The tracking setup every marketing website needs
GA4, Tag Manager, Google Ads conversions, Meta Pixel and Conversions API, Clarity and UTM discipline, explained without jargon.
If you cannot see where a lead came from, every optimisation decision after that is a guess. This is the setup we ship with every website.
Google Tag Manager as the container
Everything else loads through it. This means you can add or change a tag without touching code, which matters when the developer is busy.
GA4 with real events
Page views are not enough. Fire events for form submissions, WhatsApp clicks, call clicks, booking steps and payment submissions. Mark the meaningful ones as key events so they show up as conversions.
Google Ads conversions imported from GA4 or fired directly
Either works. What matters is that only genuinely valuable actions are marked primary, because Smart Bidding optimises to whatever you tell it to.
Meta Pixel plus the Conversions API
The pixel alone loses a large share of events to browser restrictions and blockers. The Conversions API sends the same event from your server, with hashed email and phone for matching. Use the same event ID on both so Meta deduplicates them.
Microsoft Clarity for the why
Analytics tells you that people leave the pricing page. Clarity session recordings and heatmaps show you why. It is free and takes ten minutes to install.
Search Console for the search side
Verify the property, submit the sitemap, and check the pages report monthly for indexing problems that no analytics tool will ever tell you about.
UTM discipline
Agree a naming convention and stick to it. Lowercase, no spaces, consistent source names. Store the first touch UTM in the browser and pass it into every form, so the lead record itself carries the source rather than depending on the analytics tool to reconstruct it later.