Google Tag Manager Tutorial for Beginners (2024) with New Google Tag

A step-by-step guide on how to get started with Google Tag Manager (and install Google Analytics 4). This includes the new Google Tag template in GTM.
If you are working with Google Analytics 4, Google Ads, Facebook Pixel, or other analytics/marketing tracking tools, Google Tag Manager is a must. It lets you manage tracking codes much faster and easier.
If you are not sure how or where to get started, this Google Tag Manager tutorial is exactly what you need. In this 1 hour video, I'll show you how to:
- Create your first container
- Create your first tags in GTM (we'll use Google Analytics 4)
- How to make sure that your setup works properly
- And how to publish those changes (so that Google Analytics would start measuring your website traffic).
Additionally, some parts of the video will contain a quick introduction to Google Analytics 4 functionality.
=== TIMESTAMPS ===
00:00 - Intro
00:46 - What is Google Tag Manager?
04:14 - Create an account and container
06:30 - Account overview
10:17 - How to install Google Tag Manager
14:28 - Tags, triggers, and variables
18:07 - Quick introduction to Google Analytics 4
24:40 - Tags. Tracking pageviews with Google Analytics 4
28:40 - Testing tags
32:20 - Publishing tags
34:40 - Implementing custom scripts
37:58 - Quick introduction Google Analytics 4 event tracking
42:34 - Triggers
48:47 - Event tracking (with GA4)
01:00:09 - What you should do next
⭐⭐⭐ FEATURED RESOURCES ⭐⭐⭐
✭ Free E-book: Google Tag Manager for Beginners
www.analyticsmania.com/free-e...
✭ Course: Google Tag Manager Masterclass for Beginners
www.analyticsmania.com/course...
=== LINKS ===
Subscribe to our KZbin channel / @analyticsmania
✭ Video: Google Analytics 4 tutorial for beginners
• Google Analytics 4 Tut...
✭ How to install Google Tag Manager
www.analyticsmania.com/post/h...
✭ Google Tag Manager Preview Mode not Working? Here’s how to fix it
www.analyticsmania.com/post/g...
✭ Chrome Extension: Tag Assistant Companion
chrome.google.com/webstore/de...
✭ Documentation: Automatically tracked events in Google Analytics 4
support.google.com/analytics/...
✭ Documentation: Google Analytics 4 recommended events
support.google.com/analytics/...
✭ Documentation: Enhanced Measurement Events
support.google.com/analytics/...
📕 Free e-book: Getting Started with Google Analytics 4
www.analyticsmania.com/p/gett...
✭ Wordpress plugin: GTM4WP
wordpress.org/plugins/duracel...
=== CONNECT WITH JULIUS & ANALYTICS MANIA ===
✭ Facebook / analyticsmania
✭ Twitter / fedorovicius
✭ Linkedin / fedorovicius
Subscribe to our KZbin channel / @analyticsmania
#googleanalytics4 #googletagmanager

[@karmenpintar9553]

Finally someone qualified to accurately show GTM and GA4 flow. What about linking to Google Ads? I would be happy for a more detailed presentation of the connection between Google Ads and GTM + Remarketing. Thanks for the great posts!

[@BenedictHensley-mq9vc]

You putting this up for free is actually clutch - praise to you

[@gicarol]

I love that you explain everything in detail, slow and patiently like teaching a toddler, EXACTLY WHAT I NEED! lol, thank you!!

[@dtps_champion6016]

Thank you for keeping the guides updated

[@francesf2536]

amazing! Finally understood how GTM and GA4 work together. Thanks for the great video tutorial.

[@shlomibiton9804]

Very informative and easy to follow

[@anthonykol]

The best teacher ever!

[@malcolm5969]

Thank you for such in depth tutorial, much better than UDemy courses out there.

[@SpitfireDance]

Your video was so helpful! I was flailing around going from tutorial to tutorial learning bits and pieces until I found this. Thank you!

[@ihuraibi]

You're a legend 💙

[@ronaldv.7931]

I failed to setup Google Analytics with GTM using intuition (I've done it in the past), then reading Google support pages, I don't know if it's misleading or plain wrong. I didn't know where to get the tag ID. This tutorial saved me. Thanks!

[@nahidkhan4320]

Best 👌👌

[@lockheed55]

Thanks for your video's! While watching the GA4 configuration video with a single GTM container for multiple environments, I noticed the update where the GA4 config was exchanged for Google Tag. So I am wondering how can I implement a single GTM container for multiple environments and connect it to the live and staging GA4 properties.

[@MLATX512]

Thank you so much for this! The Google training is light on the important details. Their approach is, "Do x and it just works" but it is much more complex than that. For example, they suggest using Purchase events but provide no more detailed background, as if simply enabling the purchase event automagically provides purchase information without being set up and configured for the correct triggers and variables on your website.

[@lilyann168]

This helped me prep for an interview so I can sound at least somewhat knowledgeable….you described things very clearly with super helpful visuals thank u so much

[@FiestaConsultants]

amazing content and explained in such detail and structure. hardly you get so motivated to comment someone after a tutorial -- great work

[@drumhead869]

Thank you so much for the video Julius , really helped me to understand the basics of google tag manager

[@realtortony702]

Thank you for taking the time to put together the tutorial, I followed along but ultimately could not get it to operate correctly. I will continue researching so that I can get a better understanding.

[@silverploompuu5637]

Thank you for the tutorial! Crazy how opposite of user friendly this setup process is for the average user, feels like you should study the setup process for half a year to really feel confident that you've got a grip on it.

[@THRIV3Creative]

Fantastic course thank you man!

[@YorkshirePork]

Omg I finally understand it now. A tag is for each action. I was trying to use a single tag for each platform and adding multiple triggers to it for different events. So I need a new tag for each event on each platform with a trigger of custom event. Thank you

[@Binks1112]

You are amazing, I watched every step and you made it super simple. Please never stop creating!! thank you thank you thank you!!!!!

[@Danielaviv]

Exellent tutorial, very helpful, thank you!

[@Saiidsadiikii]

Merci beaucoup pour toutes ces explications approfondies. 👋

[@sylwiabandura3612]

The best of the best. Finally understood how GTM works!

[@neattips6739]

Amazing 😍😍

[@mbazarah]

The best video tutorial, thank you

[@BHAII7860]

I was waiting for this

[@stepaheadweb]

Julius, all I have to say is, Google must drive you nuts with all of the changes and updates, that force you to keep re-doing the same or similar tutorials over and over. LOL But we all appreciate your work and help tremendously. I was on one of your tutorials, then it said .. go here for a new one .. then it said, wait .. go here for the newer "new" version. I was just laughing. If it seems to drive us crazy, I can only imagine you having to keep up with all of this. I hope you're laughing as these changes occur instead of getting frustrated. Thanks again bud. Wonderful job. 😀

[@olenavashchenko4242]

True! And Julius updates these instructions for free every time. Thank you!

[@user-gf6yn6pu8c]

This is quite insightful, thank you

[@bernhardsmuts2265]

Great info! Thanks for the video, it's well appreciated!

[@Sochi-app]

This video was extremely helpful. Thank you.

[@madhavbhattarai2861]

Thank you so much for the video, really enlightening 💡

[@seven340]

This was awesome, the step by step walk through Creating "Triggers", then "variables", then "tags" was super helpful for someone with minimal coding experience.

[@Shawneeford]

this

[@hajjimubarak]

Thanks bro, you made it look easy

[@yuriykabanets7665]

Super, thank you!

[@user-qc6fp4it8w]

Thanks a million,,,,,,,,💞💞💞

[@user-vi8qd4sh7q]

Hello, how are you? You are doing a good job. I searched your channel, which is wonderful and full of events, but I noticed that there is no video talking about how to retarget the dynamic through Google Ads Remarketing and how it works. Please explain. Thank you.

[@OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO0001]

Extremely helpful

[@suzijane101]

Thank you for the video! Very informative! The GA4 account we use was set up by someone who's no longer part of our company. At that time, unique tags for GA4 were added to each webpage, with some pages having up to three tags. Additionally, some pages include a container. I'm working on streamlining our website and ensuring accurate event and data collection. Unfortunately, I don't have access to the original GTM account, so we need to set up a new GTM account for our GA4. Would it be advisable to establish this new GTM account and apply a single GTM tag across all pages, even though this might result in loss of some data? Any thoughts?

[@kalaharikomerc6214]

Great tutorial!

[@HUBBOND]

Hey Julious, I am really excited to have dropped on to your channel. I thought all you really needed top do was to copy and paste the Google tracking code into the head, and BINGO, all the info reports would be there to view. O how was I wrong. You really take time giving the steps to actually understand this process, and i really enjoyed this particular video , even though it is my first dive into this topic. I have a very important website and all this data needs to set up so improvements can be made to get the full knowledge for traffic and conversions . I will be your student from now on. My name is Mark.

[@arielhatav0232]

You are the best

[@GylesGallagher]

Clear and understandable, I wish there was more information like this.

[@AliciaLacasse2015]

What's the best method of sending the same events to multiple measurement IDs?

[@wrt3778]

Awesome tutorial, thanks!

[@user-lk2lc4ym4j]

thank you bracie

[@cisssdubas-saint-laurent8177]

Is it possible to track a click on link (custom event) but only "once by session"?

[@olhamikhavchuk9104]

Very useful video, thank you!

[@olenavashchenko4242]

Great job! I'm following this tutorial step-by-step for the second time - amazing! Thank you! By the way, in the case of Tag set up "Initialisation ...." didn't work for me. The "All pages" setup worked. Did anyone have the same issue?

[@palashsana1517]

Very helpful

[@K1LLA_KING_KONG]

Thanks for this. Just 1 question, once a GA4 event is created, how long does it take until you can import it to 'Ad words' conversions? Is this also a 24-48hr wait?

[@user-op8xi4gv8y]

you just earned another subscriber

[@vampir94]

Hello mate, been watching your videos and you helped a lot! Thank you! One question: Does having the Shopify "Google & KZbin" app as well as the GTAG manager setup in the theme code on Shopify bring double clicks to my GA? How do I check that?

[@alyaabdullah217]

Awesome 😍

[@SladjanavanderToorn]

Julius you’re the best!

[@user-fg6ty5wu8n]

I learned more about Google analytics than anywhere else

[@aliahabdullah]

Hi! great video! Question regarding the triggering part at 28:29 since you said the current recommendation is "initiallization - All Pages" and then on the testing tags part you said it should be fired on "container loaded" 29:12. when I did it and choose initiallization - All Pages it fired only on initiallization. is this correct? and whats the diffrent between initiallization - All Pages and All pages option?

[@AnalyticsMania]

Editing mistake. Sorry. The current recommendation is on initialization. It fires a bit earlier than container loaded

[@healthcaremarketingpro]

@@AnalyticsMania this messed me up for almost 30 minutes. Thanks for the video but man this was frustrating.

[@JasminIssaka]

Thanks you! This really confused me @@AnalyticsMania

[@bensamsteele5622]

Thanks for replying to this!! I also got stuck for like an hour. You can see in cuts that at 28:25 it show "type" - Tag, but then then in the next cut it shows "type" Google Analytics... @@AnalyticsMania

[@bensamsteele5622]

And google's instructions say to check if it's working in the Initialization tab not container loaded tag. Just for anyone else who gets stuck. But thank you for this awesome tutorial! I've been taking google's own Skillshop course and this really fills in some gaps that they skip.

[@user-qq5dw2if6i]

I have a question that Gtags ID in my GA4 start with AW- instead of G-. Is it normal or some mistakes here? Looking forward to here from you. Thank you!

[@Bidya765]

Thanks

[@minjusong3445]

Thank you for the video! I use Shopify and at 14:23, you said to add the code in every page. How to add the code in every page? or every liquid? Thank you!!

[@elifenzi]

Hi. i've got a "thank-you"-Page. i've created in google tag manager a tag called "opens_thank_you_page". trigger: page-url it works fine (at least I am shown this event in the debugview). Now I want to create a google ads conversion. so the thank-you-page also should work as a conversion goal for google ads. So i created a new tag for google analytics with the page-url as a trigger.(like in previous mentioned example) Now how is it possible to distinguish wheter a visitor came through google ads or organic search? via the google conversion label and ID or how? can someone help? Kind regards

[@_aisolo]

Hey! what is your thoughts on using sitekit for wordoress to have like GA4, GTM, and google ads all setup? or wouldit be better to just add the gtm code manually?

[@Moonfox87]

awesome video.. I made everything until event tracking but, how can I track purchase at woocommerce ?

[@EL1L]

Hi, the video is very good, thanks! But I wanted to ask what a digital agency does? I work with my clients through MCC but I don't know how to work with them with GTM... is there a tag arena? Is there a similar platform like MCC? The customers don't know how to open the GTM account and they also don't want to share their email details, what do we do?

[@BobBob-du3so]

hi ! Google Tag says : "" Paste this code as high in the of the page as possible "" , than why did you pasted it before the closing tag and not after the ? Many thanks in advance. Your is the Best video in KZbin of the topic !

[@AnalyticsMania]

No big difference

[@BobBob-du3so]

@@AnalyticsMania Cool ! Many many thanks ! 🙂

[@user-wi7mw1gk8g]

Julius, thank you for this information. I have a site that I setup several months ago, but I initially disabled the ISPs from crawling my site until I felt I was ready to launch. After launching, I enabled the feature for google to crawl my site, but it has been at least 3 - 4 weeks and I can't find my site in any searches. Meanwhile, I went and setup Google Analytics yesterday, and while doing so it said it could not detect a google tag on my website. While the setup assistant allowed me to move forward despite this, I'm concerned because the G-code they provided in the setup does not match the G-code that GA provided upon completion of the install. Can you provide some help and or guidance? Much appreciated!

[@rod-hs4hm]

Great video, but do have a question, when I install the code in the header and body, I did a test (optional) and got a green check mark. But when I did a preview, its said it couldn't connect due to a timed out. Is that a problem?

[@digitaldivergence777]

Hi great video as always, however there is an error in the video at 28m.53sec. The instructions provided indicate the developer should be looking in the 'container loaded' however the trigger you requested was "initialise" not "all pages'. This means the developer should be looking in the 'Initialization' event to ensure that the tag fired successfully. The 'container loaded' event will indicate that the tag has not fired.

[@makingenglishfun257]

Very Grateful for the effort on this, i messed up first time round so i when i preview to see if the tag is firing (it isn't) but i have 2 google tags found, one is the container icon, one is the new tag icon and then another is a analytics icon. So the container icon says not foudn on the site - the tag we set up with the "measurement id" shows up but says no hits were sent by this tag. 3 days and i jsut got over mediavine numbers and i messed it all up :( any ideas?

[@joshuahawkes7923]

I have 3 versions of my GTM container. I had to roll back to the 1st version (empty container), but after I published the empty container, my GA4 and remarketing tags are still showing up in the legacy browser extension and they're firing in preview mode. Does this just take some time to adjust?

[@user-vu8zu3lb3w]

30:54 When I click on the tag detail I have : Type, Firing Status (succeded), measurement ID. But no "send a page view" , "send to server" and i have nothing in Analytics after this. Do you know why ?

[@vishaljaiswal1939]

Hi could you please make video on roadmap to learn GTM and sequence wise topic to cover

[@ghostnbdy]

was hoping you show this 1st before showing the dashboard on google analytics. 28:00 but anyhow, thanks for this.

[@Koszika]

I want to track conversions on my youtube video. How do I set it up there? And also: why doesnt youtube already have the Google Tag on there, so I dont need to set it up?

[@rusnoyam2526]

Great Video! Thanks. If Google Analytics is already installed on the website, should it be removed when Google Tag Manager is installed?

[@AnalyticsMania]

If you install Google Tag Manager and then install GA4 via GTM, then remove Google Analytics from the code of the website

[@rusnoyam2526]

@@AnalyticsMania Thanks for reply!

[@Cece_m2]

Can you also add google tag manager on the google site? TIA for response

[@suzanamaric5029]

Hi Julius, tag doesnt fire when i put trigger "initiaization - all pages". even you changed at 28:45 trigger to "all pages"...is it possible?

[@mandyarchery3780]

Would you know if google sites have updated to ad Google tag manager

[@kensleylewis]

I have a project where I am using JavaScript to get all the class names of my HTML element, from all pages. And want to see them in Google Analytics. Should I created a custom HTML Tag for this? or should I use DOM element tag for this?

[@nashanfernando]

Thank you for such in depth tutorial

[@user-wi8vv7zq8p]

Hi Julius, first of all, great video and thank you for the tutorial! Regarding the event parameter, you entered 'link_url' and 'link_text' in 53:40, and it was checkmarked as 'this is a known parameter.' My questions are: 1. On the old GTM setup, this was customizable, and we could enter whatever we wanted. However, when I updated the tag, I received a red notice text 'event parameter cannot be emptied.' Can you share the default parameters we can use? 2. Can we change it based on our needs to create a custom parameter? Thank you!

[@AnalyticsMania]

The error says that parameter cannot be empty. Maybe you left an empty field? Or maybe left a space? You can still eneter custom parameters there.

[@user-fg8bw5zl8r]

nice

[@studiopantarhei]

The event container loaded does not take place when the trigger 'Initialisation All Pages' is selected. Is that a change?

[@user-vs4ee1qr3q]

Hey great video man as always! I have done everything perfectly, when I try to test my Debug later in the video it is inaccurate, when I go on the website nothing comes up on the debug, my tag is firing successfully however, so I do not know why it is not updating. Any advice?

[@user-hf9uq5uh5j]

Publish

[@BLTspirit]

This video was very triggering.

[@andyd568]

An underappreciated pun. Thank you.

[@saraginsburg9839]

codeless injection isn't showing as an option on wp--any idea if this is a change in the plugin or an issue on my site?

[@PaganDreamer]

@AnalyticsMania I do the same thing as you do when we talk about GA4 initialization code - all pages (30:10 timer) but my container loaded is not firing. Initialization works, but other than that no - any thoughts? GA4 in Debug View shows the events correctly on the other side

[@AnalyticsMania]

Sounds like your dsta layer is broken www.analyticsmania.com/post/pageview-trigger-not-working-in-google-tag-manager/

[@morganfranklin8389]

First, this is an awesome video! I have paid for courses that didn't do as thorough a job as you have. Thank you so much. Question: I have installed the snippet and can see it on my site in inspector. However, when I use the tag assistant it sees the tag but when I look at "container loaded" it states not fired. I have reviewed my tag set up and confirmed that I followed your instructions at the 29:23 mark. Any idea why it wouldn't be firing?

[@morganfranklin8389]

But it does show as fired under "Set"?

[@AnalyticsMania]

Hi, difficult to troubleshoot like that. Can be various reasons, but this would require a more thorough audit

[@morganfranklin8389]

@@AnalyticsMania Figured it out. For some reason when I only selected initialization it didn't work. However, when I selected all pages it worked. I also removed the google analytics script from the site. Assume that could have been causing some kind of conflict with the GTM analytics tag?

[@tomstexasrealty]

@@morganfranklin8389 Thanks for posting this. I had the same issue.

[@supernaturae639]

Hi! I’m having an issue with testing tags at 29.26. First it tells me To improve the quality of your testing, enable your Tag Manager container for debugging in the Tag Assistant window, then return here. Next clicking bag, it tells me not found . So frustrating ! I disabled the cookies consent form on my website so it should allow me to track, not really sure how to proceed.

[@kavyakatariya3824]

HEy did you solved this. I am facing the same , it says my google tag not found

[@AnThOnY-NOW]

I have a. Google tag ID going to two different destinations. When setting this up I accidentally created two analytic accounts. I have moved the duplicate analytics account to trash but my google tag id still shows going to active analytics account and the one I deleted.I do not see a way for me to delete that destination, when clicking on minus button it only allows you to change to another existing tag or create a new one. Anyt thoughts … ?

[@Justin-Bamforth]

Could anyone help me? Where do i find the data to show my clients in GA4? I've setup correctly in Tag Manager but can't work out where it shows up in GA4.

[@user-xg6vd9rz8h]

new fan here, sir

[@JasmanJssmanosman-lq1bk]

5:21 5:23

[@user-kr6by4rq1l]

What if the tag is not fire on the Container Loaded?

[@beaubreau]

Just as a note here for those that do not code. Many CMS services have a dynamic structures to render pages. Typically the content is injected into your highest level file. For the example he was showing was a Shopify theme.liquid file. The theme.liquid file to be clear is not your home page rather it is a file that nests all your other pages/components that you want to render to the web. Why this matters - you can indeed just put Google tag manager in your theme.liquid file and every page does have access to GTM. What he is talking about with pages only matters if all of your pages are individual .html files that are only linked to the homepage. So for example you would have your homepage as something like index.html and then your about me page as about.html and then on your home page nav you may have a link to your about me page. If your setup is like this, then yes you need to put your Google tag on that about page. I am only pointing this out because the vast majority of modern websites do not use this file structure anymore but rather they use dynamic rending of pages all sourced within the highest level file. Therefore, all of the pages then do have access because the header is used for every page on your site. We do it this way now so that we do not have to repeat the same code over and over again for the things that are constant across your site such as your nav and footer. If your site was not dynamic you would have to copy that code to every single html page and that just gets super clunky and slows down the site. This can be super confusing because theme.liquid in some ways is very similar to the index.html in the way that we do treat it as the homepage often and sometimes even code up static information within the file. I wanted to make this clear as I imagine some people might be confused if they are trying to figure out where to put the GTM for their other pages when they probably don't need to do that.

[@Joewiththedadbod]

How do you add a google tag to a forwarded website so that you can track clicks through the forward link?

[@AnalyticsMania]

You can't. Ga4 must be added as a javascript code to the website and that page must load for ga4 to work

[@gunjansatija5647]

Please help me with this error - No hits were sent by this tag Other tags on this page may have taken action (Once I connect my website with it )

[@awakenthegreatnesswithin]

At 29:19 should we only have three tags? One for GTM and one for GA4 and one for the Gtag? I seem to have more. I don’t understand why

[@AnalyticsMania]

You can have more. This is just a tutorial for beginners

[@awakenthegreatnesswithin]

@@AnalyticsMania oh ok cool thanks

[@milosgajic23]

Hi, on minute 30:32 under container loaded my is showing Tags Not Fired, but under Initialization it is Tags Fired > GA4 config is it good or bad? Also on GA in DebugView it show some tracking.

[@thesavvysquad]

Following! Also happening to me. Checking "container loaded" and it shows my GA4 under "Tags Not Fired"

[@tiffanymoss457]

Same exact issue here and I’m stumped!

[@thesavvysquad]

Hey guys, I've just read some comments in this thread and I'm assuming this is a mistake in the video. If you check the "Initialization" folder instead of "Container Loaded" - GA4 config should be firing in here. It's showing for me in this folder which makes sense because we set it up as initialization! Hope this helps! :)

[@milosgajic23]

Yes, i think it’s mistake in a video GA is working fine

[@joeymorando1415]

I am not getting the same results after following this video. 1. When I create a trigger and preview it (around 45:11) i cannot see any of the clicks that I do on my site. 2. When I go to cerate a tag later in the video (51:11) where am I getting the Meaurement Id from? Thanks for any help on this!

[@sandykuo9022]

Hey there! I think the Measurement ID you can get it from your GA4 (Admin->Data stream-> your measurement ID)