How I track WhatsApp conversations as conversions in Google Ads

Update: I've extracted the solution I describe below into a service that anyone can use. You can start tracking WhatsApp leads as Google Ads conversions today: Convertista.com.

At the time of writing Google has no way of tracking WhatsApp leads as conversions. You can track the click on your WhatsApp button as a conversion but that's not very useful because:-

• It doesn't tell you if the person who clicked actually started a conversation.
• It doesn't tell you who clicked. You don't know if that click was from a legitimate lead, an existing client, someone wanting to sell you something, a job seeker or a spammer.

I hope Google eventually offers conversion tracking for WhatsApp so we can:-

• Optimise campaigns for WhatsApp contacts like you do for enquiry forms.
• Upload WhatsApp leads as offline conversions to improve lead quality.

Without this you don't know if you're actually getting real value from your ad spend and optimising campaigns is guesswork.

Workarounds for WhatsApp conversion tracking.

I've used a couple of work arounds to track WhatsApp leads as conversions in Google Ads.

The first was with a third-party tracking service. It was expensive to integrate and came with a hefty monthly bill. But it made sense for the client because they get thousands of leads every month. They needed something automatic to handle the volume.

The second takes some manual work.

It's a good fit if you're getting a couple of hundred (or fewer) leads a month and can't justify the expense of a fully-automatic solution.

I've used it for a handful of clients with great results. Before we did this they were flying blind. Now they know that their Google Ads delivers good quality leads. And we're starting to optimise for better quality leads using offline conversions. They're also confident that their new Facebook and TikTok ads are making money.

Here's how it works.

1. When a visitor click on your ad Google (and other ad platforms) add some tracking information. (UTM, GCLID and other parameters if you're feeling technical.)
2. When the visitor clicks on your WhatsApp button my system stores that tracking information in a database.
3. The system adds a unique reference number to the opening WhatsApp message.
4. If the visitor sends the message you'll receive the reference number along with their message.
5. Later you can look up the tracking information using the reference.

Let me show you.

Click on the WhatsApp button on this page. You'll see an opening message with the reference number.

The main weakness with this approach is that the visitor could delete the reference number before sending the message. This does happen every now and again. But, we get enough useful data from the 99% who include the reference to make it worth doing.

If you're paying for ads and have a WhatsApp button on your website you're welcome to use my system.

Setting it up is a copy+paste job we can do together on Zoom. It shouldn't take more than 5 minutes.

After that you'll know where your WhatsApp leads are coming from, and you'll be getting useful data about what's working in your ad account. Use this and you can optimise your ads for more and better quality leads.

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The Google Ads WhatsApp conversion tracking guide

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My lead count doesn't match my conversion count

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