Google Tag Manager, Remarketing, Conversion Tracking in Checkout

vogto

Couple of requests:

1) I understand it may be hard to implement for security reasons, but it would be fantastic if I could track clients in the checkout and see in analytics/adwords the full conversion funnel. Having ads driving traffic to my site it's a real shame I can't see how much of that traffic is converted and how.

2) Add ability to modify the google tracking code. I want to enable re-marketing but for that I need to amend the code, which obviously isn't possible at the moment. Alternatively, allow to add the code for Google Tag Manager, which would be an ideal solution.

Many thanks.

diezelglax

Google Analytics
This is very important now as SEO ranking is getting tough and tough and tough. Smugmug should try and open this up else folks will be forced to look for other avenues. please consider this fast!!!

SethRyan

Conversion tracking for e-commerce is a must. Is there any current way to track conversion from source with a code; ie place Google Adwords code on "Thank You" order confirmation to track back to advertising source?

leftquark

Typically the e-commerce tracking code for Google Analytics would be placed on the "Thank you" order confirmation page, however, on SmugMug the current "Thank you" order confirmation page will not work because the same page is loaded multiple times (upon checkout, to check the status of the order, etc) and Google Analytics does not do any form of duplicate detection to prevent multiple page loads from sending the transaction multiple times. We're hard at work on revamping the checkout process and we've been looking into adding some form of GA tracking into it.

I do have 1 question: what are you looking for in GA that couldn't be provided by a more detailed sales information on SmugMug? We could provide a lot more detailed information, in a page formatted specifically for your photo sales. Is this request because we don't have this page at the moment, or is there something specific that Google provides that you're looking for?

vogto

leftquark wrote: »

Typically the e-commerce tracking code for Google Analytics would be placed on the "Thank you" order confirmation page, however, on SmugMug the current "Thank you" order confirmation page will not work because the same page is loaded multiple times (upon checkout, to check the status of the order, etc) and Google Analytics does not do any form of duplicate detection to prevent multiple page loads from sending the transaction multiple times. We're hard at work on revamping the checkout process and we've been looking into adding some form of GA tracking into it.

I do have 1 question: what are you looking for in GA that couldn't be provided by a more detailed sales information on SmugMug? We could provide a lot more detailed information, in a page formatted specifically for your photo sales. Is this request because we don't have this page at the moment, or is there something specific that Google provides that you're looking for?

Hi leftquark and thanks for your reply. Yes, there is plenty of things we need Google tracking code for. To start with, and probably most importantly, to track conversions. When running Pay-Per-Click ads, using Google AdWords for instance, we need to be able to tell how many visitors became paying clients and how much did it cost us to generate our sales. Without conversion tracking we can't calculate our return on investment, and in order for it work we need to be able to track people going through the checkout, as SethRyan pointed out.

Being able to monitor visitors' behaviour in the checkout is also very important, for instance seeing exit pages can help us optimise our products - e.g. if people exit when they see the prices may mean we're too expensive, or when they exit when they are about to choose a print size may mean we haven't included the right sizes, etc. Hope I make sense.

Google Tag Manager is perfect, by adding one bit of code it allows us to add tracking code not only for AdWords but pretty much for any advertising platform including Bing Ads, Facebook Ads, Twitter Ads, etc. You guys (SmugMug) use Google Tag Manager for yourselves already, why not allow your users to take advantage of it as well? You don't need a different piece of code for every single "Thank You" page, there's just one code for every page on your site and you set everything else directly in GTM. Plus there are other ways to implement the tracking (e.g. if your "Thank You" page doesn't have a separate URL).

I started this thread almost 2 years ago, and I'm still hopeful one day we will be able to track our conversions in SmugMug. And I know I speak for quite a few people, every SmugMug user I personally know, and pretty much everyone serious about making money from their photos while using SmugMug. I'm happy to elaborate further should you have questions. Cheers

leftquark

It's definitely something we'd like to implement as we rebuild the shopping cart (the checkout portion), but as it stands, there's no way to ignore duplicates caused by the thank you page being loaded multiple times. As such, any conversion tracking you try to do won't be accurate and we don't want to falsely present you bad data. We're hard at work on the checkout of the shopping cart and adding tracking is on our minds as we build it. That doesn't mean we'll have it in there when the new cart goes live, but we will try to build it in a way that properly supports it and can be added.

RustlingLeafDesign

What is the Status of this Happening? Thank you.

RobertdeBoer

Is there an update on this matter? Or does Sumgmug provide any solution to this issue. Obviously we would like to see our data just as much as Smugmug likes to see its data.

Thank you.

leftquark

Robert, thanks for writing in. We don’t have an update at this time but to help us provide additional insight in the future what data are you looking to gather?

dedricramseyphoto

> @leftquark said:
> Robert, thanks for writing in. We don’t have an update at this time but to help us provide additional insight in the future what data are you looking to gather?

I cant speak for Robert, but I know that it would allow us to see the ROI for Google Ads if we could track conversions. As it is today, Goal tracking doesn't work (for instance, if you wanted to see if the person who clicked on your ad also clicked your contact form). Basically, what user vogto is saying.