The best way to track Gravity Forms submissions as conversions in Google Ads
Learn how to get a 23% increase in recorded conversions by properly tracking Gravity Forms submissions as conversions in Google Ads
Use Attributer to capture the GCLID and other identifiers in Gravity Forms and then send them back to Google Ads as a conversion (either straight away or when the lead becomes a customer in your CRM).
Google Ads is a great way to generate new leads and customers and for your business, but properly setting up conversion tracking is hard.
Tools like Google Tag Manager require you to write custom code to listen for form submissions, and then you have to configure triggers, tags, variables, and a whole lot of other complicated stuff.
And basic approaches like tracking thank you page visits can result in up to 30% of conversions being missed due to things like ad blockers, privacy features built into browsers (like Safari), or people clicking your ad on their phone and then converting later on their computer.
So what are you supposed to do?
In this article, we’ll show you how to set up proper conversion tracking in Google Ads when someone submits a Gravity Form on your website (using an approach known as server-side tracking).
Why you need to be doing server-side tracking in Google Ads
Common approaches to tracking conversions in Google Ads, such as tracking thank you page visits or firing events through Google Tag Manager, have some serious flaws. In fact, studies show that these methods can result in missing up to 30% of conversions.
This happens for a number of reasons:
- Ad Blockers - Ad blockers prevent the Google Tag from firing on your website, which means it can’t track anything users do on your website
- Privacy Features in Browsers - Web Browsers like Safari have built-in technologies that block the Google Tag from tracking visitors for more than a day (so if a person clicks your ad and then converts 3 days later, it won’t be tracked).
- Using multiple devices - People might click your ad on their work computer but later convert on their home computer (or on their mobile device), which means their original ad click can’t be tied to their later conversion
This is why you need to be doing server-side tracking. Instead of relying on things to happen in the browser (like the user visiting a thank you page) and hoping that the Google Tag can track it, you basically send a direct, private message to Google with all the lead’s details (which ensures the information isn't blocked by ad blockers or privacy settings).
This has been proven to work significantly better. In fact, Google’s own data shows that using server-side tracking typically results in a 23% average increase in total recorded conversions and a 10% reduction in cost per conversion (because Google’s algorithms have more accurate conversion data to learn from and can better serve your ads).
How to track Gravity Forms in Google Ads using server-side conversion tracking
There are actually a couple of ways you can set this up, and it really depends on when you want to send the conversion event to Google Ads.
Option 1: When a lead submits the form
Tools like Converly make it easy to send server-side conversions to Google Ads whenever someone submits a Gravity Form on your website.
Instead of messing around with Google Tag Manager trying to listen for form submissions, extract lead data from the form, hashing it with SHA-256, sending it to the API, etc, Converly gives you a simple, visual builder you can use to build your conversion flow.
You simply select a trigger (like when a Gravity Form is submitted on your site) and then select the actions you want to happen (like sending a conversion to Google Ads).
Converly will then automatically detect when a form is submitted on your website, extract the user’s name, email, phone, etc., secure it with SHA-256, and send it to Google Ads. It also captures a whole heap of other information about the user and their visit to your website (such as the GCLID, GBRAID, WBRAID, User Agent, etc) and sends it over with the conversion as well, which helps increase the chances Google will be able to match the conversion that just happened on your site back to which campaign, ad, keyword, etc the lead originally clicked.
Ultimately, you’ll get all the benefits of server-side tracking (like a 23% average increase in total recorded conversions and a 10% reduction in cost per conversion) without the need to write custom code, learn what SHA-256 means, or how to send events to Google’s API.
Option 2: When a lead becomes a customer
If you generate leads from your website via Gravity Forms and send them to a CRM like Salesforce, Pipedrive, etc. then you can also send conversions back to Google Ads later in the sales cycle (like when a lead becomes a customer for instance).
You can do this by capturing some extra information with each form submission and sending it to your CRM. Here’s how it works:
1. Install Attributer on your website and add a hidden field
To get started, sign up for a 14-day free trial of Attributer. You'll be given a small snippet of code to install on your website.
After that, you need to add a series of hidden fields to your Gravity Forms, including:
- GCLID
- WBRAID
- GBRAID
- User Agent
To do this, simply drag and drop a couple of ‘Hidden’ fields into your forms and give them a specific name (full instructions on what you need to add can be found on the Attributer Help site).
2. Attributer writes data into the hidden fields
When you sign up for a free trial of Attributer, you’ll get given a small snippet of code to place on your website.
When a visitor lands on your site from a Google Ads, Attributer will capture all the data Google Ads needs for a server-side conversion (GCLID, GBRAID, WBRAID, Agent, etc) and store it in the visitor’s browser.
Then when they complete a Gravity Form on your website, Attributer will write the data into the hidden fields you added to your form and it will be captured with the form submission.
3. Data is sent to your CRM
Once the data is captured with the form submission, it can be sent to your CRM alongside the name, email, phone number and any other information the lead entered into the form. This can be done via Gravity Form’s native integrations or through 3rd party tools like Zapier.
The data is then stored on the contact/lead record in your CRM for when it’s needed.
4. Send the data to Google Ads
When a specific milestone is reached (like when a deal is created, or when the lead becomes a customer), you can send all the data back to Google Ads to mark a conversion.
Tools like Zapier and Make are great for this. They connect to just about any CRM and can be set up to trigger the conversion in Google Ads at any time (when a new deal is created, when it's closed, or any other point). Similarly, they give you a nice interface to map the data that Attributer gave you (GCLID, GBRAID, WBRAID, User Agent, etc) back to the fields in Google Ads.
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Why sending server-side conversions to Google Ads is the best approach
At a high-level, server-side tracking is better than client-side tracking (I.e. tracking things that happen in the browser) because you get much more accurate results.
In a client-side tracking setup, everything is happening in the visitor's web browser, which is a chaotic environment you don’t control. Server-side tracking moves everything to a server, creating a controlled environment that privacy settings and ad blockers can't touch.
Here are the four primary reasons why this approach is the most effective way to track conversions:
1. Overcomes Ad Blockers
Traditional tracking (such as tracking thank-you page visits or using Google Tag Manager) relies on scripts that load in the visitor's browser, but ad blockers and privacy-focused browsers often prevent these scripts from firing.
And recent research suggests that over 30% of internet users are using some sort of ad blocker.
Server-side tracking works by sending the conversion data directly to Google’s servers, making the process invisible to ad blockers and ensuring that every lead is accurately counted.
2. Bypasses Safari & iOS Privacy Limitations
Apple’s Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) often deletes tracking cookies within a couple of days, which means you lose the connection between an ad click and the conversion if the person doesn’t convert that same day.
By doing server-side tracking, you can use a lead's email as a permanent identifier that links them back to their original ad click, regardless of how long it was between the ad click and the conversion
3. Works across devices
It’s possible that a lead could first come to your website on one device (like their mobile), but wait until they are at a computer to eventually fill out a form.
Traditional browser tracking can’t connect these two sessions as they happen on different devices, but sending identity data (like their name, email, etc) from the server allows Google to "stitch" these different website visits together and give your ads the credit they deserve for starting the journey.
4. Eliminates duplicate and messy data
On top of all the above, browser-based tracking is prone to other errors like double-counting from page refreshes or missing data due to slow load times and internet interruptions.
Tracking from the server is much more precise because it triggers a conversion only when a form is successfully completed (not when a thank you page is visited), ensuring conversion counts in Google Ads match your real lead numbers much more closely.
3 reports you can run when you properly send conversions to Google Ads from Gravity Forms
In my 15 years of running marketing for various companies, I have spent millions in Google Ads and run hundreds of reports to track how they were performing.
Below I have shared 3 of the reports I found most useful over the years:
1. Conversions by Keyword
If you’re like most businesses, you’re probably bidding on multiple different keywords across different campaigns (maybe for different services you offer, such as personal injury law versus family law).
If so, this report can show you which keywords are generating conversions for your business (rather than just generating impressions and clicks that don’t become real leads).
It can help you understand which keywords are profitable and which ones aren’t, and ultimately, which ones you should put more budget behind to get more clicks.
2. Conversion Value by Campaign
If you’re sending conversions back to Google Ads from your CRM, you can include the value of the conversion (which would be populated from the value of the Deal/Opportunity in your CRM).
This is important because not all customers are equal. If you’re a law firm, getting a new customer from your ‘contract review’ campaign is likely nowhere near as profitable as winning a customer from your ‘litigation’ campaign, so you don’t really want to treat them as equals.
But if you send a conversion value from your CRM to Google Ads, you can run reports that show you got X revenue from leads that came from this campaign, and Y revenue from leads that came from this other campaign. This can help you make much better decisions about which campaigns ot put your budget behind.
3. Conversions by Geography
Particularly useful for businesses that get most of their customers locally (like boutique law or accounting firms, construction companies, etc.), this report shows how many conversions you got by geographical region.
You can view this data at a high level (like a Country, State or City), but you can also drill down to be as granular as a specific Postcode. This allows you to see if your leads are actually coming from your target service areas, or if you are wasting money on clicks from suburbs that are too far away for you to profitably service.
Once you have this data, you can use Location Bid Adjustments to improve your results. This allows you to tell Google to bid more aggressively in the specific postcodes that are most profitable for you, and lower your bids (or stop spending altogether) in the areas that generate clicks but never actually fill out your forms.
Wrap Up
Sending conversions to Google Ads can really improve the results you get. It gives you the data you need to make manual adjustments (like bidding higher on certain keywords or geographical areas), and it also gives Google’s algorithms the data they need to make automated bidding adjustments for you.
But it only works well if you are sending accurate conversion data. If you’re doing things like tracking thank you page visits or sending events in the browser (through Google Tag Manager, for instance), then you’re really not sending proper data, and your Google Ads performance will drop as a result.
So, regardless of how you do it and when you do it (on form submission, when the lead becomes a customer, etc), make sure you’re sending conversions server-side to get the best results!
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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.