Conversion tracking requires three layers: the tracking infrastructure, event definitions, and validation. Start by installing Google Tag Manager (GTM) on every page of your site—one container snippet in the head, one after the opening body tag. Then set up Google Analytics 4 through GTM or directly. GA4 automatically tracks page views and some user interactions, but you need to manually configure the conversions that matter to your business. Define your conversion events based on business value. E-commerce sites track purchases and add-to-cart actions. Lead-gen businesses track form submissions, phone clicks, and email clicks. Local service companies often track direction requests and call button taps on mobile. In GA4, navigate to Admin > Events > Create Event or mark existing events as conversions under Admin > Conversions. Common events include purchase, generate_lead, contact, and form_submit. For Google Ads campaigns, link your GA4 property to Google Ads and import your conversions, or set up conversion tracking directly in Google Ads using the global site tag. Phone call tracking requires either Google's website call conversion tracking (free but limited) or a third-party service like CallRail or CallTrackingMetrics (starting around $45–$75 CAD/month). These replace your site's phone number with tracking numbers that attribute calls to specific campaigns. Test everything before trusting the data. Submit test forms, make test purchases in a staging environment, click tracked phone numbers. Use GA4's DebugView or GTM's Preview mode to watch events fire in real time. Check that revenue values pass correctly for e-commerce and that source/medium attribution makes sense. At Ottawa SEO, we typically configure 4–6 conversion events per client: a primary macro-conversion (purchase, qualified lead) and several micro-conversions (newsletter signups, resource downloads, engagement milestones). We validate tracking monthly because site updates, plugin conflicts, and platform changes break tracking more often than most businesses realize. Without accurate conversion data, you're optimizing blind—spending ad budget and SEO effort without knowing what actually drives revenue.