Track ClickFunnels form submissions as conversions in Google Ads

Running ads to a ClickFunnels funnel is a great way to get new leads for your business. But if you can't tell which clicks actually turned into leads or sales, you have no idea how to optimise your campaigns to get better results.

Most people try to solve this with Google Tag Manager, but that means writing custom code to listen for form submissions, then wiring up triggers, tags, and variables to get it over to Google Ads.

You could try doing simpler things like firing conversions on a thank you page, but that doesn't work very well these days as ad blockers & privacy features in browsers like Safari will stop about 30% of your conversions from ever making it back to Google. Plus, Google wants you to send the lead's name, email, phone, etc. with each conversion, and that data isn't available on a thank you page.

So how do you actually set up proper conversion tracking in Google Ads when you use ClickFunnels? This guide will walk you through it.

Why you need to send conversions to Google Ads server-side

Google Ads smart bidding engine (the one that powers bid strategies like Target CPA or Maximise Conversions) looks at hundreds of signals (location, time of day, past purchase behavior, and more) about a particular searcher and decides how much to bid for the click based on how likely they are to convert.

It's extremely powerful, but without reliable conversion data, Google is essentially guessing. This is why accurate conversion tracking is super important.

The problem is that the usual methods of setting up conversion tracking (like tracking thank you pages or using Google Tag Manager) all rely on a tag loading and firing events inside the visitor's browser, and there are a bunch of things that stop that:

• Ad Blockers — Ad blockers stop the Google Tag from loading in the visitor's browser, so nothing they do on your site will ever be tracked.
• Privacy Features in Browsers — Safari and other privacy-focused browsers cap how long they'll let cookies set by the Google Tag stay in the visitor's browser (usually just to one day), which means the Google will struggle to attribute a conversion back to an ad click unless it happens that exact same day.
• Using multiple devices — If someone clicks your ad on their phone during lunch, then completes your form that evening on their laptop, then browser-based tracking can't connect those events because they happen on different devices.

Server-side tracking works differently. Rather than sending a conversion event through the visitor's browser and hoping it works, Converly sends the lead's details straight to Google's servers, so ad blockers and privacy settings never get a chance to interfere.

it makes a real difference too. In fact, Google reports that businesses switching to server-side tracking see conversions rise by 23% on average, while cost per conversion drops by roughly 10%, because the algorithms have the covnersion data they need to learn who your ideal customers are so they can serve your ads more prominently to others like them.

3 simple steps to send server-side conversions to Google Ads from ClickFunnels

Here's how to connect ClickFunnels to Google Ads with server-side tracking in 3 easy steps.

Step 1: Build your Conversion Flow in Converly

Converly handles the connection between ClickFunnels and Google Ads without you need to write any custom code or any complicated set up.

If you've used Zapier or HubSpot Workflows before, the builder above will feel instantly familiar. You simply choose a trigger (like a form being submitted in your ClickFunnels funnel), then pick the action you want it to take (like sending a conversion to Google Ads).

That's the whole setup. A few clicks and you have server-side conversion tracking running in Google Ads.

Step 2: Add the Converly code to your funnel

After you publish your Conversion Flow, Converly will give you a little snippet of code to add to your funnel.

Inside your ClickFunnels account, this goes into your funnel's tracking code settings, or the header/footer section if you're adding it site-wide. Alternatively, if you have tools like Google Tag Manager installed on your funnels then you can add it through there as well.

Step 3: Test it works

To confirm everything is wired up correctly, go complete a test opt-in or order form on your live funnel.

Then head back into Converly, open your Conversion Flow, click the 3 dots menu in the top right, and choose View Logs.

From the logs page, click into the entry you just created to see everything captured about it, including whether Google Ads accepted it.

Dig in a bit further and you can even see the exact payload Converly sent to Google Ads, along with the response it got back.

Once your test submission shows up in the log as successfully delivered, your tracking is live. Most people have the whole thing running in well under 5 minutes.

Why Converly is the best way to send conversions to Google Ads from ClickFunnels

There's more than one way to send ClickFunnels orders/opt-ins into Google Ads as conversions, so what makes Converly the best?

1. Easy to set up

Google Tag Manager is the ten-thousand-pound gorilla in this space that most people start with. But doing that means writing code to detect submissions across every funnel step, pulling the lead's name and email into the dataLayer, hashing that data with SHA-256 the way Google requires, and then stitching together the right triggers, tags, and variables.

If you're not an expert in Google Tag Manager, that's a lot of hours to burn just to get basic tracking working.

Converly handles all of the complexity for you. You just pick your trigger (a ClickFunnels form completion), pick your action (a Google Ads conversion), and you're done. No custom code, no hunting through GTM documentation.

2. Not affected by ad blockers and privacy restrictions

Browser-based methods, whether that's Google Tag Manager or basic thank you page tracking, lose a real chunk of conversions to ad blockers and privacy-first browsers before they ever reach Google. In fact, one study looking at over 7 million conversions found tag-based tracking was losing close to 30% of all conversions.

Converly avoids this entirely by sending conversions directly from our server to Google's servers, so none of that gets blocked.

3. Works across devices

A visitor clicking your ad on their phone but completing your form later on a laptop is normal behavior these days, and that's going to cause issues with browser-based tracking methods (like using Google Tag Manager to track thank you page visits), because the original ad click and then later conversion happen on different devices with no way to link them together.

Converly helps you solve this by passing the lead's details (name, email, and so on) straight to Google's servers. This gives Google the data that it needs to match conversion back to person that originally clicked the ad, which allows it to accurately attribute the conversion back to the campaign, ad group, keyword, etc they clicked.

4. Sends more data

Beyond sending basic contact details like name, email, and phone, Converly also captures technical signals such as the Google Click ID (GCLID), IP address, and User Agent, and passes all of it to Google Ads.

That gives Google Ads a much richer profile to work with when trying to match a conversion back to the original person that clicked the ad, and helps make your overall conversion tracking much more accurate.

5. Supports multiple tools and platforms

Converly connects to over 100 form builders, website builders, scheduling tools, chat widgets, and more (including ClickFunnels). From there, it can push conversion events out to Google Analytics, Google Ads, Meta Ads, ChatGPT Ads, LinkedIn Ads, Microsoft Ads, and several other destinations.

So if you add a new tool to your website or start running ads somewhere new down the track, you're not rebuilding tracking from zero. Just connect it inside Converly and go.

6. Gives you a full conversion log and email alerts

With tools like Google Tag Manager, you can do some tests when you are initially setting it up, but once it's up, you're mostly hoping it keeps working.

Converly removes that guesswork. Every conversion gets logged, and you can see what data was captured, exactly what got sent to Google Ads, and how Google Ads responded.

You can also switch on email alerts, either for every conversion or just for failures, so you find out as soon as something breaks (instead of discovering it a month later when you have 0 conversions in your reports).

3 things you can do when you properly send conversions to Google Ads from ClickFunnels

Once Google Ads is getting real, accurate conversion data from your funnel, a lot of new options open up:

1. Report on conversions by campaign, ad group, keyword, etc.

Instead of just clicks and impressions, your Google Ads account now shows conversions, conversion rate, cost per conversion, return on ad spend, and more. And you can break all of that down by campaign, ad group, keyword, ad, country, and other dimensions.

That level of detail makes it much easier to see wwhich campaigns, ads, keywords, etc are actually working, and which ones you might be able to cut.

2. Switch to smart bidding strategies like Maximimse Conversions or Target CPA

Doing manual bidding isn't really the best way to run a Google Ads account. You're essentially telling Google to spend up to $3 a click (for example), and it obeys that instruction no matter who's actually searching or how likely they are to convert.

Smart Bidding works differently. You give it a target, like $45 per lead, and Google handles the bidding for you. It takes into account signals about the searcher (like device, location, age, interests, and prior behaviour) and will bid higher for people who it thinks are more likely to convert (and lower for those who won't).

It's an easy and effective way to get more leads at less cost, but it doesn't work without solid conversion data behind it though. If you're accurately telling Google ‘This person converted and this person didn’t' then it can't learn what a good searcher looks like for you, and it will just end up overpaying for clicks from people who were never going to convert.

Using Converly means you're giving Google's smart bidding technology the clean data it needs to work, so you can actually take advantage of it and bring in more leads for less.

3. Retarget people who visited your site but didn't convert

Accurate conversion data also lets you build remarketing audiences made up of visitors who came to your funnel but didn't opt in or buy.

From there, you have a few ways to bring them back:

• Search — Adjust your bids up or down for this audience the next time they search for your keywords.
• Display — Show display ads to just this group as they browse other sites on the Google Display Network.
• YouTube — Serve YouTube ads specifically to people who visited your site but didn't convert, keeping your brand in front of them and driving them back to your site.

Wrap Up

If you want accurate conversion data flowing in Google Ads, Converly is the simplest way to make it happen.

Conversions are sent directly to Google's servers, so ad blockers and privacy browsers never get in the way, and Converly sends the full set of lead details (name, email, phone, IP address, User Agent, and more) so Google has everything it needs to match the conversion back to the original ad click.

It takes just a few minutes to set up and comes with a 14-day free trial, so give it a try today!