The key points
- Track a small number of events that mean money.
- Count a confirmed submission, not a button click.
- Never send names, emails, phone numbers or message text to analytics.
- Mark the right events as key events; this is not retroactive.
What should you measure?
A small number of events mean money: enquiry submitted, call started, WhatsApp opened, booking completed, purchase made. Everything else is context. Most accounts we inherit track dozens of events and none of these, or count page views as conversions, which turns every spending decision into guesswork dressed up as data.
Why count the server-confirmed submission?
A button click shows that someone tried to continue; a confirmed submission shows that the message arrived. Counting the click inflates results and counting nothing on failure hides a broken form. Fire the event once, after the system accepts the enquiry, and make sure a refresh or double click cannot count it twice.
Why do analytics and your ad platform disagree?
Ad platforms credit conversions to themselves within an attribution window; GA4 applies its own attribution model across channels. Neither is lying, and the gap is not a bug. Nominate one source of truth for decisions and note where the others differ, so nobody loses a week reconciling two numbers that were never going to match.
Setting up enquiry tracking
List the actions that matter
Decide which actions are worth money to you: enquiry submitted, call started, WhatsApp opened, booking completed.
Send named events
Fire one event per action, after the action succeeds, with no personal details in the parameters.
Mark key events
In GA4, mark the events that represent real enquiries as key events so reports and ads can use them.
Test both paths
Test success and failure, including double clicks and page refreshes, so nothing is counted twice or missed.
Build a simple report
Show enquiries by source and page on a dashboard someone will read.
Tracking checklist
- Which actions on your site are worth money?
- Does each fire once, after success?
- Is personal information excluded from events?
- Are the important events marked as key events?
- Does anyone read the report each week?
Sources
Rules and guidance this answer relies on. Policies change, so check the current version before acting on it.