The easiest way to track Google Ads campaigns in Zuora
Learn how to capture Google Ads data and send it into Zuora with each new customer, so you can see which campaigns are actually generating your customers & revenue.
Have you been dying to know which of your Google Ads campaigns are producing customers and revenue?
Imagine you could see exactly where each customer you has come from, down to the campaign and ad they clicked. If this is doable, you’d be informed as to which campaigns and ads are actually producing customers and revenue, and you'd be able to optimise your ad spend accordingly.
In this post, we’ll teach you how to use Attributer to capture Google Ads data in Zuora so you can build reports that display exactly where your customers and revenue are coming from.
Why it's important to track customers and revenue from Google Ads
Let’s say you run a business that offers project management software. To make your business more known, you run ads on Google showcasing different types of terms people might be searching for, like ‘Project management software’ and ‘Task management software.’
If you were using a tool like Google Analytics to quantify visitors and form completions, you’d probably get results like this:
| Spend | $2,000 | $2,000 |
| Visitors | 200 | 100 |
| Goal Completions | 20 | 10 |
If the only information you had access to is on ‘visitors and leads from spend,’ it would look like your Task Management campaign was outshining your Project Management campaign, and you’d want to direct more of your budget to that.
But what if you could see the results all the way through to the number of customers and amount of revenue generated?
You’d get something like this:
| Spend | $2,000 | $2,000 |
| Visitors | 200 | 100 |
| Leads | 20 | 10 |
| Customers | 2 | 5 |
| Revenue | $8,000 | $25,000 |
When you have a way to monitor campaign performance down to customers and revenue, you can understand the real story.
In this scenario, the Task Management Campaign is doing better because:
- More customers were generated from the Project Management Campaign (12) than the Task Management Campaign (2)
- The free trial-to-customer conversion rate is far higher for the Project Management Campaign (60%) than the Task Management Campaign (14%)
- The average customer value in the Project Management Campaign is $2,083 per customer vs. $1,142 per customer from the Task Management Campaign.
- The cost of getting a customer is lower in the Project Management Campaign: $416 vs. $714
As you can see from the analysis above, you get a better understanding of what’s working and what isn’t when you capture the source of every customer and use it to see campaign results all the way through the funnel.
So how do you do it?
4 simple steps to capture Google Ads data in Zuora
Attributer makes it simple to capture Google Ads data in Zuora. Here’s how it works:
1. Add UTM parameters to your ads
Before capturing Google Ads data in Zuora, you must first add UTM parameters to your campaigns.
If you’re unfamiliar with UTM parameters, they’re basically additional text you add at the end of the URL that you send to people from your campaigns.
Let’s say the page you want to send someone is attributer.io/integrations/salesforce, then your final URL with UTM parameters may turn out like this:
attributer.io/integrations/salesforce?utm_medium=paidsearch&utm_source=google&utm_campaign=brand-campaign
Although you can add the UTM parameters however you want, the general best practice for Google Ads is something like this:
- UTM Medium = Paid search
- UTM Source = Google
- UTM Campaign = The name of your Google Ads campaign
- UTM Term = The name of the ad group the ad belongs to
- UTM Content = The specific ad
Tagging your ads with UTM parameters is straightforward. Plus, free tools available online can help you build them.
2. Attributer stores the Google Ads data in a cookie
When the Attributer script is live on your site, Attributer will monitor your visitors for the presence of the UTM parameters you’ve previously added to your campaigns.
If Attributer detects them, it will appoint this specific visitor to ‘Paid Serch’ and then store this information in a cookie in the user’s browser. This way, it’s ready to go when the user submits a form (i.e., starts a free trial of your SaaS product or purchases your subscription offering).
3. Google Ads data is sent to Zuora
Whenever a visitor enters information in one of your site’s forms, the Google Ads data is sent into Zuora along with all the other data entered by that user (i.e., name, email address, company, etc.)
You can send this information to Zuora in two ways:
- Hidden fields in forms - When you add a series of hidden fields to your forms, Attributer will use them to write necessary data automatically. Once the form is submitted, this data and all other information in the form are passed to Zuora.
- Retrieve from the cookie - By adding a simple line of javascript to your registration process, the UTM parameters are captured from the Attributer cookie and then sent to Zuora. This is helpful if you give your users the option to sign-up for your product or service by signing into their Facebook or Google account, as this removes the need for the user to fill out a form.
4. Run reports in Zuora (and other tools)
Once the Google Ads data (e.g., the campaign they came from, ad group, keyword, etc.) and customers are inside Zuora, you can use them to run reports.
Here are some of the reports you can run:
- New Customers added each month by Campaign
- New Revenue added each month by Ad Group
- Average Revenue Per Customer by Ad
- Customer Lifetime Value by Channel or Campaign
- Customer Churn Rate by Channel or Campaign
- And many more!
You can run these reports inside Zuora itself using their built-in reporting tools, or sync your data into other analytics tools (like Looker, Mode, Grow and more) to run even more detailed reports.
Why using Attributer is the best way to capture Google Ads data in Zuora
There are other methods for capturing Google Ads data and sending it into Zuora, so why use Attributer?
Here’s why:
1. Captures all traffic
Apart from Attributer being an efficient tool for sending Google Ads data into Zuora, it can also identify all the other sources of customers (I.e. Organic Search, Organic social, Paid Social, etc.)
This means that when you run reports to see where your customers’ have come from, you can determine the source of ALL your leads, not just the ones from your Google Ads campaigns.
Having this data on the source of all your leads can be extremely beneficial, particularly if - for example - your SEO efforts are generating more signups and customers than of your Google Ads campaigns. You’d want to know this so you can adjust your budget accordingly.
2. Remembers the data as visitors browse your site
Other tools for sending Google Ads data into Zuora require the UTM parameters to be present on the page where the form is submitted. This warrants a problem when the page visitors complete your form on differs from the first page they landed on.
For example, say someone clicks one of your Google Ads and goes to a landing page for this campaign. They then click the ‘Start Free Trial’ button and are taken to a different page to fill out your form to sign-up for your product or service. This means that the page they complete a form on isn’t the same as the one they initially landed on, so the UTM parameters are lost.
This won’t happen with Attributer because it keeps the UTM parameters in a cookie in the user’s browser. This way, the UTM parameters are always sent no matter what page the user completes a form on.
3. Provides cleaner data
One of the dilemmas with using other tools that capture raw UTM parameters is that you can end up with messy data, making it challenging to build accurate reports.
For instance, pretend some of your Google Ads campaigns are tagged with UTM_Source= Google.com (capital G), others with UTM_Source= google (lowercase, no domain), and others with UTM_Source= adwords.
If you send these raw UTM parameters to Zuora to see how many sign-ups and customers your Google Ads campaigns have provided, you’ll get three different sources that you must stitch together manually.
You don’t have to do any of these with Attributer because it considers the possibility of capitalization and other inconsistencies and would appoint leads to the Paid Search channel regardless.
4. Captures landing page data
Ever wondered how many leads and customers come from your blog and other in-depth content pieces you did?
Attributer can send you in the right direction here too, as it also captures landing page (i.e., attributer.io/blog/capture-utm-parameters), and the landing page category (i.e., /blog).
With this data available, you can see the performance of specific sections on your site (e.g., your blog) in terms of generating leads, customers, and revenue.
Moreover, since it captures both the landing page and landing page group, you can view your blog’s performance in two ways: as a whole section and as individual blog posts.
Wrap up
If you’re looking for a way to monitor the number of sign-ups and customers you get from your Google Ads, then Attributer is an excellent solution.
It will capture the UTM parameters behind your Google Ad campaigns and send them into Zuora, allowing you to create reports showing you which campaigns produce sign-ups and customers for your business.
Moreover, it will also give you information on leads that come from other channels. This way, you can determine the source of ALL your leads and ultimately know where to invest in optimizing your business.
The best part is it’s free to get started. So begin your free trial today and see what Attributer can do for you and your business.
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About the Author
Aaron Beashel is the founder of Attributer and has over 15 years of experience in marketing & analytics. He is a recognized expert in the subject and has written articles for leading websites such as Hubspot, Zapier, Search Engine Journal, Buffer, Unbounce & more. Learn more about Aaron here.