Tag management systems have become the most popular method for implementing tracking tags/scripts. This is often due to the ease of use and the built-in triggers that allow for a single container script to be implemented on the website where previously hundreds of lines of code were required to accomplish the same tasks. The most common tag management system is Google Tag Manager, but Pace also has expertise in Dynamic Tag Manager (Adobe) and Tealium. These allow us to create complex comprehensive tracking ecosystems efficiently and effectively.
The primary advantage of Google Tag Manager and other systems is that they can be implemented with a single script. The site developer need only make one adjustment, and then the marketer/analyst can create the tracking tags from within the system’s interface. These tags typically come in a variety of premade formats. Common examples are analytics tags, social media tags, ad network tags, conversion pixels/scripts, custom html, A/B testing scripts or a combination of these.
Tags are combined with triggers and variables to produce outputs that are:
- Connected: Most third-party marketing platforms can be easily connected to tag managers, through either built-in tags or custom HTML options.
- Targeted: Tags can be constructed to show for certain audiences or user behaviors.
- Rule Based: Triggers allow for tags to fire as widely or as narrowly as needed, defined by the tag builder.
- Scalable: Tags and triggers can be copied, re-used or adjusted en masse to coincide with new events, campaigns or site changes.
- Dynamic: Variables are constructed to provide values provided by the site, such as URLs, element IDs, element classes, user-entered values and additional CSS selectors.
The standard implementation that Pace offers most clients is a cocktail of tracking tags from a variety of platforms. This includes, but is not limited to, analytics page tracking, analytics event tracking, social media conversion pixels, social media standard events, social media retargeting, paid ads conversion pixels, paid ads retargeting, heat map scripts and A/B test accounts. From here, we customize our tag manager builds to create the most personalized and relevant KPI metrics to generate usable and actionable data for our clients.
