My New Best Friend Is Google Tag Manager

I have a new best friend. It’s name is Google Tag Manager, but you can call it GTM — totally cool with nicknames. Let me tell you why this tool has changed my life — and this is not an exaggeration.

My day-to-day as a Paid Media Manager consists of creating online ads to help companies get their service or product out to those who need it. This means I tend to get excited about all sorts of analytics and data. How many clicks did we get yesterday? Were they more than the day before? How about for the week? Did our conversions go up? Why not? How much more should we spend? Are these campaigns worth it?

I’m always looking for new bait, new hooks, new lines and lures, so I can test them out, and dispose of what I don’t like while I try to find a way to integrate what I do like into an ever-changing system. But that’s what keeps it exciting! The constant change. Tools are evolving as I type this very sentence! Features come and go, and working with 3rd-party web developers can often lead to lag time between updates when it comes to tracking paid media results.

This is why, when I met Google Tag Manager, I forced it to become my best friend…

For those of you who have no idea what a Tag Manager is, let me explain as briefly as possible: First, tags are like flags placed on websites that alert the paid media manager of specific events that happen (purchases, newsletters sign-ups, clicks, etc.). With these flags, we can better target ads on Google, Facebook, and other platforms, based on what customers are actually doing.

Before I met GTM, I felt like I was walking on eggshells with clients. Not only was the update process slow but I often found after setting up tags and triggers to track ads, I’d realize after a week or so that a detail had been missed or was not registering data correctly.

You can imagine how beet red my face was, having to explain an already complex orchestration to our client who thinks I’m giving them the runaround!

Luckily, all this has been solved.

A Tag Manager helps marketers update the information as it comes in, but what’s special about GTM is it makes the process effortless and easy to update at any time.

Here are 5 reasons you should be using Google Tag Manager for tracking analytics for your own business or for your clients:

SIMPLICITY

It makes the process so much easier. Not only are you able to make adjustments from a dashboard that allows seamless continuation of whatever data you are recording, but you can even adjust tags that were misfiring to fire correctly or correct conversion tracking if the website goes through any major updates.

As long as the code remains on the page, you are able to optimize as needed without having to ask anyone else to make an update.

ALL-IN-ONE

It’s not perfect, but the ability to run Facebook, AdWords and Analytics through one tool is like making your cake and eating it too. I don’t know why you would want to make a cake without at least having the chance to eat it, but luckily we don’t have to be concerned with answering that question!

Just like when you use an all in-house agency — someone like, oh, I don’t know, off the tip of my tongue, Agency Media — the process becomes so much easier to orchestrate when you can create and coordinate everything in one location.

CURRENT

I’m not sure if it’s just me, but innovation is sometimes a gift and a curse. The most up-to-date platforms mean you have the most up-to-date technology, but this means that outdated information becomes less prevalent but the newer technology doesn’t always have the most up to date documentation.

The good news is you are able to innovate your campaigns as technology improves month-to-month, week-to-week, or day-to-day. The bad news? You have to stay on your toes to make sure you don’t miss anything.

FREEDOM

Testing has never been easier. A good idea doesn’t have to wait to make sure it’s going to work. With GTM, you can load the website you are working on in a ‘demo’ mode and make sure everything is firing how it should be. Once everything is in working order, you can upload your newest version and BOOM! Your site is ready to track!

Test and confirm like never before, and then implement (no more sweaty palms while you wait to see if your conversions start to track).

FUTURE POTENTIAL

Businesses are moving online. And if they aren’t, they are already behind. The best way to prove to your client that advertising on ‘the Google’ or ‘the Facebook’ is the most beneficial way of sharing a product or service, is providing them with actual results. GTM allows you to efficiently maximize the data you collect and update as new innovations and resources are released via Google, Facebook, and other advertisement platforms you might be keen on.

As it is a benefit to both Facebook and AdWords, GTM will continue to be a consideration when these massive companies implement future technologies onto their advertising platforms.

There are many more things that you can fall in love with when you use Google Tag Manager. I personally love the acronym. Let’s be honest, I just love the word acronym. But truth be told, life was made so much easier for me when I discovered GTM — a little code can go a long way.

If you have any questions about Google Tag Manager or want to share your own thoughts on why you love (or loathe) this tool, please leave a comment!

Alexander Johnson, Paid Media Specialist, Agency Media