Testing Google Analytics and Google Tag Manager with Custom Dimensions

When testing new events or other objects within Google Tag Manager sometimes it is important to pass the version information to Google Analytics within a Custom Dimension.  When dealing with larger, multi-departmental, multi-container implementations this can be even more crucial to quickly debug and most importantly fix a problem.

What you need to do:

• Activate Built in Version and Version ID Variables within Google Tag Manager
• Add a Custom Dimension to your  Google Analytics Settings Tag
• Add a Custom Dimension to your Google Analytics Settings
• Use as a Dimension in your reports to see when a problem started to happen

Activate Built in Version and Version ID Variables within Google Tag Manager

1. Navigate to Workspace > Variables and click Configure
2. Select ContainerID and Container Version

Add a Custom Dimension to your Google Analytics Setting

1. Navigate to your Google Analytics Admin Settings > Custom Dimensions
2. Add a new Custom Dimension
   1. Enter Framework Version for the Name
   2. Make it a Hit-based Dimension
   3. Remember the Index number for the next step

Add a Custom Dimension to your  Google Analytics Settings Variable within Google Tag Manager

1. Navigate to Workspace > Variables and Edit the Google Analytics Settings variable (if you don’t have one, you should)
2. Enter the Index Number used above and use the following for the Dimension value:{{ContainerID}} – {{Container Version}}
3. Publish the Google Tag Manager Container

Use as a Secondary Dimension in your reports to see when a problem started to happen

1. Navigate to any of the Google Analytics Table Reports
2. Click on Secondary dimension and select Framework Version (or whatever name you used)