Setting up ActiveCampaign Server Side Tracking in Google Tag Manager
Ate Keurentjes | 9 January 2025 | Last updated: ActiveCampaign is an online CRM platform that collects and analyzes customer data. In this blog, you will read how to set up ActiveCampaign in Google Tag Manager for server side tracking. This allows you to collect data through your own server (first-party data) instead of through third parties (third-party data), which complies with GDPR regulations.
What is ActiveCampaign?
ActiveCampaign is an online CRM platform that offers features such as email marketing, sales automation and customer data management. It allows companies to automate customer interactions, such as adding new customers to a CRM list via a Web site form. Once a user registers, the data is transferred directly to ActiveCampaign.
Active campaign in combination with Server Side Tracking.
ActiveCampaign with Server Side Tracking provides an accurate way to collect and analyze customer behavior by running tracking through the server instead of the browser.
Benefits of ActiveCampaign with Server Side Tracking
1. Better data quality: Collecting data directly from the server makes data more accurate.
2. Enhanced privacy: No third-party data collection strengthens GDPR compliance.
3. More efficient performance: Less load on the browser results in faster load times.
4. More detailed customer information: Greater insight into customer behavior for personalized marketing.
5. More accurate segmentation: Improved data quality enables targeted campaigns.
Server Side Tracking gives you more control over your data and allows you to optimize your marketing efforts.
Want to know more? Check out the 7 benefits of Server Side Tracking.
What events can you measure with Active Campaign Server GTM?
You can measure any event by setting a custom name. 4 examples are:
- Form Submissions: Users who complete a form.
- Purchases: Orders in an online store.
- Page views: Pages visited.
- Button clicks: Actions such as clicking a CTA button.
How do you set up ActiveCampaign in Server Sgtm?
There are two options:
Option 1: ActiveCampaign Server Side Tracking with TAGGRS templates
Import preset GTM templates from the TAGGRS template gallery. This reduces implementation time and minimizes errors.
- Go to the TAGGRS dashboard and select the all platforms combined template .
- Download the JSON files and import them into your Google Tag Manager server container.
Once you have imported the files, open the server container in Google Tag Manager. Select Tags and click on the ActiveCampaign tag. Instantly see how the tag is structured and what settings are required for it to work correctly.
Pause or remove tags and triggers that are not being used. For example, if the Cookiebot tag is not needed, it may unintentionally affect data collection.
Setting variables
After you pause or remove the unnecessary tags, in the Variables section, insert the necessary codes for the different platforms being used. These codes are automatically associated with all relevant tags. Below is an example of setting the TAGGRS Container ID variable.
Option 2: Set up ActiveCampaign Server Side Tracking manually.
For manual configuration of ActiveCampaign Server Side Tracking:
2. Add tracking tags and ensure integration with ActiveCampaign.
3. Verify that the server container is configured correctly, because ActiveCampaign only uses data from the server container. Use the test roadmap for this.
Once you complete these basic settings, you can move on to setting up the active campaign tag. The video below provides step-by-step instructions on how to set up ActiveCampaign in conjunction with Server Side Tracking.
How can you test the configuration?
Test the configuration via debug mode in Google Tag Manager. Verify that events such as pageviews and form submissions are correctly forwarded to ActiveCampaign. First, add a server container URL in the container settings as shown in the video below:
What to watch out for
1. Check the data layer:
Make sure there is a functioning data layer on your website. Without this layer, e-commerce events cannot be measured properly.
2. Avoid direct links outside of GTM:
Make sure no direct links, such as a direct GA4 link, are active. This can lead to data loss.
ActiveCampaign Server Side Tracking completed.
With these steps, you can set up ActiveCampaign in conjunction with Server Side Tracking via Google Tag Manager. This configuration gives you better control over customer data and improves data quality for personalized marketing campaigns. In your TAGGRS dashboard, view the additional measured data by using TAGGRS Server Side Tracking.
Don't forget to put the configuration live to get everything up and running!
