GTM is a free tool that generates the tags of a website with a single code fragment and allows you to manage everything from a single interface. Surely it has happened to more than one that to launch a remarketing campaign or a sponsored ads campaign you have had to “fight” with the IT department to implement the necessary labels. Google would have to give the Novel of Peace with the development of GTM, instead of having to be adding scripts from Adwords, Analytics, Doblueclick, crazyegg etc. a single container is added that offers greater flexibility, and allows webmasters to focus in more important tasks. With GTM you can easily add and update tags, with just a few clicks, whenever you want, without bothering ID people or retyping the site code. Google Tag Manager is an asynchronous tag, so which, when executed, does not block the representation of other elements of the page.
What is Google Tag Manager?
This is a <script> code that generates a container iframe that, when placed just after opening the <body> on a web page, will replace most of the campaign and tool tracking tags that we used to install one by one. . For example, to perform a correct measurement of SEM campaigns, to install web analytics tools or for A / B testing .
To configure the container and indicate which labels we want to be activated and on which pages , we must access the Google Tag Manager online tool. Its interface has greatly improved with successive changes, resembling other Google tools. Even so, if we take into account the complexity of the matter we are dealing with and the enormous benefits that its understanding will bring, it is logical to have to train a little to get to handle it and squeeze it out completely.
Why use Google Tag Manager?
Speed: Changes and new tags can be made quickly and do not require code changes on the website.
Flexibility: labels can be created by any member of the marketing team, without the need to involve developers.
This saves time and effort for developers who can focus on larger projects.
Debug options: making sure the tags work before posting the site live is very, very important. GTM has an integrated debugging feature that allows you to personally test and debug every update in the browser on the actual site before posting the change.
Version control: every time a change is published, a new version is created, which is systematically archived. If for something specific you need to revert to an existing version, it can be done easily. This is also a way to keep tags organized and locate tagging problems.
User permissions: GTM allows you to configure permissions for individual users that include viewing, editing and publishing.
Built-in Tags: GTM has included Adwords, Analytics, Doubleclick, Adometry, Google Consumer Surveys, Criteo, Google Trusted Stores tags. ADroll, Marin, ComScore, Linkedin, Clictale, Crazyegg, Dstillery, Turn…. This is extremely useful for companies that are starting with the GTM and do not have much coding experience. This allows you to customize labels with only a few pieces of information and without the complication of code implementation.
Event detectors: GTM takes the trouble to manually tag each link that you want to track with the different attributes of the onclick to send events to Google Analytics. Instead, you can target links or buttons of attributes that are already in the link or by using a standard naming structure as data attributes.
What is Google Tag Manager for?
Has it never happened to you that you want to launch a campaign of sponsored ads or remarketing and from your programming department they inform you that it is not possible until such a day that the web is uploaded to production? Or, in the case of agencies, don’t you feel that you have dependence on your web development providers to implement certain tags in the source code? Wouldn’t you like to have control, a container to rule them all ? If the answer to any of those questions is yes, you are in luck.
With Google Tag Manager, instead of having to go modifying code on different pages or includes , to insert a new tag, or having to be reviewing an endless list of files to see where certain tags are placed that you have to remove, just consult a Administration panel and work with tags, triggers and variables.
The previous image shows some of the tag templates available in Google Tag Manager, as an example, but there are many other Tag Manager utilities that will help simplify and automate marketing processes. Here are some examples of currently accepted labels, which can get you out of trouble:
Google AdWords conversion tracking (also without thank you page !) And call conversion settings (AdWords forwarding number).
AdWords Remarketing and Dynamic Remarketing tags : a long time ago you had to go page by page – or by content groups – by manually entering the different Google remarketing tags for different user lists (amazing but true!). Our theory is that the development of Google Tag Manager, apart from the utility that it brings to all marketing agencies and departments, was partly Google’s response to the need to have a dynamic remarketing tag (others already had it before he).
Google Analytics tracking, with all kinds of advanced implementations at your fingertips, minimizing the use of code to the minimum and necessary – the dataLayer . You can use GTM to generate automatic click events , form, timer, etc., virtual pages , e-commerce tracking, subdomain and multi domain tracking , user ID , content groupings, dimensions and custom metrics …
Traffickers! Conversion tags and counter of DoubleClick, Marin Software, ClickTale, comScore …
Custom image and HTML tags: this last point opens a world of almost infinite possibilities, with the exception of a few tags (synchronous, in two parts, etc.) that cannot be used and that tend to disappear …
Advantages of Google Tag Manager
At all times we try to implement small fragments of code in some part of our website, be it Analytics tracking code, tags for monitoring sales generated on a site or for tracking conversions generated in our advertising campaigns based on Google AdWords . The advantage of the Google tag manager is to organize all those code snippets or tags within a single container.
Google Tag Manager offers us the possibility of generating dynamic tags, which are easy to manipulate, manage, monitor and update quickly and safely. With what we streamline the processes, we reduce the number of errors and avoid in some cases the services of a WebMaster.
The purpose is simple, reduce execution or development times of each site to spend as much time as possible to generate results; visits, customers and sales.
The Google Tag Manager gives us the freedom to implement all the tags we need and in turn integrate Google products or even third-party products; Crazy Egg, DoubleClick, Facebook Pixel .
List of tags that Google Tag Manager currently supports
Concepts you need to know
Label:
It is a code snippet which is executed within a certain page of our site (everything will depend on the needs or characteristics that you want to grant). The labels are responsible for sending information; clicks, sales, visits, downloads, etc.
Activator:
It serves to condition the execution of a label, so it can be activated in a certain situation depending on where we want it to be executed.
Variable:
They are values that can be customized. For example: JavaScript code snippets , DOM Elements, Constants (such as the Google Analytics Tracking ID ), a certain URL.
The variables are used to define a value and be reused within any other Label.
For example, if we want to collect information on how many people visit the “contact us ” page within Ydoxy.com , we must define a tag with these characteristics:
Variable: We define a constant variable, enter the value of our Analytics Tracking ID and give it a name.
Trigger: We define a name and choose an event of “Page View” type and in the same way for the “Trigger type” . In the “Fire On” option it will show us some fields with the conditions to be configured so that the “Trigger” is activated. We select: in the first field, Page URL ; in the second, CONTAINS ; and in the third, we place “/ contact us” . The conditions are for our Trigger to be activated only when the user visits the contact us page within converiones.com
Tag: We define a name and select “Google Analytics” as our predefined tag, in “Tag Type” we select “Universal Analytics”. Configure Tag : In Tracking ID we select the name of the variable (in this way we streamline processes, since it is already defined within a variable). Track Type: Select Page View and in “Fire On” select “More” where we will open a tab with the Trigger defined in point 2, select it and click on “Create Tag”.
To know if the label is working correctly, click on “Preview” , once selecting this option it is necessary to go to the contact page and see if everything is working correctly, once verified we can publish.
At some point it was necessary to directly manipulate the site code? Was it necessary to communicate with a Webmaster?
As we can see everything was simple and fast. In addition, it was not necessary to manipulate code , so the main advantage of the Google tag manager is to give the analytical staff the ability to create, modify and update tags .
Advantages of using Google Tag Manager
It improves the performance of the site: the execution of each tag integrated in the site is executed asynchronously, so it does not affect the loading speed. In addition, it is only necessary to integrate a single Google Tag Manager container to link our Google Analytics account, AdWords or any other third-party tag
Cleaner code: when you need to measure links or buttons it is not necessary to go directly to the code of our site to implement this functionality, just create labels.
Version control: total control of the integrated or published tags within a given portal, so if modifying any tag causes an error, we can always return to an earlier version to correct possible errors
Easy integration with Google products and third parties: in addition to the available Google products you can integrate third-party tags such as DoubleClick or Floodlight
Streamlines production processes: avoids the need to use the services of a webmaster and allows you to implement labels on your website quickly
It helps to reduce the rate of errors: if for some reason when updating a label you do not get the results you are looking for or you simply update it incorrectly, you can always return to an earlier version
Tag management: Google Tag Manager has an administration panel where we can always see all the tags that are published, so we can manage each of them and thus avoid duplicate tags.
The benefits offered by the Google Tag Manager are huge for any type of company; big or small. It helps reduce development or execution times of a website to focus as much time as possible on customer acquisition and generate sales through the Internet.
Tell us your experiences with Google Tag Manager, how you have implemented it and if the integration of a single container has really given you good results.
The three main parts of Google Tag Manager are:
Tags: These are snippets of code or tracking scripts that collect data or perform specific actions on your website.
Triggers: Triggers define when and where tags should be fired. They are based on specific user interactions or page conditions.
Variables: Variables store and retrieve information used by tags and triggers. They can be predefined or custom-defined to capture specific data.
You can track a wide range of user interactions and events with Google Tag Manager, including pageviews, form submissions, button clicks, video views, downloads, and eCommerce transactions. The specific tracking events and goals depend on your website’s objectives and KPIs.
