When you manage data for multiple websites and mobile applications, you will be tempted – with good reason – to consolidate the data into a single data source. Because we are now slimming down our data footprint, this post shows how to achieve data consolidation using server-side tag management. The post will be focusing for Google products, but rest assured this can be done with other vendors.
A few years back, back when we were still using Google Universal Analytics, I wrote about consolidating traffic from multiple sites and apps. When Google Analytics 4 came out, its data collection API was missing the equivalent of a customTask method, which could perform data requests from the original data event request. Because of the lack of a customTask-like feature, the workaround method was to multiply tags, this meant more implementation work and more risks of crossing beams.
Introducing server-side data collection
Server-side tag management may look adorable but it’s deceptively powerful.
In a nutshell, a sTMS (server-side tag management system) is used to funnel API calls from marketing tags before processing them and finally dispatching them to the right endpoints.
Unlike regular, client-side tag management (essentially a direct tag delivery platform), using a sTMS reduces the number of client-side requests. sTMS products of choice include Google Tag Manager, Piwik Pro or Jentis. Based on hosting options, you may want to use a sTMS broker/proxy such as Addingwell or Stape.
“But what does it have to do with data consolidation?”, you ask?
Let’s use the example from my older post: let’s say we manage three websites, cleverly named sitea.com, siteb.com, and sitec.com, each using their own tag data silo. In this example, we will use Google Analytics 4 measurement IDs as an example but feel free to use <insert that analytics solution you use>.
Let’s assume we have different measurement IDs for each site, as well as a separate measurement ID that will be used for consolidation. Right now, there are no concerns for GA4 account/property structure but that can come later.
| “Local” Site | “Local” Measurement ID | “Global” Measurement ID |
| sitea.com | G-WHATEVER-1 | G-ALLDATA-1 |
| siteb.com | G-WHATEVER-2 | G-ALLDATA-1 |
| sitec.com | G-WHATEVER-3 | G-ALLDATA-1 |
Like I hinted at before, we want to avoid multiplying tag implementation work on each site – and each site’s client-side TMS.
sTMS to the rescue
Let’s make a couple assumptions:
- you have set up server-side tag management (Google Tag Manager server-side over Addingwell)
- You are using your Google Analytics 4 as a trojan horse or as the “‘pig’ in ‘piggyback’” server call.
From there, you are very likely using GA4 event data from the server side to fire other tags, as shown below:
At this point, all it takes is to add another “GA4 consolidation” tag to your sGTM container that fires along every GA4 tag request:
As you can see, I added:
- a GA4 measurement ID for my consolidation property
- consolidation-specific event parameters
These parameters will be used to overwrite or enrich the data from each site into that single measurement silo. Of course, you can add additional rules and triggers to only include some information or to only fire in a specific page folder – or something – so go crazy.
Depending on your setup, you may be using subdomains with specific data collection, or even track multiple domains using the same sGTM instance mapped on multiple domains (thanks, Addingwell!).
This method will also grant you a level of data governance especially if multiple parties can access/modify site tagging. With sTMS and transformations (like in sGTM), you can correct or redact data before it gets sent to your favorite data analytics provider.
In closing
If you have not yet made the move to server-side data collection, now would be a good time to start a migration project because, despite the costs associated with running your sTMS instance, the battle of the next few years will be to own your first-party data. Server-side tag management is a major weapon in your data collection arsenal so you can win that battle and crush your competitors, see them driven before you and hear the lamentations of their marketing teams.
If you have multiple digital assets, make sure you use a server-side methodology to tie all that data neatly into a single source of truth.
Thoughts? Feedback? Let me know in the comments!
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