If your Google Ads account says you've had 40 conversions this month and you can only remember a dozen people getting in touch, your tracking is wrong, and it's probably wrong in one of a few predictable ways. Google is counting things that aren't enquiries (page views, clicks on a phone number, short calls), counting some enquiries twice, and missing others entirely. The fix is to decide what a lead actually is for your business, track only that, count each one once, and check the number against the enquiries you really received.
This matters more than it used to. Smart Bidding and Performance Max spend your budget chasing whatever you tell Google is a conversion. Tell it a contact page view is a conversion and it'll find you plenty of people who look at contact pages. This guide covers the mistakes I see most in small lead generation accounts, how call tracking works in the UK, and the setup I'd use for a typical local service business. It's part of my small business guide to Google Ads.
The quick test: does Google's number match your enquiries?
Short answer: take last month's conversions from Google Ads and compare them with the calls, forms and emails you actually received from people who came through your ads. If they're miles apart, the tracking needs fixing before anything else.
On every account I manage, I measure leads: who got in touch. I report totals by source and type (calls, forms, emails), the spend, and the cost per lead. Not clicks, not "engagements", not conversions that nobody can put a name to. If Google's conversion figure and the real enquiry count don't roughly agree, one of them is wrong, and it's rarely the enquiry log.
To run the check yourself:
- In Google Ads, go to Goals, then Summary, and list every conversion action. Note which are Primary (they feed the Conversions column and bidding) and which are Secondary.
- Segment last month's campaign report by conversion action, so you can see which actions make up the total.
- Count the genuine enquiries from the same period: calls, form submissions and emails, from your phone log, inbox and website forms.
- Compare them. A big gap tells you where to look next.
Why your Google Ads conversion numbers are wrong
Short answer: most errors fall into three groups. Counting things that aren't leads, counting the same lead twice, and not counting leads that did happen.
| What's happening | Effect on your numbers | How to spot it |
|---|---|---|
| A page view (contact page, "thank you" page with no form behind it) is set as a conversion | Too high | Conversion action based on a URL that people can reach without submitting anything |
| Clicks on your phone number or email address are Primary conversions | Too high | Conversions with no matching call or email in your records |
| The same form is tracked by the Google Ads tag and by a GA4 import, both Primary | Doubled | Two actions with near-identical counts |
| Lead actions set to count "Every" conversion | Too high | One person submitting twice, or refreshing the thank you page, counts twice |
| Automatically created actions left as goals (Calls from ads, local actions such as directions and website visits) | Too high | Actions in your list you don't remember creating |
| Call conversions with a very short minimum call length | Too high | Lots of call conversions, few real phone enquiries |
| Calls from people who saw the ad and rang the number on your site aren't tracked | Too low | More phone enquiries than Google reports |
| Consent banner blocking tags with no consent mode in place | Too low | Gap between forms received and forms Google records |
| Conversions reported against the click date, not the enquiry date | Looks wrong month to month | Last month's figure keeps rising after the month ends |
A few of these deserve more explanation.
Counting "Every" instead of "One"
Every conversion action has a counting setting. Google's counting options page explains that "Every" counts every conversion after an ad click, which suits sales, while "One" counts only one conversion per ad click, which suits leads, because only one unique lead per click is likely to bring value. For a trade or service business, lead actions should be set to One.
GA4 imports and the Google Ads tag counting the same thing
You can track a form with the Google Ads tag directly, or create the conversion in Google Ads from a Google Analytics key event. Doing both is fine, as long as only one is Primary. Google's page on primary and secondary conversion actions says Primary actions feed the Conversions column and bidding, while Secondary actions are for observation only, and warns that getting this wrong "can prevent Smart Bidding from optimising effectively".
There are other differences worth knowing. Google's guide to creating conversions from Google Analytics says Google Ads reports conversions against the date of the click, not the date the enquiry happened, and that Analytics conversions can take up to 24 hours to import. That's one reason the two tools never quite agree. My own preference for lead generation accounts is the Google Ads tag as the Primary source, with GA4 used for looking at what visitors did on the site.
Actions you didn't create
Google creates some conversion actions for you. Turn on call reporting and Google's calls from ads guide says new calls are counted with the default "Calls from ads" action. Use location assets and Google's page on local actions conversions explains it can create actions for directions, clicks to call, website visits, orders and menu views. Some of these are useful to see. Few of them are leads, and none of them should be driving your bidding unless you've decided they should.
Tracking phone calls in the UK: calls from ads vs calls from your website
Short answer: there are two kinds of real call to track. People who tap the phone number in your ad, and people who click the ad, visit your site and then ring. Both can be tracked in the UK with Google forwarding numbers, and neither is the same as a click on your phone number.
For most trades, calls are the majority of enquiries, so this is the part that most often makes the numbers wrong. Google's phone call conversion tracking page lists the options:
| Call conversion type | What it counts | Is it a real call? |
|---|---|---|
| Calls from ads | Calls made from the phone number in a call asset or call ad, lasting at least the length you set | Yes, and the length is measured |
| Calls to a phone number on your website | Calls to a Google forwarding number shown on your site to people who arrived from an ad, lasting at least the length you set | Yes, and the length is measured |
| Clicks on your number on your mobile website | Taps on a phone number or call button on your site | No. It's a click. The call may never have connected |
| Imported calls | Calls tracked in another system, such as a call tracking provider or your CRM, uploaded to Google Ads | Yes, if your system records it properly |
Some practical points, all from Google's own help pages:
- Google forwarding numbers work in the UK. The United Kingdom is on Google's list of countries where forwarding numbers are available.
- Call reporting has to be switched on. Google's call reporting page explains it records details such as call duration, start time and whether the call connected, and that there's no charge when someone dials a forwarding number by hand.
- You set the minimum call length. Every call that lasts at least that long counts as a conversion. Check what yours is set to. A call long enough to be a genuine enquiry is a lead. A ten-second wrong number isn't.
- Website call tracking needs the Google tag and the exact number. Google's website call setup guide says the number you enter must match the digits on your site exactly, and that the default code swaps only one number per page.
My view on phone number clicks is simple. Track them, because they're useful to see, but make them Secondary. A tap on a number isn't someone getting in touch, and bidding on taps teaches Google to find people who tap. If you're on Shopify and want to see those clicks in GA4 anyway, I've written a guide to tracking phone clicks, email clicks and form fills in GA4 on Shopify without GTM.
If you'd rather use a third-party call tracking service, most can import calls into Google Ads as conversions. That's the "imported calls" route. It's worth it if you want call recordings or detailed call logs in one place, but for many small businesses Google's own forwarding numbers do the job.
Tracking form enquiries properly
Short answer: count the successful submission, not the page. Then consider enhanced conversions for leads, which uses the details people enter to match enquiries back to ad clicks more accurately.
The safest form conversion fires only when a form is actually submitted: either a thank you page that people can only reach by submitting, or an event from the form itself. If your form plugin shows a message on the same page instead, you'll need an event. I've covered one example in my guide to tracking Avada form submissions in Google Tag Manager, and the same principle applies to any form builder.
Once the basics are right, enhanced conversions for leads is worth setting up. When someone fills in your form, the tag sends a hashed (scrambled) version of details such as their email address. Later, when that lead turns into paid work, you upload the same details and Google matches them to the original ad click. Google's offline conversion imports FAQ recommends it over the older click ID method, and says it gives more durable, accurate reporting, including across devices.
Consent mode: required for UK advertisers
Short answer: if your site has UK visitors, Google requires you to collect consent and pass consent signals to it. Consent mode is how you do that without losing all your measurement when people decline cookies.
Google's EU user consent policy applies to the European Economic Area, the UK and Switzerland, and its help page on verifying consent signals says plainly: "Consent is required in the European Economic Area (EEA), the United Kingdom, and Switzerland." The consent mode help page explains the two approaches:
- Basic consent mode. Google tags don't load until the visitor responds to your cookie banner, and nothing is sent before then.
- Advanced consent mode. Tags load straight away and send cookieless pings when consent is declined, which gives Google more to work with when it models conversions it couldn't observe directly.
A cookie banner that simply blocks every tag, with no consent mode behind it, is a common reason small accounts under-record form leads. Google also warns that blocking tags until someone interacts with the banner means it can't verify consent choices, which can lead to data loss. Get your web developer, or whoever set up your banner, to confirm consent mode is in place and passing the ad_user_data and ad_personalization signals.
Importing leads and jobs from your CRM
Short answer: if you log enquiries in a CRM or even a spreadsheet, you can tell Google which ones became real work. That's the most accurate signal you can give it.
Google's offline conversion imports FAQ lists the ways in: Google Sheets or CSV uploads, Data Manager, the Google Ads API, and CRM integrations. Using the Google click ID (GCLID) you can upload conversions for up to 90 days after the click. Using enhanced conversions for leads with customer details, the window is 63 days.
For most of the small businesses I work with, this is a later step, not a first one. Get the calls and forms right first. Once the enquiry numbers are trustworthy, importing which enquiries became paid jobs lets Google learn the difference between a £90 tap washer job and a £4,000 boiler installation.
The setup I'd use for a typical local service business
Short answer: a small number of Primary actions that are all genuine enquiries, counted once each, with everything else Secondary.
| Conversion action | Source | Primary or Secondary | Count |
|---|---|---|---|
| Form submission | Google Ads tag (with enhanced conversions for leads) | Primary | One |
| Calls from ads | Call reporting, with a meaningful minimum call length | Primary | One |
| Calls from website | Google forwarding number on your site | Primary | One |
| Phone number clicks | Google tag or GA4 | Secondary | One |
| Email address clicks | Google tag or GA4 | Secondary | One |
| GA4 imports of the same form | Google Analytics | Secondary | One |
| Local actions (directions, website visits) | Created by Google | Secondary | As created |
| Won jobs (later) | CRM or spreadsheet import | Primary once reliable | One |
Two more settings worth checking while you're there. The conversion window, which Google's conversion windows page says defaults to 30 days for Search, is usually fine for local services. And if you run Performance Max, getting this right is non-negotiable, because it has fewer controls and leans entirely on your conversion data. I cover that in Performance Max for small businesses.
Once the tracking is right, the rest of the account starts to make sense. If you're still getting clicks and no enquiries, my guide on why Google Ads get clicks but no calls covers the other causes. My Google Ads audit checklist includes conversion tracking alongside everything else worth checking, and the PPC ROI calculator shows what your real cost per lead means in revenue.
FAQ
Why does Google Ads show more conversions than I had enquiries?
Usually because it's counting things that aren't enquiries, such as page views or clicks on your phone number, or counting the same enquiry twice through the Google Ads tag and a GA4 import. Check which conversion actions are Primary and set lead actions to count One.
Can I track phone calls from Google Ads in the UK?
Yes. Google forwarding numbers are available in the UK. They can track calls from the number in your ad and calls to the number on your website from people who came through an ad, counting a call as a conversion when it lasts at least the minimum length you set.
Should I import GA4 conversions or use the Google Ads tag?
Either can work, but don't make both Primary for the same action or you'll double count. For lead generation I prefer the Google Ads tag as the Primary source, because it avoids the import delay and is the route Google documents for setting up enhanced conversions for leads, with GA4 kept as Secondary for observation.
Do I need consent mode in the UK?
Google requires advertisers to collect consent and pass consent signals for users in the EEA, the UK and Switzerland. Consent mode is Google's way of receiving those signals, and without it a cookie banner can stop your conversions being recorded at all.
What are enhanced conversions for leads?
A way of matching enquiries to ad clicks using hashed details from your form, such as an email address. When the lead later becomes a paying customer, you upload the same details and Google links the sale back to the click. Google now recommends it over the older click ID import method.
Not sure your numbers are real?
Every decision in Google Ads, yours and Google's, rests on the conversion figure. If it's counting the wrong things, the account is being optimised towards the wrong things, however good the rest of it looks.
If you're running your own ads and they're not paying, I'm happy to take a look. I'll check what your account is counting as a conversion, compare it with the enquiries you actually had, and tell you what needs changing. Read about my Google Ads management service and wider PPC services, or get in touch and you'll deal with me directly.
