-Side Tracking disabled): if ContactInfo is available and Enhanced Conversions is active, it is sent with the hashed contact details to the Click action, and Google records it if it can match the person to an ad interaction.

Check That It Works

In Google Ads, go to Goals > Conversions > All conversions and locate the Tracklution conversion actions. Once conversions arrive, their status will be updated. A new conversion action can take up to 6 hours to start receiving conversions, and Google Ads can take up to a further 48 hours to report them. Getting your conversion action to receive conversions and seeing them reported is usually quicker, but Google still reports common waiting times up to 3 hours with last-click attribution, and up to a further 15 hours with other attribution models, before you see your conversions in their reports.

A/B Testing Tracklution Google Ads Connector

To compare Tracklution with your current setup, create the Tracklution conversion actions as Secondary and run them in parallel with your current setup for about two weeks. Compare the sum of both Tracklution actions with your current conversion action.

When you are satisfied, switch both Tracklution actions to Primary at the same time, and set your old setup to Secondary (you can remove it later).

Comparing with Your Previous Setup

When comparing with another setup, always add both Tracklution actions together. E.g. a standard web tag gives you one action that contains all conversions, while Tracklution splits the same conversions over two (Click and Booster). In this case, if your web tag shows 20 conversions and the two Tracklution actions show 24 and 7, compare 20 to 31.

Compare in the All conv. (by conv. time) column rather than All conv. Both columns count the conversions Google Ads has recorded, but they put them on different days:

• All conv. counts each conversion on the day of the ad click it is attributed to.
• All conv. (by conv. time) counts each conversion on the day the conversion happened.

By click time, each conversion action's attribution settings (conversion window, attribution model) decide which click, and so which day, a conversion lands on, and conversions keep being added to past days as they come in. Two different setups rarely line up this way. By conversion time, each day shows the conversions that happened on it, which makes it the more reliable comparison.

Use the All conv. columns, not Conversions, while you test. The Conversions columns include only Primary conversion actions, so Tracklution actions set to Secondary during an A/B test do not show there.

Enhanced Conversions

Enhanced Conversions lets Google attribute conversions without a click ID by matching hashed contact information (email, phone number) to people who interacted with your ads.

1. Collect contact information with Tracklution's ContactInfo tag. Here are the instructions on how to collect ContactInfo from your site.
2. In Google Ads, go to Goals > Conversion settings and:
   • Turn on Enhanced conversions and select Google Ads API as the method.
   • Turn on Enhanced conversions for leads and select Google tag as the method.

The Google Ads connector in Tracklution shows Enhanced Conversions is active once the setting is on in your Google Ads account. If it shows Enhanced Conversions is not active, follow the steps above. Without it, conversions that reach Tracklution's server only, without a click ID, are not sent, and click conversions are sent without contact information.

Ecommerce / Cart Data and Product ID Format

Cart data adds the purchased products to each conversion Tracklution sends to Google Ads, for Shopping and Performance Max campaigns. Google matches every product to your Merchant Center feed by its ID, so the ID Tracklution sends must be identical to the item ID (offer ID) in your feed.

Set up cart data

1. Link your Merchant Center account to your Google Ads account (Google's instructions).
2. In Tracklution, open your Google Ads connector and find the Ecommerce / Cart Data section under Advanced Settings.
3. Enter your Merchant Center ID and select the Feed Country and Feed Language. Cart data is not sent until the country and language are set.
4. Compare the product IDs with the item IDs in your feed. If they differ, set the Product ID format.

Product ID format

Leave the field empty to send the ID tracked with the purchase event (item ID). If your feed uses a different ID, build a format from these variables:

• {{product_id}}: your store's product number, shared by all variants of the product.
• {{variant_id}}: the number of the exact variant bought: the Shopify variant ID or the WooCommerce variation ID.
• {{sku}}: the product code from your store admin.
• {{item_id}}: the ID tracked with the purchase event, the same ID that is sent when the field is empty.
• {{item_variant}}: the item's variant value. Use it only if it matches the item IDs in your feed.

You can add fixed text around the variables to copy the pattern of your feed's item IDs, for example shopify_ZZ_{{product_id}}_{{variant_id}} (the Shopify preset). The format must contain at least one of the variables above and can be up to 120 characters long.

When a product doesn't have the ID

Not every product has every ID: a simple WooCommerce product, for example, has no variation ID. Empty values and 0 count as missing. When the value your format needs is missing, Tracklution uses the next available ID in this order:

• Empty field or {{item_id}}: item ID → SKU → variant ID → product ID
• {{variant_id}}: variant ID → product ID → item ID → SKU
• {{product_id}}: product ID → item ID → SKU → variant ID
• {{sku}}: SKU → variant ID → product ID → item ID
• {{item_variant}}: item variant, then item ID → SKU → variant ID → product ID
• Formats with fixed text or several variables, such as gla_{{variant_id}}: the full format when every value exists. If a value is missing, that product gets the first available ID from the default order (item ID → SKU → variant ID → product ID), without the fixed text.

If none of the IDs exist, the product is left out of the cart data. The conversion is still sent.

Example: WooCommerce feed with variation IDs

Your Merchant Center feed uses the variation ID for variable products and the product ID for simple products. Set the Product ID format to {{variant_id}}:

• Hoodie, size M (variable product 4242, variation 4243) → 4243
• Coffee mug (simple product 7825) → 7825, because a simple product has no variation ID

Good to know

• The format applies to all cart data Tracklution sends to Google Ads, both server-side and in the browser.
• A change applies to conversions sent after you save it. Conversions that were already sent are not updated.
• The format only changes the IDs sent to Google Ads. Your event data in Tracklution keeps the original product IDs.
• If products still don't match, compare the IDs with the item IDs in your feed, including any fixed text such as a prefix.

Disable Client-Side Tracking

The connector settings include a Disable Client-Side Tracking switch. When it is on, Tracklution does not load the Google tag on your site and sends conversions server-side only. The Conversion Booster action then receives no conversions: conversions without a click ID are sent only if ContactInfo is available and Enhanced Conversions is active, to the Click action. This is not recommended for most setups.

Messages in Google Ads That Are Not Errors

"The Google tag may not be firing on your website"

This message shows on the Tracklution action without "Conversion Booster" in its name. That action receives conversions only through the API and never uses the Google tag, so the message is expected and can be ignored. The Conversion Booster action is the one connected to the Google tag.

Data Manager API logs: Errors and Success rate

Tracklution sends conversions through Google's Data Manager API or the Google Ads API, depending on your setup. If your account receives them through the Data Manager API, you can see its logs in Google Ads:

• The Errors column counts conversions Google received successfully but did not attribute to an ad. Success rate is the share of received conversions that Google recorded and attributed.
• Conversions with a Google click ID (GCLID) are almost always recorded.
• Conversions without a click ID are sent with hashed email and phone number (Enhanced Conversions). Google records them only if it can match the person to a click or engagement on one of your ads. If the person found you through organic search or came to your site directly, Google receives the data but does not record a conversion, so it ends up in the Errors column.

These errors are expected. They do not mean conversions were lost, and they do not point to a problem with your goals or conversion values. Conversions: N at the top of the page is the number of conversion actions in use, not the number of conversions.

Consent Mode v2 and Advanced Consent Mode

Consent Mode v2 is required in EEA from March 2024 onwards. Tracklution provides full support for this. Read more here: Compatibility with Cookie Banners and Consent Mode (v2).

Using Multiple Google Ads Accounts for One Container

You can link multiple Google Ads accounts to the same Tracklution container. This means you don't need to create separate setups for each ad account, ideal if you manage several accounts for the same website and want to keep everything organized in one place.

You'll find this option right at the top in your Google Ads connector in Tracklution. Click + New to add a new Ad Account.

Before creating any conversion action in Tracklution, open Google Ads account settings and ensure the management of conversion goals is set to the individual account.

New vs Returning Customer Detection

Tracklution automatically determines whether a converting visitor is a new or returning customer and includes this as a customer_type signal in every Google Ads conversion upload. This is calculated based on when the visitor was first seen in your server data, no configuration needed. Read more about it here.

Troubleshooting

Issues with a connector? Visit our Troubleshooting and FAQ to find answers to most common issues for each connector.

Connector shows that Tracklution no longer has access? Send a new access request from the connector page and accept it in Google Ads under Admin > Access and security > Managers.

Are you missing an event that should be delivered to Google Ads? Find your missing event by going through the Tracklution Debug Quest.