The Importance of PPC Tracking

Tracking is the part of PPC that turns guesswork into decision-making. Without it, you’re flying blind, spending money without knowing what’s working, what’s wasted, or what could be improved. Whether you’re running a small campaign or managing a complex account, tracking is what makes the data useful.

This guide explains why PPC tracking matters, what to measure, and how to avoid the common mistakes that lead to bad decisions and wasted budget.

What Is PPC Tracking?

PPC tracking is the process of monitoring what happens after someone clicks your ad. It shows which campaigns are generating leads or sales, which keywords are worth keeping, and where your budget is being wasted. It also feeds data back into the platform, helping automated bidding and audience targeting improve over time.

Tracking can include a range of actions:

• Page views

• Form submissions

• Purchases

• Phone calls

• Button clicks

• Revenue from sales

The key is to track what matters to your business. A form submission might be a lead for one company, but completely useless to another. That’s why setting up the right conversion actions is just as important as tracking them in the first place.

Why It Matters

Good tracking doesn’t just help with reporting, it actively improves performance. When tracking is set up properly, you can:

1. Optimise With Confidence
Tracking lets you see what’s working. If a keyword is driving conversions, you can put more budget behind it. If an ad group is wasting money, you can fix or pause it. Without data, you’re making changes based on assumptions.

2. Prove Return On Investment
Clients and internal teams want proof that PPC is working. Tracking provides that. Whether it’s sales, cost per lead, or return on ad spend, you can only measure these things with tracking in place.

3. Protect and Scale Budget
When you know what’s profitable, you can justify more spend. When you see what’s not working, you can reduce waste. This leads to better budget allocation and a more efficient account overall.

4. Train The Algorithm
Modern PPC campaigns rely heavily on machine learning. Google’s algorithms use your conversion data to optimise bidding, placements, and targeting. If the data is wrong, the platform learns the wrong lessons. If it’s accurate, performance improves faster and more consistently.

Common Tracking Mistakes

Too many campaigns fail because tracking wasn’t set up properly from the start. Here are the most common issues:

• Tracking the wrong actions: Don’t mark every page view as a conversion. Only track actions that matter to your business.

• Double-counting conversions: If a thank-you page is counted every time it loads, your data will be inflated and useless.

• Missing conversions: A single misconfigured tag or broken tracking link can make your results look far worse than they really are.

• No revenue tracking: Without order value or lead quality, you won’t know which conversions are actually profitable.

What You Should Be Tracking

Every business is different, but here are the most important things to track in most campaigns:

• Lead generation: form submissions, phone calls, live chat enquiries

• Ecommerce: sales, order value, product ID, customer lifetime value

• Engagement: button clicks, video views, page scroll depth (useful for re-marketing)

• Offline actions: if you close deals offline, import that data back into Google Ads using offline conversion tracking

If you’re not sure what to track, start with your end goal and work backwards. Then make sure the data is accurate, complete, and tied to the right keywords and campaigns.

If you’re not sure your PPC tracking is working properly, or you’re wasting time second-guessing the data, we can help! Our PPC management service includes full tracking setup and audits, so you get the insights you need to improve performance and spend more efficiently!