Since writing my rant about the schema conspiracy of web analytics platforms, I’ve been giving the whole idea of hit-level data collection a lot of thought. Sessionization is very heavily implemented in Google Analytics, which is understandable, but the regular Google Analytics API just doesn’t give you the kind of information you’d need, if you wanted to stitch hits together differently in your own backend. In fact, there are four distinct levels of aggregation that are not exposed via the API, even though I think they should:

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On March 30th, right on (the latest) schedule, the Migration Assistant tool was published for Google Tag Manager V2. This tool lets you opt-in to account migration for your legacy Google Tag Manager Accounts. Migration means simply that the accounts will be converted to V2 accounts, and you will have access to all the new features the upgrade provides. In this #GTMtips post, we’ll go over the migration steps (it’s pretty simple), and I’ll leave you with a couple of tips on how to get started with the new features.

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One of the unfortunate misunderstandings regarding the wonderful Google Tag Manager Preview mode is what it actually means when GTM reports “Tags Fired On This Event”. For many, this seems to indicate that whatever code the Tag was meant to execute also completed successfully. However, this is not the case. Tip 19: Debugging Tag execution vs. actual requests Let’s get the distinction straight right away: Google Tag Manager debug panel tells you when a Trigger has been invoked by certain conditions, and the Tag which uses this Trigger has its JavaScript injected into the Document Object Model.

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In 2013, I wrote a guide for Universal Analytics and Google Tag Manager on how to poll for weather conditions, and send this information to Google Analytics as a custom dimension of the session. The guide was intended as a technical introduction to Google Tag Manager, and I think it succeeded in that. However, GTM has changed a lot over the last 1.5 years, and I’ve made some improvements to the method along the way.

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(Updated 15 July 2015: Added a huge simplification. Jump straight to the update at the end.) URL fragments are strings of characters that follow a hash mark (#) in the URL. Typically, they are used for anchor links, where following a link keeps you on the same page but jumps the browser to some anchored position. They’re also the tool of choice for single-page apps, where content is served dynamically without page reloads.

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In Google Tag Manager, every single Tag requires a Trigger to fire. Every single Trigger requires an Event condition to activate. Sometimes, these Event conditions are obfuscated under template semantics, but you can also create a Custom Event Trigger, where you specify the value of the ‘event’ key in dataLayer that fires your tag. You can read more about the relationship between GTM events and Tags in these two posts:

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Be honest, can you think of anything that’s more unfair than this: A new Google Tag Manager feature, published at 02:07 AM my time, and with an easter egg hunt involved?! Of course it was the infuriating Charles Farina who found the new feature and claimed the prize. Curses! (Just kidding Charles, you’re still awesome.) Anyway, there’s a new GTM feature in town, and oh boy, this time it’s a big’un!

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