Performing Test Click and Conversion

Before you begin, we suggest you check on the following things:

  • The Tracker codes are set up on your landing pages and confirmation pages.
  • If you are using redirects for the click capture instead of the Tracker code, make sure the URL you are using has the redirect tracking parameters.
  • Check that the conv_type IDs have been entered into the conversion pixel tracking code correctly.
  • Check that @Order-ID@ and @Price@ variables have been replaced with appropriate site-side variables or blanks in the confirmation page.

Things To Note Before Starting

You use the Past Hour and Past 24 Hours reports to show actions captured by the Marin Tracker.

The platform generates these reports at the top of every hour, and they will be available around 5 - 20 minutes later (e.g. at 08:20). The reports are not recreated from scratch when you click and open them, and are limited to 5000 rows. For example, for a website where Tracker records 5000 clicks and conversions within two minutes, the report will only contain the last two minutes before the report is generated (in this case data from 07:58 and 07:59). This in turn means that if you perform a test conversion at 7:45, for example, it will not be shown in the report that is generated at 08:00, as the report will have been capped after it reached the 5,000 row limit at 7:58 already.

How To Do A Test Click

  1. Select one of the URLs in the platform that has tracking, and replace the tracking ID value (i.e. the mkwidvalue) with a hard-coded testing name.
    • For example, if your URL is: http://www.powpowsports.com/?mkwid={ifsearch:s}{ifcontent:c}abc123cb&pcrid={creative}&pkwid={keyword}&pmt={matchtype}
    • Update it to: http://www.powpowsports.com/?mkwid=testingname&pcrid={creative}&pkwid={keyword}&pmt={matchtype}
  2. Open a new browser and clear your cookies.
  3. Paste the updated URL into the browser.
  4. Once you have reached the landing page, please wait for the top of the hour, so the Tracker report gets generated that would contain your click (i.e. if you reached the landing page at 1:57 PM, open the report after 2:05 PM)
  5. Follow these steps to open a Past Hour or Past 24 Hours report:
    • Click the Settings > Revenue  & Tracking link in the upper-right.
    • Click Tracker > Tracker Diagnostics at the top of the page.
    • Click Tracker Event Details 
    • If you attempt to open one of these reports and receive the message: "The requested report is not available.", this means that the report is still being generated. The report often becomes available 15 - 30 minutes after the hour, so please wait until then before attempting to re-open the report.
  6. Look for your mkwid testing value (i.e. as in our example above, look for testingname), which should show up within the Query String column (Column F).
  7. This should also be associated with an Action ID of 1 (Column C) which represents your click.
  8. Finding this Action ID of 1 means that Tracker is picking up your click, and the landing page pixel looks to be implemented correctly.
  9. Copy down the UUID for this click as seen in Column D (You use it in step 4 below).

How To Do A Test Conversion

  1. Go back to the website, and complete a transaction for the conversion.
  2. Once you have reached the conversion/confirmation page, please wait for the top of the hour, so the Tracker report gets generated that would contain your conversion (i.e. if you reached the confirmation page at 2:57 PM, open the report after 3:05 PM).
  3. Open a new report in the platform as you did in step 5 above.
  4. Filter for the UUID you saved for your click in Column D.
  5. In the Action ID column (Column C), you should see an Action ID of 1 (your click) and an Action ID of 2 (your conversion).
  6. The Query String column (Column F) for your Action ID of 2, will show the conversion script (i.e. will show the conversion type ID) that is on the confirmation page for your reference.
  7. Finding this Action ID of 2 means that Tracker is picking up your conversion, and the conversion pixel looks to be implemented correctly.

Important Note

If you attempt a test click and test conversion, this should show up in the revenue file for the next day. You can find this by looking up the UUID associated with your test and finding this same UUID within the revenue file.

Note that most likely this will not attribute to any keyword and creative in the platform, since those parameters that are populated by the publisher would have been hard-coded in your test (i.e. would say {matchtype} instead of exact).

Written by Marketing @ Marin Software

Last published at: January 5th, 2024