Twitter Conversion Tracking with Google Tag Manager

If you’re already using Twitter as a marketing tool, you want to measure the results, right? You have multiple options here – remarketing, Twitter conversion tracking, etc. However everything takes time to implement – you send an email to the developer with requirements of what should be tracked and it takes him weeks complete the task. But not anymore! With the help of Google Tag Manager you can speed up the process.

Before you continue

This blog post assumes you have a working knowledge of Google Tag Manager tags. If you’re a beginner – I highly recommend checking out these free Google Tag Manager courses, first. The minimum requirements are:

• You have Google Tag Manager tracking code installed on your website.
• You know what tags, triggers, variables and dataLayer are and how they work in Google Tag Manager.

P.S.  This blog post is a part of more comprehensive guide – Google Tag Manager + Twitter, so if you’re looking for in-depth information about how to upgrade your Twitter marketing with Google Tag Manager, give it a try.

So What’s the Plan?

If you’re familiar with Adwords tracking setup process via Google Tag Manager, is particularly the same. All you need to do is to:

1. Create Twitter Universal Website tag in Twitter Ads account.
2. Find and copy your pixel id.
3. Paste it in appropriate field of the tag.
4. Make the tag (or tags) fire after certain interactions you want to track as conversions.

I have described first 3 steps in this blog post, so before you continue, make sure you have also read Twitter Tracking Pixel + Google Tag Manager.

Twitter conversion tracking works is closely related to remarketing. You’ll be using the same Twitter Tag Template in Google Tag Manager, but events will be different. In the blog post about Twitter Pixel I have created a Twitter Pageview tag, in this blog post we’ll track more precise interactions, like signups or purchases.

Different types of events

For every interaction you want to track with Twitter, you’ll need to create a separate GTM Twitter tag. It will use the same Tracking ID pixel from your Universal Website tag but different tag events:

Also, triggers in Google Tag Manager will be different for each event. Now I will give you short examples of how you can utilize each event type.

Twitter event – View Content

If you’re tracking visitors on a blog, then ViewContent Twitter tag should fire when visitor navigates to a blog post page. If you’re the owner of e-commerce business, then your content is a product page. Sample tag could look like this:

Let me explain:

• I added additional parameter – content_name. This data is not available in GTM by default, so you’ll need to create a user-defined a Javascript variable – Page Title (Variable type: Javascript variable, Global variable name: document.title). Adding additional parameters is optional! You can skip them, if you wish.
• Trigger’s (that I used for this Twitter tag) settings are:
  • Title – Pageview – Viewed Blog Post.
  • Type – Pageview.
  • This trigger fires on – Some Page Views
  • Rule – Page Path starts with /post/, because all posts in my blog contain “/post/” in URL., e.g. https://www.analyticsmania.com/post/konami-code-with-google-tag-manager/.

Twitter event – Search

When a visitor uses search on my blog, page’s URL changes to analyticsmania.com/?s=search_query. So for Twitter Search Tag, I’ll use a trigger with the following settings:

• Title – Pageview – Used Search.
• Type – Pageview.
• This trigger fires on – Some Page Views
• Rule – Page Path starts with /?s=

Twitter Event – Add To Cart

If you own an online store, then this event is pretty important in order to measure sales funnel. Every e-commerce platform is really different, so it’s impossible to describe a standard method how to track Added to cart  event.

The most robust solution would be to ask developer to send this interaction as a dataLayer event. Then you could catch that event with Google Tag Manager and use it as a trigger which launches AddToCart Twitter tag.

Read this blog post to find out how you can use Data Layer Events as Triggers.

Twitter Event – Add To WishList

The issue is pretty similar to Add To Cart events – it’s impossible to write a solution that fits all online stores. The most robust solution is to ask developer to send this interaction as a dataLayer event. Of course, it’s possible that some online stores redirect users to a particular page when an item is added to a wishlist.

Then you could use Pageview trigger with certain Page Path pattern. But in this case you have another problem – bad user experience. Redirecting user to a certain page after each Added to wishlist event may result in poor sales due to annoying  behavior flow.

Twitter Event – Initiate Checkout

If your checkout process consists of more than one step, then usually step 1 has some unique string in the URL, e.g. sampleshop.com/checkout/step1/some_other_stuff. In that case you can use Pageview Trigger with the following rules (remember – it’s only an example. In your case Page Path might be different):

• Title – Pageview – Initiated Checkout.
• Type – Pageview.
• This trigger fires on – Some Page Views.
• Rule – Page Pats contains /checkout/step1/

Twitter Event – Added Payment Info

There are two most common scenarios how we can identify that visitor entered payment information:

• Either he/she visited a particular page with unique URL. Then, you should use Pageview trigger (like I have described InitiateCheckout tag).
• Or the URL does not change when payment info is entered. In that case – ask developer to send dataLayer event, when payment information was successfully saved. Actually, I’d ask to add two events: 1. User started entering payment information. 2. User successfully entered information. This way I could see how many people bounced off my checkout process in this step.

The same principle (Pageview or Data Layer event) can be also applied to the following Twitter events:

• Purchase.
• Signup.
• Download.
• CompleteRegistration.

Very useful information:  I highly recommend reading this guide of 5 form tracking methods with Google Tag Manager. It will be especially useful if you’re want to track Signup or CompleteRegistration Twitter events. Chances are you won’t need developer’s input when it comes to track form submissions.

When you set up all Twitter tags, do not forget to test them:

• Utilize GTM’s Preview and Debug mode to see if tags fire when they suppose to.
• Also use Chrome plugin – Twitter Pixel Helper.

Twitter Conversion Tracking: Things to Keep in Mind

• It may take up to 24 hours for data to appear in Twitter Ads account (but usually it’s processed much faster).
• Before you enter tagging “rampage mode”, prepare a measurement plan – a list of what you really need to track. It will bring more transparency, help you plan ahead and avoid inconsistency problems.
• Test, test, test before publishing – devil is in the detail. One tiny mistake can lead to huge problems.

I will not go into details how to setup the actual ad campaign in Twitter. You can watch this video instead.

Other useful resources:

• Twitter Website Tag Overview.
• Advanced conversion tracking in Twitter.

Twitter Conversion Tracking – Conclusion

Twitter conversion tracking is pretty similar to Adwords or Facebook conversion tracking in Google Tag Manager. First, you need to decide which website interactions are important to you. Then set those events within GTM as triggers (e.g. “Visited Thank You Page”) and link them to Twitter Universal Website Tags.

Remember: for every important interaction you need to create a distinct Twitter UW tag in Google Tag Manager.

Twitter conversion tracking enables you to measure your ad campaigns and see which ones drive more signups or sales.

Did I miss something in this blog post? If yes, let me know in the comments!