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How to Debug and Fix tracking errors - YouTube
Channel: MeasureSchool
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- Do you trust the data
you are collecting?
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If not, in this video, you're
gonna learn a framework
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to ensure your tracking
is working correctly.
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I'm gonna give you a five-step
process you can follow
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to determine any problems with
your tracking and solve them.
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All and more coming up right after this.
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(energetic music)
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Hi there, and welcome to another
video of measureschool.com,
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where we teach you the data-driven
way of digital marketing.
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My name is Julian, and on this channel,
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we do marketing tech reviews, tutorials,
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and how-to videos just like this one.
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So if you haven't yet,
consider subscribing.
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Now a lot of you guys have followed along
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with our tutorials and
installed new tracking
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on your website over the past few months.
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But maybe looking at the data now,
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you find that it doesn't
seem that accurate anymore,
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or is definitely broken.
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What can you do?
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Well, you could investigate
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and see if you can find the error.
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How?
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That's a question I actually
get asked quite often,
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so I thought I'd break it down for you.
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I've come up with a framework you can use
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to find tracking errors,
test your existing tracking,
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and get a clearer picture of your data.
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Now, we got lots to
cover, so let's dive in.
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(energetic music)
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Before we start diagnosing
our tracking error,
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we need to go through
some preparations first.
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So step one is writing down
your tracking steps and results.
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Before you start testing,
you want to have a replicable
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process to go through
with a measurable outcome.
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So for example, if your
conversion is a transaction
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in an e-commerce store
and you wanna test that,
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you should go through the
steps of adding a product
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to your cart, going through the checkout
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and using your credit card
or another payment method,
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and then landing on the thank you page
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where the conversion actually happens.
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Now the results you are
trying to achieve is that
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the conversion actually shows up
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in your e-commerce reports
in Google Analytics.
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That's the measurable
outcome that will determine
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if your test was successful or not.
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Having steps like these
written down will give you
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a clear picture of the variables,
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and determine a definitive
checkpoint to go back later to.
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If you are done with
this, we can proceed to
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step number two which is getting
your debugging tools ready.
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You cannot see what you cannot see.
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Tracking is not directly visible to you
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on the website itself, it
works by sending requests
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to the tools in the background.
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So if any errors happened,
you wouldn't necessarily
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see them in the browser.
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That's where debugging tools come in.
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Now, it often depends
which platform or device
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you wanna try to debug,
but for web tracking,
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we have quite good tools to our disposal.
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For example, if you are using
GTM to deploy your tracking,
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you have the preview
and debug console to see
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a lot of information already
about your tag deployment.
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There are also hosts of
other different extensions
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for Chrome which can make
your tracking visible,
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depending on your tag.
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There's a tag assistant, a tag inspector,
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a Facebook pixel helper,
WAST, GA debugger, and more.
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If you need to see the
requests that are really
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coming and going from your browser
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and you don't mind getting
a little bit more technical,
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you can utilize the
Chrome developer tools.
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Other than that, you can
also use external proxies
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such as Fiddler or Charles,
to see what is being sent
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and received by the browser.
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No matter what you are trying to achieve,
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make sure you have the
right tools in place
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so you can diagnose any problems later.
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Which takes us then to step number three,
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which is actually testing
our implementation.
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So with all your debugging
tools running now,
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you can now execute the
process from step number one
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and go through them step by step.
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Note down if you see any weird errors,
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and if you can replicate your
end result from step one.
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If you run into any major
issues, you can go over to
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step number four, which is
debugging and fixing your error.
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And this is really all about
asking the right questions.
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So in our previous
example, if our transaction
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doesn't get tracked, I would ask myself,
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what needs to happen in
order for this to work?
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Luckily, there is a blueprint
in the Google documentation
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which explains how things
are supposed to work.
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In most cases, transaction
tracking heavily relies on
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custom data that needs to be
pushed to Google Analytics.
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I would start investigating
with the GA debugger
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if this data actually gets pushed,
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and if there are any errors on the page
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in the markup itself that
prevent that from happening.
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Yes, this can be quite
intensive, technical,
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and sometimes frustrating,
but it can really help you
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to come up with a solid
treatment to fix your error.
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Then you can go back to your developer,
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re-implement, and start
tracking your data again.
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Once it's working correctly, I would go to
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step number five, which is cross-checking.
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What does that mean?
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Well, in our previous
example, we did transaction,
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even if they now get
tracked in Google Analytics,
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it doesn't necessarily mean
that this data is correct.
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But we can utilize external data sources,
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in our case, it would be
the back-end order records,
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to cross-check that data, and
see if anything is missing
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or if it's in realms of acceptability.
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And by the way, no tracking
is always 100% accurate,
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so don't stress too much about
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a small margin of error that can occur.
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(energetic music)
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So there you have it, five steps to test
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and verify your tracking.
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A short recap, first of
all, mark down your steps
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and end result you need to go through,
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then get your debugging tools ready,
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then test your tracking by
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going through your testing protocol,
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and debugging and fixing any errors.
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And in the end, cross-check your data
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with available third-party data.
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So now I wanna hear from you,
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what was your most frustrating error
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that you had to debug and
fix with your tracking?
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Please leave a comment below
and join the conversation.
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And as always, if you like this video,
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please share it to your
friends or colleague,
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and subscribe to this channel
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to get more of these
videos every Wednesday.
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My name is Julian, 'til next time.
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