Fashion store case study

The problem

GA4 was undercounting purchases, leaving the team unsure what was actually happening.

The store's Shopify order data showed more purchases than GA4 was reporting. That gap made performance reporting unreliable and made it difficult to understand whether campaigns were underperforming or conversions were simply going untracked.

The team needed a tracking setup they could trust when making marketing decisions.

What I found

Compared GA4 purchase events against Shopify orders to establish the size of the tracking gap.
Traced ecommerce events across the customer journey, from landing page through checkout and purchase confirmation.
Checked where events were being blocked or lost, including browser privacy restrictions and ad blockers.
Audited the existing Google Tag Manager setup to identify gaps and inconsistencies.
Mapped the events that needed to be recovered before rebuilding the tracking setup.

The key issue wasn’t simply that GA4 had “bad data.” Some ecommerce events were being lost before they reached the analytics platform.

What I did

Rebuilt the tracking around a more reliable data flow.

Moved key ecommerce events server-side through Stape to reduce dependence on browser-based tracking.
Rebuilt the purchase and add-to-cart events in Google Tag Manager.
Checked event parameters against actual Shopify order information.
Tested the purchase flow from product page → cart → checkout → confirmation.
Verified that the rebuilt events were being received correctly in GA4.
Documented the setup so the team could understand and troubleshoot it without starting from scratch.

The result

The store could finally compare its analytics data against real orders with confidence.

The rebuilt setup recovered previously missed purchase events and significantly reduced the gap between GA4 and Shopify.

96%

of previously missing purchases now tracked

days from first call to verified setup

gap between GA4 and Shopify after the fix

The bigger win

The client wasn’t just given a collection of working tags. They had a documented tracking system that gave them a clearer view of what was actually happening after a customer placed an order.

Before vs. after

BEFORE

Shopify orders ≠ GA4 purchases

The reporting gap made campaign performance difficult to interpret. A lower number of recorded purchases could mean fewer customers—or simply missing tracking.

AFTER

Shopify orders ↔ GA4 purchases

The tracking flow was rebuilt and verified against real orders, giving the team a much more reliable foundation for ecommerce reporting.

Why it mattered

Accurate tracking isn’t about making an analytics dashboard look better. It’s about being able to answer basic business questions with confidence.

Which campaigns generate purchases?
How many conversions actually happened?
Where are customers dropping out?
Can we trust the numbers we are using to make decisions?

Once the tracking was fixed, those questions had a much stronger data foundation.

What I delivered

Tracking auditReviewed the existing ecommerce measurement setup and identified where purchase data was being lost.

GA4 + GTM rebuildRebuilt the critical ecommerce events and their parameters.

Server-side trackingImplemented the key events through Stape to reduce reliance on browser-side tracking.

ValidationTested the setup against actual Shopify orders and verified the resulting events.

DocumentationCreated documentation so the team could understand the setup and check it themselves.

The takeaway

Better marketing decisions start with trustworthy data.

The store didn’t need another dashboard. It needed confidence that the numbers inside the dashboard reflected what was actually happening in the business.

That’s what the tracking fix was designed to provide.

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