You’re running pay-per-click (PPC) campaigns on platforms like Google Ads to drive leads and sales. You meticulously track clicks, impressions, maybe even form submissions.
But what about phone calls?
If your business relies on phone calls for sales or other customer inquiries, and you aren’t tracking calls from your PPC efforts, you’re missing a huge piece of the puzzle.
That’s where PPC call tracking comes in.
Ready to improve your PPC campaigns and optimize your ad spend? Learn more about 800.com’s call tracking features—or schedule a demo—today.
What exactly is PPC call tracking?
Simply put, PPC call tracking helps you understand which of your paid advertising campaigns, ad groups, and PPC keywords make your phone ring. It helps to connect the dots between your online ads and offline phone conversions.
Here’s how PPC call tracking works
Call tracking services assign unique phone numbers—either toll-free or local—to different marketing sources (in this case, PPC ads). When a potential customer sees your ad and calls the displayed number:
- The call routes through your call tracking platform and gets forwarded to your main business phone number.
- The platform captures data, including the marketing source, caller ID, location, call duration, and more.
- This data gets fed into your call analytics dashboard, showing you exactly which PPC efforts drive calls. The best call tracking solutions pull in call recordings and transcripts, too, even flagging common keywords and offering AI-powered sentiment analysis.
Benefits of call tracking for PPC campaigns
- Better understand ROI: Calls may convert at a different rate than other channels. Tracking them gives you a more complete picture of your PPC campaign performance and the true return on investment you get from PPC.
- Optimize ad spend: With call tracking, you know exactly which marketing channels, traffic sources, and PPC networks generate the most valuable calls—meaning you can shift your budget to what works and stop spending on underperformers.
- Refine your messaging & creative: By tracking the impact of individual ads against one another, you can see which ad copy or visuals resonate most with your customers.
Google Ads call tracking vs. 800.com call tracking
Google Ads does offer its own Google call tracking features, but—while this can be a good starting point—it comes with some limitations.
- Limited scope: Google’s native tracking primarily focuses on calls directly from ads or immediately after an ad click. That means it can struggle to capture the full customer journey or calls happening later.
- Basic data: While it tracks call counts and duration, Google Ads often lacks deeper insights, like multi-channel attribution (was the caller influenced by other channels before clicking the ad?)
- Siloed call data: Google Ads tracks—well—Google Ads-driven calls, meaning you can’t measure PPC call data up against other sources of calls.
Track your PPC calls with 800.com
A dedicated call tracking solution can help fill some of the gaps above and further empower your call tracking efforts. With call tracking from 800.com, you get:
- Real-time analytics dashboard: Get instant access to comprehensive call data, visualized clearly, so you can see trends in caller location, peak call times, answered vs. missed calls, and more.
- Multi-channel call attribution: 800.com can help attribute calls even if the caller interacted with multiple touchpoints (e.g., saw a Facebook ad, then searched on Google, then called), enabling you to better understand the whole customer journey.
- Dynamic Number Insertion (DNI): Easily track calls generated from website visits based on the PPC source, keyword, or campaign that led them to your site.
- Call recording & transcription: Review calls for quality assurance, training, and for customer sentiment and keywords frequently used during conversations.
- AI sentiment & outcome analysis: Go beyond basic metrics to understand the vibe of the call and whether it resulted in a likely conversion.
- Better, more data-driven decisions: By analyzing PPC call data alongside metrics from other channels (SEO, social, email, direct mail, etc.), you gain a more holistic view of marketing performance, enabling smarter, more effective budget decisions.
How to set up PPC call tracking with Google Ads and 800.com
Connecting 800.com with Google Ads helps accurately measure ROI, identify your best ads, and make smarter marketing strategy and spend decisions.
If you already have an 800.com, you can connect it with Google Ads and set up call tracking by following the steps below.
Note: if you need help connecting Google Ads to 800.com or troubleshooting any issues, you can contact our support team at [email protected].
Step 1: Log in to your 800.com account
- Log into your 800.com account.
- In the left-hand sidebar, choose the Settings tab.
- Select Integrations, then click on Google Ads.
Step 2: Connect your Google Ads account
- Click the Connect Google Ads button.
- You’ll be redirected to Google’s login screen. Select the Google account associated with your Google Ads, and grant 800.com permission to access your ad data.
- Once connected, you’ll be redirected back to 800.com, and your Google Ads account will now appear under the Connected Accounts section.
Step 3: Set up a call tracking number for Google Ads
- From your 800.com dashboard, go to Numbers > Add Number, and choose a local or toll-free number.
- In Number Settings, set the number to forward to your main business line.
- Under Campaign Source, select Google Ads.
Step 4: Add your tracking number to Google Ads
There are two main ways to use your call tracking number in Google Ads: call extensions and call-only ads.
Call extensions simply show the phone number on your ad, and potential customers can choose to manually call or click on the ad to visit your website. Call-only ads are specifically designed to drive calls—clicking anywhere on the ad (from a mobile device) automatically initiates a call directly to the associated number.
Option A: Call extensions
- Open your Google Ads account, and go to Ads & Extensions > Extensions.
- Click the + icon and select Call Extension.
- Enter your 800.com tracking number and save.
Option B: Call-only ads
- In Google Ads, create a New Campaign.
- Choose Leads as your goal and Search as your campaign type.
- Under Ad Type, select Call-Only, and use your 800.com tracking number as the phone number in the ad.
Step 5: Enable call reporting and call conversions
- In Google Ads, go to Tools & Settings > Measurement > Conversions.
- Click New Conversion Action, and choose Phone Calls.
- Select Calls to a phone number on your website or Calls from ads, depending on your chosen setup from step 4.
- Fill in the conversion settings (name, value, duration) and click Create and Continue.
Make every call count with 800.com
While Google call tracking offers basic functionality, integrating a dedicated platform like 800.com unlocks deeper analytics, multi-channel attribution, and seamless data flow into your other business systems.
Ready to improve your PPC campaigns and optimize your ad spend? Learn more about 800.com’s call tracking features—or schedule a demo—today.
