Thank-you page & redirects: A cautionary tale for HubSpot conversion tracking

Thank You Page & Redirects: A Cautionary Tale for HubSpot Conversion Tracking

HubSpot is a practical CRM and marketing automation platform used by many businesses for their inbound marketing, and their conversion tracking features seem like a convenient way to measure campaign success.

When using embedded contact forms from HubSpot or similar platforms on your website, one common recommendation you will find is to redirect users to an external “thank you” page after they submit a form. You then use Google Tag Manager to track a page view event, so each view of the thank-you page counts as a form submission.

While this method promises an easy setup for convenience, it is unfortunately riddled with potential problems that can lead to inaccurate conversion data.

Potential issues:

1. Reliability Issues: Relying on users reaching a specific page (especially an external one) is inherently risky. Slow internet connections, ad blockers, and browser quirks can all prevent the page from loading properly. This means you could miss out on tracking conversions that actually happened.
2. Attribution Errors: Redirecting your users to an external “thank you” page after they finish submitting your form risks muddling conversion attribution. Users who close the window before the thank-you page loads are never counted, and anyone who reaches the page another way (a bookmark, a shared link, a refresh) is counted when they should not be.

What is the solution?

Instead of the redirect/page view method, use a more direct approach for tracking conversions:

• Event-Based Tracking: Implement event-based conversion tracking from the HubSpot form itself. HubSpot fires a browser event, hs-form-event:on-submission:success, when a form built in its current editor is submitted successfully (older legacy forms use the onFormSubmitted callback). Listen for it in Google Tag Manager and send your conversion event from there. These events are more reliable and can be sent to Google Analytics or other platforms for analysis.
• Custom JavaScript: If you cannot use Google Tag Manager, add a small script to the page that hosts the form, set to fire the conversion event when HubSpot’s submission event arrives. Place it before the form embed code, as HubSpot’s developer documentation recommends, so the listener is ready before the event fires. Browser-side tracking still depends on consent and can be blocked, so test that each submission is recorded once, and pass HubSpot’s conversion ID to Google Ads as the transaction ID to minimise duplicate conversions.
• HubSpot’s Native Integrations: Explore the native integrations HubSpot offers with Google Ads and other platforms. These integrations often provide more accurate and streamlined conversion tracking options.

Accurate conversion tracking

Everyone needs accurate conversion tracking for reliable data. Without understanding your true conversion rate it is a challenge to make informed decisions about a marketing campaign. 

Relying on inaccurate data, means you could:

• Waste time and money on an ineffective campaign.
• Miss opportunities to optimise even the successful strategies.
• Misinterpret the real influence your marketing has.

If you are struggling with HubSpot conversion tracking or want to optimise your analytics setup, consider reaching out to a digital marketing specialist. Nevertheless, if you take a DIY approach, do not fall into the trap of relying only on redirects for any embedded contact form conversion tracking. Consider using either event-based tracking or a custom code snippet for more accurate data, and test the setup before you rely on the numbers.