As of 12 June 2024 we’ve noticed that the checkbox "include user-provided data" is no longer available in the settings of the Google Ads conversion tag inside the server-side Google Tag Manager container and this lead us to exploring even more changes that Google made that relates to User-provided data (UPD) in GA4 and gAds (both web and sGTM container). These are the main takeaways:
1. The checkbox "include user-provided data" is no longer available in the settings of the Google Ads conversion tag inside the server-side Google Tag Manager container.
2. The new gAds tag type was added to sGTM - Google Ads User-provided Data Event, similar to the one in web GTM.
3. Google removed the limitation that enabling UPD would disable user ID exports to BigQuery. It means that if UPD is enabled it won’t affect user or event data export in BigQuery.
4. Enhanced Conversions for Leads can now be set up via sGTM. Meaning that now you can configure offline event tracking in sGTM.
Previously when you wanted to configure enhanced conversion tracking for Google Ads and share user-provided data in sGTM gAds conversion tracking you had to create a user-provided data variable in web GTM, and add it to GA4 tag settings inside the web GTM. The last step was to enable the checkbox “Include user-provided data from your website” inside the Google Ads server-side conversion tracking tag. Like in the screenshot below.
Google did not update the gAds enhanced conversion documentation yet. From our test, the checkbox for user-provided data is enabled by default in sst gAds tags. This means that if you send user-provided data from web GTM to sGTM using a GA4 tag, server-side Google Ads tags automatically parse user data from GA4 requests. So the control of user-provided data was transferred from server to web GTM.
1. Enable Enhanced Conversions in Google Ads.
Log in to your Google Ads account, navigate to Tools & Settings → Conversions → check Turn on enhanced conversions.
2. Configure User-Provided Data variable in web GTM and add it to GA4 tag settings.
In web GTM, create a Data Layer Variable to capture user data (such as email, phone number, and address). Then, create a User-Provided Data Variable and associate it with the captured data.
3. Set Up Conversion Tracking Tag.
In the GTM server container, create a new Google Ads Conversion Tracking tag, and trigger it based on the desired conversion events. Tag will automatically parse user data form GA4 requests.
And that’s it! No additional changes or modifications were made to the Google Ads Conversion Tracking setup.
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