How to set up conversion tracking

You get a few signups, orders or enquiries, but you cannot say which post, email or ad brought them, and the numbers in Google, Meta and your store never agree. To set up conversion tracking, you pick the one action that makes you money, count it in Google Analytics for free, test it with a real conversion, and save where every customer came from in your own list. Without it, you keep doing what feels busy, and the first ad you run spends money you cannot judge.

Do these three things

About 2 hours today, then 5 minutes a day and 20 minutes each Sunday. Add an ad platform's tag only before you spend your first $1 on its ads.

Show the three actions in fullHide the full list

1. 1Today: pick the one action that makes you money (a signup, an order or an enquiry), make it a key event in Google Analytics 4, which is free, and test it with one real conversion.
2. 2Every day: check that every signup, order or enquiry from yesterday shows in Google Analytics and in your own list, with where it came from.
3. 3Every Sunday: count the week's conversions by where they came from in one sheet. If Google Analytics and your list differ by more than 1 in 5, fix tracking before you trust either.

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1. Decide which one action counts as a conversion

A conversion is the moment a visitor does the thing that makes you money. Write down one main action, the page people see right after it, and at most 2 smaller actions. Every other step tracks this list, so do it first.

Pick the action closest to money that happens at least once a week. If paying customers come less often than that, count the step just before payment, because a number that is zero for a month teaches you nothing.

The main action must end on its own page that only people who did it can reach: a thank-you page after a form, a welcome page after signup, or the order status page after checkout. That page is what Google Analytics will count. If your form shows "Thanks!" on the same page, change its setting to send people to a new page instead; most form tools and site builders have a "redirect after submit" option. ChatGPT or Claude can write the thank-you page in a minute: one line of thanks, what happens next, and when you will reply. Leave the page out of your menu and your sitemap, so nobody lands on it by accident.

Main: [the action] | page people see after it: [address] | how often it happens now: [number a week]
Smaller 1: [the step before it] | page or event: [address]
Smaller 2: [one more, or leave empty] | page or event: [address]

• Tool: a Google Sheet, and your form or signup settings.
• Time: 20 minutes.
• You will have: a list of 1 main and up to 2 smaller actions, each with its own page address.
• It worked if: you can open each address and see it is reached only by doing the action.
• Common mistake: counting a click on "Sign up", a visit to your pricing page or "any form sent". People click and leave, a newsletter box is not an enquiry, and every ad tool then hunts for the wrong people.

2. Install Google Analytics 4 on every page of your site

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is Google's free tool that counts visits and actions on your website. Put its tag on every page today, even before you run any ads, so you see which free channels bring people who buy.

Set it up like this:

1. 1

   Create the property

   Go to analytics.google.com and click Start measuring. In Admin, click Create, then Property. Enter your business name, your time zone and your currency.

2. 2

   Add your website

   In Admin, under Data collection and modification, click Data streams, then Add stream, then Web. Enter your website address, leave enhanced measurement on, and click Create stream. Copy the Measurement ID. It starts with "G-".

3. 3

   Put the tag on every page

   Use your site builder's own route, so there is only one copy. On Shopify, install Google's free Google & YouTube app and connect Google Analytics 4 in it. On WordPress, install Site Kit by Google, the free official plugin. On Squarespace, Wix and most other builders, paste the Measurement ID into the Google Analytics field in the settings. If your builder has no field, click View tag instructions in the stream, choose Install manually, and paste the code into the builder's custom code box for every page.

4. 4

   Keep 14 months of data

   In Admin, open Data retention and set Event data retention to 14 months, then Save. Two months is the other choice. It only limits the detailed reports, but you lose what you do not keep.

5. 5

   Leave out your own visits

   Your own visits make a small site look busier than it is. Set up the internal traffic filter so your own clicks do not count.

GA4 counts what happens on your site. Google Search Console, also free, shows the Google searches before the visit, so set it up the same day if you have not.

If people from the EU, the UK or Switzerland visit your site, add a cookie banner that asks before the tags run. Google's policy requires "legally valid consent" from people there for cookies and for using their data for ads, and you must keep a record of it. Google's consent mode works with your banner; it is not a banner itself. Most site builders have a cookie banner setting. If yours does not, use a consent tool your builder's app store lists.

• Tool: Google Analytics 4. Free.
• Time: 30 minutes.
• You will have: GA4 on every page of your site, with 14 months of data kept.
• It worked if: you open your site on your phone, open Reports, then Realtime, and see your visit within 30 minutes. Google says data can take up to 30 minutes to start.
• Common mistake: two copies of the tag, for example the builder's field plus code a freelancer pasted in, or a theme plus an app. Every visit and every sale then counts twice. Google warns about this "double-tagging" in its own help.

3. Set up conversion tracking in Google Analytics with a key event

A key event is what Google Analytics calls a conversion. Turn a visit to your thank-you page into a key event, and GA4 counts one conversion for each person who reaches it.

Do it without code:

1. In GA4, open Admin. Under Data display, click Events, then "+ Create event".
2. Name it with Google's own name for the action: sign_up for a new account, generate_lead for an enquiry or quote request, purchase for an order.
3. Turn on the toggle "Mark as key event".
4. Under "Choose how to create an event", pick "Create without code". Choose page_view as the event, enter the full address of your thank-you page, and click Create.
5. Repeat for each smaller action from step 1. A free property can have up to 30 key events. You need 3 at most.

Do not change the page_view event itself. Google warns that this stops it counting your other pages. Make a new event, as above.

If you run a D2C store on Shopify: do not build an event from a page. Orders reach GA4 through the Google & YouTube app as purchase. After the test order in step 4, find purchase in Admin, then Events, and check its star is filled in. If it is not, click it. If purchase never appears, reconnect Google Analytics 4 in the app.

If you run a WordPress site: since September 2026, Site Kit can send generate_lead and purchase on its own from WooCommerce, Contact Form 7, WPForms, Ninja Forms and a few other plugins. In Site Kit, open Settings, then Connected Services, then Analytics, click Edit and turn on "Plugin conversion tracking". Then star the event in GA4 once it appears.

Do not use GA4's automatic form_submit as your conversion. It fires for every form on your site, including a newsletter pop-up, so it mixes up enquiries with everything else.

• Tool: Google Analytics 4. Free.
• Time: 15 minutes.
• You will have: one key event for each action on your list, named the way Google names them.
• It worked if: in Admin, then Events, your new events show under Custom events with the star filled in.
• Common mistake: expecting it to count the past. A key event only counts from the moment you create it, and standard reports can take up to 24 hours to show it. That is why you set it up today.

4. Test it with one real conversion

Do the action yourself, once, from your phone, and check that it shows in Google Analytics and in your own records. Most broken tracking is found only this way.

1. Use a phone browser with no ad blocker. If you have a cookie banner, accept it.
2. Do the real action: create an account with a new email, send the quote form, or place a real order and refund it after.
3. In GA4, open Reports, then Realtime. Within a few minutes your key event should show under "Key events". For a closer look, open tagassistant.google.com, connect your site, do the action again, and watch Admin, then DebugView, which lists events from the last 60 seconds.
4. Check your own records: the new account in your database or Stripe, the email in your inbox, the order in Shopify. For a SaaS, check the welcome email arrived too.
5. Reload the thank-you page once. If GA4 counts a second conversion, that is expected for a page-based event. Remove every link to the thank-you page from your site, so only the form sends people there.
6. Write the result in your test log, and remove or mark the test in your own list so it does not count as a real customer.

Date: [today]
Action tested: [main action]
Device and browser: [phone, browser, no ad blocker]
Google Analytics Realtime: [shows 1 key event? yes/no, after how many minutes]
Own records: [the new account, email or order is there? yes/no]
Counted once: [yes/no]
Test removed from my list: [yes/no]

• Tool: GA4 Realtime and DebugView, and Google Tag Assistant. All free.
• Time: 20 minutes.
• You will have: one test conversion that you saw arrive in GA4 and in your own records.
• It worked if: Realtime shows exactly 1 key event for 1 test, and the key event is in your standard reports within 24 hours.
• Common mistake: testing in a browser with an ad blocker, seeing nothing, and changing settings that were fine. The other mistake is leaving the test in your numbers, which matters when you have 3 conversions a week.

5. Save where every conversion came from in your own list

Google Analytics counts the conversions. Your own list, with a source next to every customer, is the number you trust. Add one question and one column today.

Do three things:

1. Ask. Add "Where did you hear about us?" to your signup form, enquiry form or checkout, and on every first sales call. This is self-reported attribution: the customer's own answer. It catches the people GA4 cannot, such as someone who saw a post, then typed your name into Google a week later. It is the simplest kind of attribution, and at your size the most honest. Make it a short list with "Other" and a free-text box.
2. Tag your links. Add UTM parameters to every link you share in a LinkedIn post, an email to your list or an ad, so GA4 shows the exact source of each visit. Without them, a click from an email often shows as "direct", which tells you nothing.
3. Keep a source column. In your signup database, your order list or your sheet of enquiries, add a "Source" column and fill it for every new customer, from their answer or from GA4. A CRM can do this later; a sheet is fine for the first 50.

AI helps with the free-text answers: paste a week of them into ChatGPT or Claude and ask it to sort each one into your channel names. Check every row it was unsure about.

If you run a B2B company: add the source to the deal, not only the first enquiry, because a deal can take months. Tracking which channel brought each deal has the sheet.

If you run an agency: do all of this in your client's own forms and accounts, never your own. Ask for access to their Google Analytics (in Admin, then Access management, they add you as Editor) during onboarding, so the data stays theirs if they leave.

• Tool: your form or checkout settings, and a Google Sheet. Free.
• Time: 30 minutes, then a few seconds per customer.
• You will have: a source next to every new signup, order or enquiry.
• It worked if: at least 9 of the next 10 conversions have a source in your list.
• Common mistake: trusting only GA4's channel report. With a few customers a month, one lost source is a big share of your data, and the customer's own answer is often the only one that is right.

6. Add conversion tracking in Google Ads, Meta or LinkedIn before you spend $1

Each ad platform needs its own tag to see your conversions. Set it up only for the platform you will run ads on next, before the first dollar, and test it the same way as step 4.

Ads come after free channels for most readers: work out how much to spend on ads first. When you are ready, set up only the platform you will use:

• Google Ads. Open Goals, then Summary, and select "+ Create conversion action". Next to "Conversions on a website", select "Edit data sources", enter your domain and select Scan. Pick the category closest to your action, choose "Automatically without code", pick "URL is" and enter your thank-you page. Turn on enhanced conversions when it asks. Set this one as Primary, the only conversion Google bids for. You can also import your GA4 key event instead; only key events can be imported, and the option can take 24 to 48 hours to appear after you link the two. Google Ads for SaaS walks through a signup conversion. On Shopify, the Google & YouTube app sets up purchase, add to cart and checkout started for you, including for Google Shopping and Performance Max.
• Meta (Facebook and Instagram). Meta needs two parts: the Meta pixel, which runs in the visitor's browser, and the Conversions API, which sends the same event from a server, so it still counts when a browser blocks the pixel. On Shopify, the Facebook & Instagram app with data sharing set to Maximum adds both, as in Meta ads for a Shopify store. On any other site, make a pixel in Events Manager and add your action as a standard event (Lead, CompleteRegistration or Purchase). Since April 2026, Meta offers a one-click Conversions API that Meta runs for you, with no server or code. It is not in every account yet; if Events Manager offers it, turn it on. Then install Meta Ads Data Advisor, Meta's free Chrome extension that used to be called Meta Pixel Helper, to see each event fire.
• LinkedIn. Add the LinkedIn Insight Tag to every page. In Campaign Manager, click Measure, then Conversion tracking, then Create conversion, and choose Insight Tag conversion. Pick the category (Lead, for most), give it a value, and choose your thank-you page under Website actions. If the ad sends people to a landing page, its form must lead to that same thank-you page. LinkedIn ads for B2B shows where it fits in a campaign.

The same tags also build the visitor lists for retargeting ads, so you do this once for both. In the EU, the UK and Switzerland, the cookie banner from step 2 covers these tags too; name each one in your privacy policy.

If you run an agency: create every conversion in the client's own ad account before you run their Facebook ads, and keep a one-line note of each tag you added in your monthly report. If a client already has a pixel from an old freelancer, find it and remove it before you add yours.

• Tool: Google Ads, Meta Events Manager and Meta Ads Data Advisor, LinkedIn Campaign Manager. All free to set up; you pay only for ads.
• Time: 30 to 45 minutes for each platform.
• You will have: one Primary conversion on the platform you will use, passed by one real test conversion.
• It worked if: Google Ads shows the conversion's status as Active in Goals, then Summary (since July 2026, "Misconfigured" means it is broken and "Awaiting conversions" means none in the last 7 days); Meta shows exactly 1 event for your 1 test; LinkedIn no longer says "Unverified".
• Common mistake: two Meta pixels or two Google tags from an old theme, an app and a freelancer, so each sale counts twice. The second mistake is launching first and adding tracking "later". Every dollar spent before tracking works is a dollar you cannot judge.

7. Match your conversions every day and count them every Sunday

Every day, check that yesterday's conversions in your own list also show in Google Analytics. Every Sunday, count the week by source in one sheet. This is how you catch broken tracking in days, not months.

Every day, 5 minutes. Open your own list (Stripe, Shopify, your inbox or your signup database) and GA4's Reports, then Engagement, then Events, for yesterday. While you get fewer than about 20 conversions a day, match them one by one: each one in your list should have a key event at about the same time, and a source in your list. Fill in any source that is missing today, while the customer still remembers. Above 20 a day, compare the two totals instead.

Every Sunday, 20 minutes. Fill in one row of the sheet below. Take visits from GA4 (Reports, then Acquisition, then Traffic acquisition), conversions from your own list, and sources from your source column. Conversions per 100 visits is your conversion rate.

Week | Visits | Conversions in my list | Key events in Google Analytics | Gap | Conversions by source: [channel 1] | [channel 2] | search | AI tools | other

Then use the gap rule, once you have at least 20 conversions to compare:

• Google Analytics shows up to 1 in 5 fewer than your list: normal. Ad blockers, cookie banners and people who switch devices all hide some conversions. Store owners in a July 2026 Shopify Community thread called a 5 to 10% gap between Meta and Shopify normal, and 20 to 30% worth looking into.
• Google Analytics misses more than 1 in 5: run the test from step 4 again, on a phone and a computer.
• Google Analytics or an ad platform shows more than your list: a second copy of a tag, a test you did not remove, or a thank-you page someone can reach without the action. Find it before the next ad.

Your list is the number you trust, and Google Analytics tells you which pages and visits led there. Ad platforms count by their own rules, and they change them, so compare their numbers with your list, never only with their own past numbers. Use the weekly rows to work out what each customer cost you and, for a store, whether an ad made money at its ROAS. Once a month, bring them to your marketing review.

Your traffic from ChatGPT and other AI tools is part of this too: add an AI chat row in GA4 so those conversions get their own source.

• Tool: GA4, your own list, and a Google Sheet.
• Time: 5 minutes a day and 20 minutes each Sunday.
• You will have: one row a week with every conversion and where it came from.
• It worked if: every paying customer has a source, and after 20 conversions the gap is under 1 in 5.
• Common mistake: trusting the ad platform's number over your own list, or changing the tracking in the middle of a test or an A/B test. Change one thing, then judge it on the next 20 conversions. Judge search on months, not weeks.

If the tracking works and you still get visits but no conversions, the problem is the page or the offer, not the tags: start with why no one is buying, or fix a store with traffic but no sales. If ads bring clicks and no sales, work through ads that get clicks but no sales. If you have tracked for months and the numbers stopped growing, use the same sheet to get growth moving again.

Your conversion tracking checklist

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Work through this list with an AI assistant

It drafts the work and keeps track of what is done.

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Step 1 · Decide which one action counts as a conversion

• Write down your one main action, the page people see after it, and up to 2 smaller actions.

Step 2 · Install Google Analytics 4 on every page of your site

• Install Google Analytics 4 on every page and set data retention to 14 months.
• Add a cookie banner that asks first if people from the EU, the UK or Switzerland visit.

Step 3 · Set up conversion tracking in Google Analytics with a key event

• Create one key event for each action on your list.

Step 4 · Test it with one real conversion

• Make one real test conversion from your phone and check it in Google Analytics and your own records.

Step 5 · Save where every conversion came from in your own list

• Add "Where did you hear about us?" to your form and a source column to your list.
• Every dayTag every link you share with UTM parameters.

Step 6 · Add conversion tracking in Google Ads, Meta or LinkedIn before you spend $1

• Set up and test conversion tracking for the ad platform you will run next, before you spend on it.

Step 7 · Match your conversions every day and count them every Sunday

• Every dayMatch yesterday's conversions in your list with Google Analytics, and fill in any missing source.
• Every SundayCount the week's conversions by where they came from, and fix tracking if Google Analytics and your list differ by more than 1 in 5.

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