What is Google Tag Manager (GTM)?

What is Google Tag Manager (GTM)? The collection of data using tools such as Google Analytics is essential to expand the online reach of your company, convert potential customers into customers, and optimize a marketing strategy.

What is Google Tag Manager (GTM)?

The tags (tag) are fragments of code that is inserted in JavaScript format in the HTML of your website to extract certain information.

The information in the tags includes how long users visit a page on your website, submitting forms, how they got to your website, what links they clicked on, or even which products they removed from the cart.

Each tag tracks something different, for example, you can create a tag just to see how many people fill out the form on your contact page. This tag can send more precise information to Google Analytics, Adwords or another.

Unfortunately, encoding labels manually can be a tedious and difficult process. With Google Tag Manager, the whole tagging process becomes easier. All you have to do is insert code into your site pages once and then each time you want to create a tag, Google Tag Manager will encode it and insert it for you.

Basic vocabulary of Google Tag Manager

Tag "tag": 

It is a piece of code that must be activated on a website. It can be a tracking code, some code snippet that changes the text, whatever. When you create a tag, you tell the Tag Manager to "do this", "do that", "track visits to this visitor's page", "track this click and send to Google Analytics", and so on.

Trigger: 

It is a condition in which a tag must be triggered. Should a tag be activated on all pageviews? Or maybe on certain clicks? All of these examples are triggers. When a particular condition or set of conditions is met, a trigger is fired and all tags linked to it are sent.

Variables: 

They are little helpers that can be used in labels, triggers , or even other variables. A variable can contain a single piece of data such as the page URL, website domain, product id, and so on.

What are the benefits of Google Tag Manager (GTM)?

1. Rapid implementation of tracking codes

You can do it yourself without having to edit the website code and rely on a web developer.

2. All tags are controlled in one place, your GTM account

In the past, all tags were encoded directly in the website's source code. Thanks to Tag Manager, this process is easier: all tags are controlled in one place.

3. Third-party and built-in testing tools

Tag error and bug fixes are simplified by Tag Manager's preview and debug mode, showing which tags are triggered on a page and which are not. It also includes information about the triggers that trigger the tags and the data contained in the tracking tags, ensuring that your tags are working before publishing them on the live site.

4. Event tracking

Google Tag Manager includes a feature called automatic event tracking. Once a certain trigger is enabled in Tag Manager, you will automatically start to see specific website interactions.

The basic events that you can perform by default in Google Tag Manager are based on: clicks, link clicks, form submissions, etc.

More complex events require the participation of a developer.

5. Ready-to-use label templates

Google Tag Manager comes with a number of built-in tags important for Classic and Universal Analytics, Google Ads conversions, remarketing, and more. This allows someone with little coding knowledge to customize the tags without implementing complicated code.

Conclusion

Collecting the data of your users is essential and thanks to tools such as Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager, you can analyze the online reach of your company, convert potential customers into customers and optimize a marketing strategy.