You’ve set up your campaigns, enabled smart bidding, and followed best practices, but conversions are trickling in, and Google Ads isn’t learning fast enough. Sound familiar? You’re not alone.
This is a common challenge for marketers running campaigns with long sales cycles, low volume, or top-of-funnel goals. Without enough conversion data, Google’s machine learning can’t optimize effectively.
That’s where micro conversions come in, these are small but meaningful actions like- “Learn More”, “Signing up Newsletter”, “add to cart”, “watching a video” or “checkout”. While they aren’t final conversions, they signal user intent and can dramatically improve campaign learning and performance.
In this blog, we’ll explore what micro conversions are, who should use them, and how to track and report on them the right way.
Jump ahead to:
What Are Micro Conversions in Google Ads?
Micro conversions are smaller user actions that signal interest or engagement on the way to a primary goal, known as a macro conversion (such as a completed purchase or form submission). While macro conversions represent your key performance indicators (KPIs), micro conversions provide early indicators of user intent and are valuable for guiding campaign optimization.
Micro vs. Macro Conversions
- Macro conversions: your primary goals (e.g., purchases, demo bookings, lead submissions).
- Micro conversions: supporting actions that show progress toward those goals.
Think of micro conversions as steps along the journey. They don’t guarantee a conversion, but they do show someone is moving in the right direction.
Common Examples of Micro Conversions
- Clicking a button like “Learn More” or “Book a Demo”
- Spending a certain amount of time on your site
- Scrolling through 50% or more of a page
- Watching a product video or completing a video ad
- Downloading content such as PDFs, brochures, or whitepapers
- Adding a product to the cart or viewing a product page
- Signing up for a newsletter or creating an account
Each of these actions shows intent or engagement and can help you optimize campaigns, especially when macro conversions are limited.
How to Set Up Micro Conversions in Google Ads
To track micro conversions properly, you need to configure them as events in either Google Analytics 4 (GA4) or directly through the Google Ads tag.
Here’s a quick overview of the technical setup:
- Tracking: First, identify the micro-actions you want to track (like a button click or scroll depth). Set these up as events in GA4 or track them through your Google Ads conversion tag.
- Importing to Google Ads: Once your micro conversions are being tracked, import them into Google Ads. You’ll have the option to set them as:
- Primary conversions – These show up in the “Conversions” column and influence Smart Bidding.
- Secondary conversions – These show up only in the “All Conversions” column and do not affect bidding strategies.
- Conversion Grouping: Google Ads also allows you to create campaign-level conversion actions or conversion action sets. This lets you group and assign different micro conversions to different campaigns based on their purpose, for example, using “Add to Cart” for shopping campaigns and “PDF Download” for lead-gen efforts.
Why Micro Conversions Matter
Micro conversions are small but meaningful user actions – like watching a video, adding to a cart, or viewing a pricing page, that indicate interest before a final conversion happens. They’re crucial for improving campaign performance, especially in the following scenarios:
1. Long Sales Cycles (B2B, High-Ticket Products)– Big decisions take time. With fewer macro conversions, platforms struggle to optimize. Micro conversions (e.g., demo requests, and content downloads) give the algorithm more signals to learn from.
2. Low Conversion Volume Accounts– Smart bidding needs volume. If your account has <50 conversions/month, you can’t use automated strategies effectively. Micro conversions like add-to-cart or form views fill this gap and speed up learning.
3. TOFU & Awareness Campaigns (Display, Video, Demand Gen)– Top-of-funnel ads drive engagement, not instant sales. Micro conversions (like scroll depth or time on the page) help prove impact and justify the spend.
4. Multi-Touch Journeys– Most users don’t convert on the first visit. Micro conversions help track engagement across visits and reveal which touchpoints contribute to eventual conversions.
How to Track Micro Conversions
1. Set Up Events in GA4
Create or modify events in GA4 to capture meaningful user actions (e.g., view_pricing, download_brochure, start_form). Use event parameters to define quality (e.g., scroll > 75%).
2. Mark Events as Conversions
Go to Admin > Conversions in GA4 and mark key micro-conversion events as conversions. This allows them to be tracked as goals.
3. Import to Google Ads
In Google Ads, go to Tools > Conversions > Import > GA4 (Web). Select your micro conversions and assign appropriate categories.
4. Primary vs. Secondary Conversions
- Primary: Used for bidding (e.g., “Book a demo”).
- Secondary: For reporting only (e.g., “View Pricing”).
Use Primary for high-intent actions; Secondary for early-stage engagement.
Also read – How to Set Up the Google Tag for Conversion Tracking
Build High Intent Remarketing Audiences
Not every visitor will convert on their first visit but many leave behind valuable signals through micro-conversions. These smaller actions (like visiting a pricing page, starting a checkout, or watching a product demo video) show that a user is interested, even if they haven’t taken the final step yet.
By tracking these micro-conversions, you can build remarketing audiences that are far more targeted and likely to convert. Here’s how:
Identify High-Intent Actions- Start by defining which micro-conversions matter most to your business. For example:
- Ecommerce: Add to cart, wishlist, product views
- SaaS: Viewed pricing page, started free trial form
- Lead Gen: Downloaded brochure, clicked “Contact Us”
Create Segmented Audiences- Using Google Ads or GA4, build custom audiences based on these actions.For example:
- Users who visited the pricing page but didn’t sign up
- Users who added to cart but didn’t purchase
Serve the Right Ad, at the Right Time- With high-intent audiences, you can now run more relevant and persuasive ads:
- Offer a discount to cart abandoners
- Highlight testimonials or case studies to pricing page visitors
- Remind users of the product they viewed with dynamic remarketing
Micro-conversions let you go beyond basic retargeting and create smarter, intent-driven remarketing strategies that lead to higher conversions.
Conclusion
Micro conversions are the unsung heroes of effective PPC strategies. They provide the volume, visibility, and intent signals needed to optimize bidding, measure top-of-funnel impact, and understand user journeys beyond last-click attribution. If you’re only tracking final conversions, you’re missing valuable insights. Now’s the time to revisit your setup, identify overlooked micro conversions, and bring more depth to your reporting.
Not sure where to start?
Run a micro conversion audit or pilot campaign to see the impact firsthand.
At EasyInsights, we help performance marketers unify, enrich, and activate first-party data across platforms – so you can make smarter, data-driven decisions faster. Whether you’re optimizing ad spend or improving reporting clarity, EasyInsights makes it easy to turn microdata into major performance wins.
To Know more Book a demo today!
Additional read – Set up Facebook Conversions API on Shopify
