Sometimes, an ad doesn't lead directly to an online sale, but instead starts a customer down a path that ultimately leads to a sale in the offline world, such as at your office or over the phone. By importing offline conversions, you can measure what happens in the offline world after your ad results in a click or call to your business.
Benefits
Importing offline conversion events gives you a more comprehensive look at which keywords and targeting criteria (for example, geography or time of day) drive the most cost-effective conversions. This data can help you target and optimize your campaigns for increased profit.
If you attract leads or buyers online, or both, you might want to record a conversion in the following cases:
- When you close a sale offline (for example, over the phone or in person) and track this sale in a customer relationship manager system
- 30 days after the online sale so you can exclude transactions that resulted in a return
- Only if the sale was made to a new customer
- Only if it's a customer's second purchase
- When you close a sale online but are unable to use our standard JavaScript-based conversion tracking solution
Types of offline conversion imports
Google Ads offers 4 options to see how your Google Ads campaigns drive offline conversion imports:
- Directly through Google Ads Conversion Import allows you to import conversions that you track in any other system into Google Ads. It’s the broadest option and applies to many different ways of tracking offline conversions. And it allows you to import conversions that started with an ad click or with a call from your ad.
- Instructions: The setup is different depending on whether you want to import conversions that start with a click on your ad or a phone call from your ad:
- For conversions that start with a click: There are 2 main methods:
- For conversions that start with a phone call: Import phone call conversions
- Instructions: The setup is different depending on whether you want to import conversions that start with a click on your ad or a phone call from your ad:
- Google Ads Conversion Import for Salesforce® allows you to automatically see when sales events that you track in Salesforce started with a click on an ad. It's the best option if you use Salesforce’s Sales Cloud® to track your sales data. You can learn more about the specifics for this solution in About Google Ads Conversion Import for Salesforce®.
- Instructions: Import conversions from Salesforce
- Zapier offline conversion tracking lets you automate the import of your offline conversion tracking information from many different customer relationship management (CRM) systems to Google Ads. Learn about Zapier offline imports for Google Ads
- Instructions: Import conversions from Zapier
- HubSpot’s Google Ads optimization events tool lets you sync your CRM data with Google Ads, allowing you to track offline sales, optimize your campaigns, and improve lead quality. Learn more about HubSpot’s Google Ads optimization events tool
How it works
Offline conversion imports works a little differently depending on whether you’re tracking conversions that start with an ad click or call from your ad.
[Recommended] Conversions from clicks using enhanced conversions for leads
Enhanced conversions for leads relies on a tag to capture first party data to enable durable, more accurate, and higher quality measurement. With enhanced conversions for leads, you can upload deeper lead data back into Google in a durable way, to further drive reporting and optimization insights. Once you’re ready, you can set up enhanced conversions for leads.
Conversions from clicks using GCLID
Google Ads provides you with unique IDs, called Google Click ID (GCLID), for every click that comes to your website from an ad. To track offline conversions from clicks, you'll save these IDs along with whatever lead information you collect from the person who clicked your ad.
Later, when that person "converts" in the offline world, by signing a contract, for example, you give that GCLID back to Google Ads along with a few details about the type of conversion it was and when it happened. Then Google Ads records this conversion along with your other conversion tracking data.
Example
You design, build, and sell custom boardroom tables. You use Google Ads to drive prospective customers to your website, where they then can submit their contact information and request a sales call. If a lead results from a click on an ad, the lead's contact information will also include a GCLID.
Once a week, your salespeople review that week's sales and send you the prospects (and associated GCLIDs) that are converted into customers, along with the date and time of each sale. You then compile that data into a five-column spreadsheet and upload it into your Google Ads account. Within a few hours you'll be able to see which keywords and queries are contributing not just to new lead submissions, but, more importantly, to actual sales.
This new data saves you time and makes it easier to maximize your investment in Google Ads.
Conversions from calls
By importing call conversion information into Google Ads, you can track which of your ads and keywords result in the most sales calls for your business.
Instead of using a click ID as with conversions from clicks, you track information about your phone calls that resulted in sales or other valuable customer actions. When you import this information into Google Ads, these conversions are matched with phone calls from your ads.
For more information about how this option works, read about importing phone call conversions.
Use automated bidding with offline conversion imports
You can use Google Ads automated bid strategies to optimize for offline conversions. If you do, it's a good idea to do the following:
- Import offline conversion data frequently. (Daily is best.)
- Begin uploading conversions and then wait the length of your conversion window before you turn on automated bidding.
- If you're tracking a combination of online and offline conversions, try the target ROAS bid strategy. With target ROAS, you can better optimize for online and offline conversions by assigning different values to different conversion actions, such as leads and offline sales. Before adopting target ROAS, we recommend you include the new values in the ‘Conversions’ column and wait 6 weeks for your campaign to receive conversion values at a similar rate. We also recommend reviewing your budget settings to make sure you feel comfortable spending up to 2 times your average daily budget, while not exceeding the monthly charging limit.
Example
Say you’re tracking leads through an online conversion action, and final sales through an offline conversion action. You can assign different values to each conversion action to reflect the value each has for your business: for example, the value of a lead is $10, and that of a sale is $500. This gives Google Ads more insight into your sales funnel. And the more insight Google Ads has into your sales funnel, the better it can optimize your bids for you.
Security and privacy for conversion tracking
Google has strict security standards. Google Ads only collects data on sites and apps where you have configured tracking.
Ensure that you provide users with clear and comprehensive information about the data you collect on your sites, apps, and other properties. Make sure that you also get consent for that collection where required by law or any applicable Google policies governing user consent, including Google’s EU User Consent Policy.