Bringing together data from different sources in the most effective way is the cornerstone of what we do. NinjaTrack includes a feature that sends a call event to Google Analytics. This allows you to combine NinjaTrack call tracking data with other data collected by Google Analytics in different ways than if the data is coming from different sources. This article guides you through the setup in NinjaCat for how to add this feature to your tracking numbers.

Section Links

Connecting Google Analytics to NinjaCat

Enabling Analytics Event Tracking

Creating a Google Analytics Goal From the Call Event

Will all phone calls send a call event to Google Analytics?

Connecting Google Analytics to NinjaCat

1. If not yet complete, follow the instructions in the article, "How to Add the Google Analytics Network" to connect your NinjaCat agency to Google Analytics

Enabling Analytics Event Tracking

1. If not yet complete, follow the instructions in the article, "How to Add a NinjaTrack Call Tracking Number" to purchase at least one call tracking number and begin to track calls

2. Go to the Account Command Center of the desired account

3. For the desired tracking number, click on the menu icon in the "Action" column in the NinjaTrack card.

4. Click on "Edit"

5. Scroll to the 'Notifications' tab

6. Check the box next to "Enable Analytics Event Tracking".  This will start sending a real-time "call" event to the Google Analytics account previously connected upon the conclusion of every phone call 

Creating a Google Analytics Goal From the Call Event

1. Log in to the Google Analytics account where the call events will be tracked

2. Click on the "Gear" Admin icon near the bottom right

3. Click on "Goals" in the third column under "All Website Data"

4. Click on the "New Goal" button near the top center

5. Give your goal a name such as "NinjaTrack Phone Call"

6. Select your Goal ID number from the drop-down list

7. Select the goal type of "Event"

8. Click the "Continue" button near the bottom center

9. Under the goal details, enter the word "call" for the event category

10. The Action, Label, and Value can be left blank

NinjaNote: The setting under "Value" can be used to specify the minimum duration of the call in seconds for it to be counted as a conversion. By default, NinjaTrack will send all call events to Google Analytics regardless of the call duration or the uniqueness of the caller.

11. Once you have entered the desired settings for your Google Analytics goal, click on the "Save" button near the bottom

NinjaNote: Goals will only register calls that occur from this point going forward, it won't register goal completions for calls prior to goal setup. Keep in mind that it typically takes between 24 to 48 hours for new calls to register as Goals.

Will all phone calls send a conversion to Google Analytics?

When event tracking with Google Analytics (GA) is enabled, NinjaTrack will send a call event to the connected GA account for every phone call received after the goal setup was completed.  However, there may be some reasons why your goals are not making it into the GA account.  Here are a few common reasons to explore if you find that the number of phone calls and the number of goal completions do not match:

1. The API token for your GA account for your agency was expired or temporarily unavailable for us to send call events.
2. The GA account has several filters set up to try to restrict traffic such as bots or other unwanted call events associated with spam or invalid traffic. Check the "filters" section of the GA account to remove or disable the filters
3. The wrong GA view is connected to your account settings.
4. We have noticed since Sept 10, 2019, that a bug was introduced with GA event tracking that call events sent are visible in the GA account shortly after the event was sent, but then they mysteriously vanish or disappear after 24 hours.  GA has acknowledged this issue but has not provided a timeline for a fix.  This appears to only impact Google Paid call events.