Analytics will happily tell you that 500 people visited last month. That is not the question. The question is how many of them tried to hire you, and conversion tracking is how you answer it. This guide assumes Analytics is already running on your site; if it is not, start with the Google Analytics setup guide.
Two corrections since this guide was written. Google has reorganised Admin, so data streams now sit under Data collection and modification. And the earlier version said a new event can take up to 24 hours to appear in the Events list: Google's published figure is 24 to 48 hours, so allow two days before deciding something is broken.
What is conversion tracking, and why does Google Analytics call it a key event now?
Conversion tracking means telling Analytics which actions count as someone trying to become a customer, so it can count them. Google renamed those actions from conversions to key events. Both words mean the same thing: an event you have flagged as important.
Google's reason is about lining up with Google Ads. In its own words, it is "unifying how conversions are defined" so the numbers in Ads and in Analytics stop disagreeing. An important action recorded in Analytics is now a key event; conversion is reserved for an action you use to measure and bid on ad campaigns in Google Ads.
Google's help centre does not date the change on the page explaining it. What matters is that the interface says key event today, while older guides still say conversion. If a tutorial sends you to a Conversions section in Admin, you are looking for Key events.
What is the difference between an event, a key event and an audience?
An event is any single thing a visitor does; a key event is one you have marked as important; an audience is a group of people defined by what they did. They stack in that order, and mixing them up is the commonest reason people end up with tracking that tells them nothing.
- Event. Google's definition: something that measures "a specific interaction or occurrence on your website or app". A page load, a scroll, a click, a form submission. Most of these arrive without you doing anything.
- Key event. An event that measures "an action that's particularly important to the success of your business". Marking one changes no tracking at all, only the reporting: the action joins the Key events column in reports like Traffic acquisition and Landing page.
- Audience. A saved group of users — everyone who started a form but never submitted one, say. Useful for remarketing. It is not a way of counting enquiries, and none of your key events need one.
One useful side effect: Google says key events are transmitted immediately rather than held back in the usual batches of up to 20 events, so they show in Realtime faster than everything else.
What does Google Analytics track automatically, and what do you have to set up?
Analytics collects seven groups of events with no code from you, through a feature called enhanced measurement, and form submissions are one of them. The rest of your enquiry list — phone taps, email clicks, bookings — you arrange yourself.
| What you want to count | Event name | Collected automatically? |
|---|---|---|
| Page views | page_view | Yes, and cannot be turned off |
| Contact form started / submitted | form_start, form_submit | Yes, via enhanced measurement |
| Click to another website | click | Yes, for links "that lead away from the current domain and to another website" |
| WhatsApp link tap | click | Usually — wa.me is another domain, so it counts as an outbound click. Verify first |
| Phone number tap (tel: link) | — | No. Not another website, so it is not an outbound click |
| Email address click (mailto: link) | — | No, for the same reason |
| Booking or thank-you page reached | page_view | Collected, but you must turn it into its own event |
| Downloads, video plays, site search, scrolls | file_download, video_start, view_search_results, scroll | Yes, via enhanced measurement |
Google documents the outbound click event as firing "each time a user clicks a link that leads away from the current domain and to another website". A tel: or mailto: link does not lead to another website, and Google's list mentions neither. Do not assume they are counted — check in DebugView first.
How do I set up conversion tracking for a contact form in GA4?
Four steps, and on most sites the first is already done for you. Budget twenty minutes, plus a wait of up to two days before the event appears in the Admin list.
1. Check enhanced measurement is on
In Admin, under Data collection and modification, click Data streams, then the name of your web stream. Under Enhanced measurement, the switch should be on, and the settings icon there lets you check the individual options, including form interactions. Changing it needs Editor access or above.
2. Submit your own form and watch it arrive
Fill in your own contact form, with the word TEST in the message so you know to ignore it, and send it. In Analytics go to Reports, then Realtime. The Event count by Event name card shows every event triggered in the last 30 minutes. You want form_submit.
3. Mark it as a key event
In Admin, under Data display, click Events, find form_submit in the list of existing events, and switch on Mark as key event. If it is not in the list yet, that is the processing delay, not a failure. Come back tomorrow.
4. Read the number that matters
After a week or two, go to Reports, then Acquisition, then Traffic acquisition, and read the Key events column. Each row is a source of visitors; the column tells you which sources actually produce enquiries. That is the difference between "we get traffic from Facebook" and "Facebook sends visitors who never get in touch".
If form_submit never appears. The usual causes are a form that submits by JavaScript without a standard form submission, or one embedded from another service inside a frame, which Analytics cannot see into. Google's documentation describes when form_submit fires but does not list these exceptions, so test rather than assume. The fallback that always works is the next section: send people to a thank-you page and count the page instead.
How do I track a booking confirmation or thank-you page?
You turn the page view into its own event, without touching the website — Google's own worked example in the help centre is exactly this.
In Admin, under Data display, click Events, then Create event. Name it plainly, such as booking_confirmed, and turn on Mark as key event while you are there. Under Choose how to create an event, pick Create without code, choose page_view as the source event, and enter the URL of your confirmation page.
Two cautions from Google. Creating an event copies an existing one, whereas modifying an event overwrites it — Google specifically warns against modifying page_view, because it stops collecting page views for the rest of your site. And event names must be 40 characters or fewer, or the event will not be reported as a key event.
This is the reliable route when a form or booking widget is embedded from another service, as long as it sends people to a page on your own domain afterwards.
How do I track phone taps, email clicks and WhatsApp clicks?
Phone and email taps need setting up; WhatsApp taps usually arrive on their own, because wa.me links point at another website and so register as outbound clicks, while tel: and mailto: links do not.
First, check the basics on a phone: the number must be a real clickable link, so tapping it offers to dial. A number typed as plain text, or sitting inside an image, cannot be tracked by anything, and is costing you calls as well as data.
WhatsApp, and any other outbound link. Tap the link yourself, look for click in Realtime, and open the event to see its link_url parameter. If that shows your wa.me address, create an event from it in Admin exactly as with the thank-you page — click as the source event, the link URL as the condition — and mark it as a key event.
Phone and email. These need Google Tag Manager, which is free. Install the container, create a click trigger that fires on links whose URL contains tel:, and attach a Google Analytics event tag named phone_click. Repeat with mailto:. Publish, check in DebugView, then mark them as key events.
Be clear-eyed about what this measures: taps, not conversations. Someone who reads the number off the screen and dials it manually leaves no trace, and neither does a mis-tap. Treat phone taps as a trend line, not a count of jobs won — and keep asking callers how they found you, which still tells you more than any dashboard.
How do I set this up on WordPress, Wix, Squarespace or Shopify?
All four get the Analytics tag onto your site without code, and none of them creates key events for you — that always happens inside Analytics. They differ in how much freedom you have to fire your own events.
| Platform | How the tag goes on | What you can do without code |
|---|---|---|
| WordPress | Site Kit by Google (version 1.187.0, 5 million-plus installs) or a field in your theme or plugin | The most open of the four. Tag Manager installs alongside it, so phone, email and WhatsApp clicks are all available |
| Wix | Marketing Integrations, Google tag, paste the measurement ID | Requires a Premium site plan and a connected domain. Tag Manager is supported separately |
| Squarespace | Developer tools, External API keys, paste the G- measurement ID into the Google Analytics account number field | Squarespace says statistics can take up to 24 hours to populate, and its documentation covers ecommerce data rather than form submissions |
| Shopify | Install the Google & YouTube sales channel, then add the GA4 tags through it | Ecommerce events are tracked automatically. Analytics cannot track anything while your store is in private mode |
The honest ranking: WordPress gives you everything, Shopify is excellent for purchases and awkward for anything else, Wix is fine on a paid plan, and Squarespace is where the thank-you-page method is usually the answer.
When should I use Google Tag Manager instead of doing it in Analytics?
Use Analytics on its own when the event already exists and you only need to promote it. Use Tag Manager when the event does not exist yet and has to be created from a click — which is the case for phone and email taps on every platform.
Tag Manager sits between your website and Analytics: one installation job, and after that you add and change tracking without touching the site. The cost is a second tool to learn and a publish step that is easy to forget. If your only enquiry route is a contact form and form_submit already works, you do not need it.
How do I check my conversion tracking is actually working?
Two tools, answering different questions. Realtime tells you whether anything is arriving at all in the last 30 minutes. DebugView shows every event from one device in detail, which is what you need when something is wrong.
To use DebugView, switch on debug mode first. Google's route for a website is Google Tag Assistant at tagassistant.google.com, or Tag Manager's preview mode, which adds a parameter to your address to turn debug mode on for your device only. Then in Admin, under Data display, click DebugView and use your own site.
The middle column shows events logged in the last 60 seconds. Click one to see its parameters — that is how you confirm a click event really carries the wa.me link, or that form_submit carries the right form_destination.
Two warnings from Google's documentation. Events do not appear in debug mode if consent mode is running and the visitor has not agreed to Analytics cookies, so accept your own cookie banner before testing or you will chase a fault that is not there. And filter out your own developer traffic afterwards, so testing does not pollute the reports.
How long before conversions show in Google Analytics reports?
Google's stated figure is that "data processing can take 24-48 hours", and the numbers can change during that window. Realtime is the exception, typically a few minutes behind.
| Where you are looking | Google's typical processing time |
|---|---|
| Realtime report | Typically a few minutes |
| Intraday data, standard property | 2 to 6 hours |
| Daily data, standard property | 12 hours |
| Overall data processing | 24 to 48 hours |
| Daily data ready in Reports (previous day) | Typically by 3:30pm, property time |
Two things people trip over: some data can arrive up to seven days late, and attribution credit for key events can keep changing for up to 12 days after the event was recorded, as Google's modelling settles. A number you screenshot on Monday may not match the same number a fortnight later. Compare month to month, not day to day.
What are the limits of conversion tracking in Google Analytics?
Analytics undercounts, always, and on a small UK site it cannot tell you by how much. Three limits are worth knowing before you make decisions on the numbers.
Consent banners
The ICO's guidance on storage and access technologies, dated 29 April 2026, does contain a statistical purposes exception that can cover analytics, including analytics run by a third party. But it applies only where the provider can "act on your behalf" and "use the information to help you improve your service", and it "does not allow you to monitor or track individual visitors". A standard Analytics property with Google signals or a Google Ads link does not sit comfortably inside that, which is why most UK sites still ask. Everyone who declines is missing from your reports.
Modelling will not fill the gap for a small site
Google fills consent gaps with behavioural modelling, but only above a threshold: at least 1,000 events a day with analytics storage denied for seven days, and at least 1,000 daily users with consent granted on seven of the previous 28 days. A local trades website will never come close, so the gap stays a gap.
Ad blockers, and calls that never touch your website
Browser extensions and privacy browsers block the Analytics tag outright, so those visits never register at all. We could not find a current, reliable figure for how many UK visitors block analytics, so this guide does not quote one — treat your numbers as a floor, not a total.
The bigger blind spot is the phone call that starts on Google itself. Your Google Business Profile has its own Calls metric, counting "the number of times a customer clicked on the call button on your Business Profile". Those calls are real work and are invisible to Analytics. Read the two side by side.
What should I do first, if I only have half an hour?
Do the contact form, and nothing else. It is the clearest signal of intent, needs no extra tools, and on most sites the collection is already happening — you are only switching on the counting. In order: check enhanced measurement is on, send yourself a test enquiry, confirm form_submit in Realtime, come back tomorrow and mark it as a key event. That is the whole job.
Then leave it alone for a month. Tracking only earns its keep if you use it, and the use is one question asked monthly: which sources produced enquiries, and which produced nothing. If you also have Search Console set up, pair the two — Search Console tells you what people searched to find you, Analytics tells you which of those visits turned into an enquiry. If the answer comes back as almost no enquiries from anywhere, the problem is upstream of tracking: start with why the website is not getting enquiries.
Common questions
- What are GA4 key events?
- A key event is an ordinary event you have told Analytics is important. Google's definition is an event that measures an action that's particularly important to the success of your business. Any event you already collect can become one: find it in Admin, under Data display, in Events, and turn on the key event toggle. The tracking does not change. What changes is that Analytics counts it in the Key events column across your reports.
- Are key events the same as conversions?
- They are the same thing you used to call a conversion, under a new name. Google now reserves conversion for an action used to measure and optimise ad campaigns in Google Ads, and uses key event for the important action recorded inside Analytics. Its help page puts it as a flow: event, then key event, then conversion. If you do not run Google Ads, key events are all you need.
- How do I track form submissions in GA4?
- Usually you do not have to set anything up. Enhanced measurement collects form_start and form_submit with no code, and it is on by default for a web data stream. Check it in Admin, under Data collection and modification, in Data streams. Submit your own form, watch for form_submit in Realtime, then mark it as a key event. Forms that submit by JavaScript, or sit inside an embed, often do not fire it.
- How do I set up conversion tracking in Google Tag Manager?
- Install Google Tag Manager, create a click trigger, and fire a Google Analytics event tag from it. For a phone tap the trigger is a link whose URL contains tel:, for email mailto:, for WhatsApp wa.me. Name the tag's event plainly, such as phone_click, publish the container, then mark that event as a key event in Analytics once it appears. Tag Manager is free.
- Why are my GA4 conversions not showing?
- Nine times out of ten you have not waited long enough. Google says processing can take 24 to 48 hours, and a new event will not appear in the Events list in Admin until Analytics has processed it. Check Realtime or DebugView first, as those update in minutes. If nothing appears there either, it is not a reporting delay but a collection problem: the form, the consent banner or the tag.
- How many key events can you have in GA4?
- Thirty per property on a standard Analytics account, according to Google's published configuration limits, and you can archive ones you no longer use if you get close. A small service business rarely needs more than five: form submission, phone tap, email click, WhatsApp click and a booking confirmation. Event names must be 40 characters or fewer, or they will not report as key events.
- How do I set up phone call conversion tracking?
- You can count taps on a phone link, not calls. Make the number a real tel: link, create an event from that click in Google Tag Manager, and mark it as a key event. Somebody who reads the number off the screen and dials it by hand is invisible to Analytics, and so is anyone who rings the number on your Google Business Profile without visiting the site.
- How do I import GA4 key events into Google Ads?
- You create a Google Ads conversion from the Analytics key event, which Google now lets you do from inside Analytics as well as from Google Ads. The counting method and conversion window are inherited from the Analytics property; the rest of the settings are edited in Google Ads afterwards. Google notes the feature is still rolling out and may not be on every property yet.
Related guides
Sources, all checked 15 September 2026. Google Analytics Help: "Conversions vs. key events in Google Analytics" (the rename and the event to key event to conversion flow); "About key events"; "About events" (event types, batching, Realtime and DebugView); "Enhanced measurement events" (the event list, the Admin path, form_start and form_submit, the outbound click definition); "Create or modify key events" (create without code from page_view, the warning about modifying events, Google Ads conversions); "Monitor events in DebugView" (debug mode via Tag Assistant, the consent caveat, filtering developer traffic); "Configuration limits" (30 key events per property); "Event collection limits" (40-character event names); "Data freshness" (24 to 48 hours, Realtime a few minutes, intraday 2 to 6 hours, daily 12 hours, data up to 7 days late, attribution changing for up to 12 days); "Consent mode on websites and mobile apps"; and the behavioural modelling thresholds (1,000 events a day with consent denied for 7 days, and 1,000 daily users with consent granted on 7 of the previous 28 days). Google Business Profile Help for the Calls definition. ICO, "What are the exceptions?", page dated 29 April 2026. Wix, Squarespace and Shopify help centres for their own Analytics setup pages, and the WordPress.org listing for Site Kit by Google (version 1.187.0, 5 million-plus installations). Google does not date the page explaining the rename, so this guide states no date for it, and no reliable current figure for UK analytics-blocking rates could be established from a primary source, so none is quoted.