Best GTM Template for WordPress and GA4

Ok, “best” is subjective, but the free download at the bottom of this page represents over five years of work towards perfecting our stock Google Tag Manager container for WordPress websites. Our typical GA4 data architecture process involves highly customized work based on individual requirements, however, this container is our starting point for every JCM client. Out of the box, it tracks the following to perfection:

• Identify logged-in admins and tell GA4 that they are internal traffic
• Clicks to call with phone number details
• Clicks on email links with email address details
• Contact Form 7 starts with form ID and title details
• Contact Form 7 submissions with form ID and title details
• Gravity Form starts with form ID and title details
• Gravity Form submissions (both page load style and ajax) with form ID and title details
• WooCommerce product view
• WooCommerce view product list
• WooCommerce add to cart
• WooCommerce remove from cart
• WooCommerce view cart
• WooCommerce begin checkout
• WooCommerce add payment info
• WooCommerce add shipping info
• WooCommerce successful purchase

Here’s how to use this container:

1. Create a new GTM container
2. This container is meant for WordPress, and its data processing depends on the plugin “Tag Manager for WordPress, which must be installed, active, and configured. Add your Google Tag Manager Container ID to the plugin.
   • Turn on WooCommerce integration
   • Add tracking for logged-in state and user type
   • You can turn on Contact Form 7 integration if you want, but this container has its own listener which tracks even more information.
3. In Tag Manager, import the JSON file called GTM-JCM-Template. The download is below.
4. In your newly imported tags, open the GA4 – PARENT TAG and add your GA4 measurement ID.
5. This container recognizes logged in administrators (which is sent to the dataLayer by the GTM4WP plugin) and sets their traffic_type to “internal” for all events. This will allow you to exclude these hits from conversion tracking. Along with the IP address tools in GA4, these two internal traffic mechanisms should prevent testing and internal traffic from clouding your data. More details in the “Google Analytics 4 Best Config” section below.
6. This container supports a session recording heatmap software called Mouseflow, which has a free version available. Register your account on Mouseflow.com and check out their pricing plans. If you wish to use the free version, make sure to downgrade to the free version before your free trial ends because you might get stuck in a “your trial has ended” prompt that makes you pay for a month if you wait too long. They may have fixed that bug at some point, but if you want to use the free version, it’s easier just to downgrade right away. It will still allow you to try out the full version until the end of the trial.
7. Examine the tag that Mouseflow gives you to find the line of code that defines your Mouseflow ID. Compare this to the “Mouseflow Integration” tag in this container and replace the appropriate line of code with the line from your actual Mouseflow account. The reason this container’s Mouseflow script is different from Mouseflow’s stock script is because we don’t allow Mouseflow to start recording unless the user scrolls or clicks on something. This prevents bounced traffic from using up your recordings, which is especially helpful on the free plan. After you’ve confirmed your Mouseflow tag to be recording, go through Mouseflow’s process to hide personal data. This container will block your logged-in administor traffic to prevent those sessions from recording, and you can also exclude your own IPs from recording in the Mouseflow interface.
8. Edit the Form Titles Regex variable to match your contact form IDs with the titles you’d like to call them. These will show up in GA4 as custom dimensions. For Contact Form 7, please note that the Form ID refers to the post ID of the contact form, which can be found in the URL when editing a form. It is not the ID referenced in the form’s shortcode.
9. Edit the Form Actions variable to send different Event Names for different form intentions. By default, each form will send events named generate_lead_start and generate_lead_complete. Tracking both starts and completions will help you determine form abandonment rates. Some forms, however, might not be lead forms. You can rename the first part of the form events to whatever you wish to better match the intention of each form, for example: sign_up, newsletter, subscribe, appointment, etc… For Contact Form 7, please note that the Form ID refers to the post ID of the contact form, which can be found in the URL when editing a form. It is not the ID referenced in the form’s shortcode.
10. Decide whether you want to track form abandonment. If you want to track rates of form starts versus completions, unpause the Tag named “Track Form Abandonment.” This will cause your form actions to generate two events per form, for example: “generate_lead_start” when someone begins filling out a form and “generate_lead_complete” when they have successfully submitted the form.
11. Publish the container

Google Analytics 4 Recommended Configuration

The following GA4 settings will make the most out of your newly-configured GTM container:

1. General Setup
   • Property settings: set your industry category, timezone, and currency
2. Data Stream
   • Enhanced Measurement
     • Turn Enhanced Measurement on, but then open it up and turn off Form Interactions. They work inconsistently and add confusion. This container will handle event tracking for your CF7 and Gravity forms.
   • Configure Tag Settings
     • Manage automatic event detection: turn off Form Interactions here, as well
     • Configure your domains: add all other domains that you’ll install your tag on for cross-domain tracking
     • Collect Universal Analytics events: make sure this is off
     • Define internal traffic: set your IP exclusions
3. Data Settings
   • Data Collection: turn on Google Signals and all other settings and sign acknowledgement
   • Data Retention: 14 months
   • Data Filters > Internal Traffic
     • Parameter name: traffic_type
     • Parameter value: internal
     • Filter State: “testing” mode so that your debugging doesn’t get blocked. If you want to exclude internal traffic in reports, you’ll need to exclude the traffic tagged as Internal with the dimension called “Test data filter name.”
4. Reporting Identity: by User ID and Device
5. Attribution Settings: cross-channel data driven
6. Product Links
   • Add Google Ads, Search Console, and other relevant products
7. Events/Conversions
   • To create conversion goals from form submissions and other interactions, explore the Events section of Analytics after your site has been logging traffic and activity. You can either mark the incoming events as conversions or you can separate them into different conversions based on passed parameters. For example, if you want/need to track different forms separately, you can create new conversions that specify particular parameters such as the form_name or form_id. For another example, you might only want to track click_to_call as a particular conversion if you’ve tagged it with a certain class, which gets passed as the parameter click_class or if it happens on a certain page, in which case you could use an existing GA4 parameter such as path.
   • You can also pre-register events as conversions by visiting the Conversions section of the Admin settings. You must type your events exactly as they will appear in order for this pre-registration to work.
   • Please note that any events you want to import into Google Ads for tracking performance and/or smart bidding strategies must be registered as conversions in GA4.
8. Custom definitions — create the following custom dimensions with event as the scope:
   • Event Category, for the parameter event_category
   • Event Title, for the parameter event_title
   • Event Details, for the parameter event_details
   • Traffic Type, for the parameter traffic_type — this is an existing parameter, but it is not a registered dimension. You’ll need it for building segments in Explorer report and building Audiences that exclude your internal traffic.
   • Page Path, for the parameter page_path — this one is optional. If you intend to use the User Explorer report, you need to register this existing dimension as a custom dimension in order to see which pages each user visits. This could be corrected in the future by Google, but for now, if you want to see this info in the User Explorer report, you have to register this as a custom dimension. Additionally, to make this solution work, you’ll also have to edit your GA4 — PARENT TAG in the Tag Manager container to send page_path in the “fields to set” section.

Please note: this container is provided as-is. Its event listeners are not guaranteed to work in perpetuity. When a plugin developer changes their code, tracking systems often break. Will will endeavor to update this container template as these changes become necessary, but if you don’t have a GA4 developer on retainer, we recommend our “GA4 Data Pro” services to proactively test and maintain your entire marketing data system.