GTM Tagging Server Hosting

A Google Tag Manager (GTM) tagging server is essentially a dedicated server that specializes in processing events (e.g. user activities on your page). Unlike client-side tracking, processing takes place purely on the server side.

The goal of these specialized servers is still to measure and share data. The same concepts (tags, triggers, variables, ...) that are known from the regular Google Tag Manager are also used.

Because the tracking takes place on a server, a number of advantages can be realized (see next question).

We have no doubt that your client-side tracking is working great and you will collect a lot of the data possible, but you may be missing a significant amount of data. Without trying out server-side tracking, you won't be able to determine or evaluate this.

As a rule, we see an increase of up to 10% in recorded events from our customers as soon as they start server-side tracking. In some cases up to 25% or even significantly more.

The additional data represents a significant competitive advantage, as insights into the use of your own services can be generated more quickly in the analytical area, which usually leads to faster decisions. In the marketing area, campaign performance improves because more conversions can be assigned to the campaigns and, above all, the partners receive data for their optimization.

Please note that a mixed form of client- and server-side tracking can also be implemented and, depending on the specific case, may also be the best option.

Yes, there are a number of other advantages, although the following list is not final:

• the loading time of your website improves, which can lead to SEO advantages
• you have full control over the flow of data to third parties, so you can better protect your users' privacy (by deciding what is really transmitted)
• you can avoid implementing code provided by third parties where you can never know exactly what it does without a careful inspection
• events can be enriched with business-critical and sensitive data that you don't want to make available to everyone in the frontend
• all events can be saved to build a data set with real first-party data
• debugging is easier because logs provide more detailed insights into data processing

Yes, our solution aims to make entering the world of server-side tracking as easy as possible. The only hurdle is your role in Google Tag Manager: you have to be an administrator to make the necessary configurations.

We also provide you with documentation that shows you step by step what you need to do to complete the configuration successfully.

You can choose between different server locations in the creation process. Currently we have two locations, but we are already planning the next ones:

• Germany
• United States - Central

We achieve this through various factors:

• all servers are rented long-term
• many servers are rented at the same time
• we rely on virtualization (Kubernetes) to get the most out of the rented resources
• our experience so that we avoid cost drivers

The answer depends heavily on your tracking setup.

If you have a own GTM container for each of your websites, it is very likely that you will need several GTM server containers too. Since only one tagging server can be assigned to each of these server containers, you need several servers from us.

However, if you are using a holistic setup, one server configuration will be sufficient. We then ensure that there are always enough tagging server instances to handle your event volume.

It is worthwhile for anyone who wants to collect more data for their company. Ultimately, more data is collected for analytics and/or marketing purposes, which is in the end time and money. You are able to perform A/B tests faster, you ad performane will increase, ...

Consequently, it is an investment decision that, based on our experience, will pay for itself within a very short period of time.