Universal-GTM Container

… or Universal Google Tag Manager (GTM) Container is the world's most powerful and natively flexible GTM container for your website. Prioritising performance (Lighthouse / PageSpeed scores) while adding a swath of practical telemetry and marketing events all-in as standard. All this is achieved while simultaneously supporting non-Google tracking pixels and APIs to leverage your enhanced analytics datasets. 

We are also preparing to support Google Analytics 4 (GA4) and Universal Analytics 4 Tags for cutting edge properties. While the UA tags remain in beta we do not recommend using a GA4 property exclusively for enterprise level reporting. Watch this space for more...

What is Universal-GTM?

Universal GTM is a Free and Open-Source Software (FOSS) consisting of JavaScript and JSON files on-which you can publish a partial or complete Google Tag Manager (GTM) container optimised for performance, accuracy and flexibility of your websites data layers and data management platforms (DMP). Offering ,,, all baked into a lightweight General Public Licence (GPL) codebase. 

How does Universal-GTM work?

To make the container easier to understand we've split the tags, triggers and variables into appropriately named sections:

• Unfiled items

  • There is / or should be nothing in the list of 'un-filed' items, everything should have and be in its correct folder for quick field reference, column sortablity and on-page search-ability.

• Common

  • These are the Universal-GTM versions of everyday variables you would expect to find in the best tag manager containers

  • Highly useful when setting conditions on triggers and parsing on page data for events

  • Also includes popular variables with the final resolved value you can pass to any tag or filter with confidence.

• Configurable

  • These variables allow you to easily configure your container to suit your properties distinctive requirements; supporting

    • multiple Top-level Domains (TLD)

    • multiple Subdomains and Hostnames

    • multiple Google Analytics (GA) Properties

    • multiple Google Optimize (GO) Containers

    • multiple Facebook App IDs

    • multiple enhanced eCommerce portals

  • Per-Page configurable Tracking ID meta overrides and Open-graph (OG) Support

  • Customisable cookie names and browser local storage (persistence) settings

  • Custom dimensions and custom metrics tailored for each property.

• Conditional

  • These variables, usually Lookup Tables (LT) are used like condition 'case' statements to test for validation before submitting a GA field reference.

• Custom Tasks

  • These variables act like 'tags' for 3rd-party pixels / trackers that leverage the data layer values when queried

  • Custom Tasks force synchronous execution before the main tag executes, reducing load spikes associated with async loading and bottlenecks, improving PageSpeed

  • This means that references to these tasks should only be made when the event tag matches the conditions defined

  • These are not available in Preview mode but can be set for output when GTM debug mode is enabled.

• Default Tags

  • These tags provide the bulk of Universal-GTM operation and craft a careful sequenced execution profile to maximize performance

  • These tags should not be modified without extensive understanding of the Tag Flow Diagram

  • When copying these tags as a template remember to give your new tags a unique folder of your own creation.

• Pausable Tags

  • These tags are distinguishable from 'default tags' because these can be paused from within GTM

  • Pausing these prevents execution of the tag specific functionality without impeding the execution of the other tags in the container

  • These also include Clean-Up tags which normalise the shared event variables after each Universal Analytics (UA) event.

• Shared Triggers

  • These are all triggers unique to Universal-GTM that help the container perform tasks at various intervals or after certain user interactions

  • Shared triggers are designed to capture the broadest events for the majority of CMS and web instances

  • We recommend leaving these 'as-is' for broadest compatibility; adding or defining your own trigger groups for custom requirements.

• User Quality

  • This special group leverages SuccessEvents User Quality Scale, asserting various progressively escalating user interactions to qualify your website visitors.

• Built-In Variables

  • These variables are included as standard with all Google Tag Manager containers

  • Each variable can be enabled as and when needed and can be disabled if there are no references to said variable elsewhere in the container