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You Won't Regret It!

    META EVENTS AND CONVERSIONS: WHY YOU’RE PROBABLY TRACKING THE WRONG THINGS (AND PAYING FOR IT)

    Published on — July 7, 2025
    • -  News  -  Knowledge  -  Meta conversions: Better inputs = better performance
    Meta Events

    YOU’RE SPENDING MONEY ON META ADS. YOU’VE GOT YOUR META PIXEL INSTALLED. YOUR REPORTING SHOWS PURCHASES, MAYBE A FEW LEADS, AND YOUR ROAS LOOKS… FINE. BUT HERE’S THE UNCOMFORTABLE QUESTION:

    Do you actually know what your conversions mean?

    If you’re treating Meta events like a checkbox, there’s a chance you could be misinterpreting the data. If that’s the case, you risk feeding the algorithm poor inputs while hoping for sharp results. It doesn’t work like that.

    Let’s fix it.

    THE THREE TOOLS YOU SHOULD BE USING (BUT MIGHT NOT)

    To get performance and clarity, you need to know the difference between:

    • Standard events

    • Custom events

    • Custom conversions

    Most advertisers hear those terms, nod politely, and keep optimising for ’leads’ like it’s still 2019. Here’s why that can be a problem.

    1. STANDARD EVENTS: META’S LANGUAGE

    Standard events are Meta’s predefined actions. Think:

    • Purchase

    • Add to Cart

    • Lead

    • Complete Registration

    • Initiate Checkout

    Using these means you’re speaking Meta’s language. They’re actions the algorithm recognises worldwide. That can make them powerful for:

    • Optimisation

      Meta can train on them

    • Reporting

      You can track overall behaviour

    • Audience building

      Create lookalikes or exclusions


    But don’t just assume standard events will automatically give you more volume, clearer data, or better machine-learned insight. How well they work really depends on your business, your budget, and your campaign goals. Events themselves don’t drive performance. They’re simply ways to measure and optimise user behaviour.

    Best practice tip: Use standard events when they fit your strategy and goals, not just because they’re there.

    2. CUSTOM EVENTS: THE UNDERRATED POWER MOVE

    Standard events don’t always cut it, especially if your funnel or product isn’t cookie-cutter. That’s where custom events come in.

    Custom events track interactions that you define. The stuff that actually matters to your business but falls outside Meta’s playbook. For example:

    • A user watches 75% of a video

    • A visitor scrolls 50% down a page

    • Someone spends more than 60 seconds on a pricing page

    • A prospect clicks your WhatsApp button

    These aren’t fluff. They’re signals of real engagement. When tracked correctly, they let you:

    • Create

      Hyper-relevant custom audiences

    • Measure

      Top-of-funnel intent without muddying your main conversions

    • Optimise

      For deeper actions, those that provide richer insights beyond basic conversion metrics

    Yes, they’re a little more technical to set up. But they give you a tighter read on what’s actually working.

    3. CUSTOM CONVERSIONS: YOUR GRANULAR LENS

    Let’s say your ‘purchase’ event is firing. Great. But which product was bought? Was it the one you’re actually advertising? And how do you track purchases for just that item?

    That’s where custom conversions come in.

    Custom conversions layer context on top of your events into standard or custom. Think of them as smart filters. You can define them by:

    • URL rules

    • Event parameters

    • Referring domains

    • Specific product IDs

    So, instead of tracking every purchase, you track the one that matters for that campaign. Or report on leads from a specific landing page. Or measure a download that only fires from email traffic.

    Important note: Custom conversions can’t be used to create audiences for targeting (like lookalikes or exclusions). However, you can optimise your campaigns toward custom conversions, meaning Meta will find and show your ads to people most likely to complete those specific actions.

    Custom conversions are also gold for:

    • Campaign reporting

    • Precise optimisation

    • Isolating results across variations

    WHY THIS ACTUALLY MATTERS (A LOT)

    Most advertisers stick to standard events and call it a day. But here’s the problem: if you’re only tracking end actions, like purchases or form submissions, without capturing the steps that lead there, your data is too limited to be useful.

    In other words, if Meta can’t see what’s happening before the final conversion, it can’t properly learn which behaviours signal intent. That limits how well it can optimise, weakens your reporting, and makes it harder to scale campaigns effectively.

    The algorithm isn’t just looking for outcomes; it’s looking for patterns. And without enough signals along the user journey, you’re leaving Meta to guess.

    If you optimise for ‘leads’, but half of those leads are unqualified, like people signing up out of curiosity or bots filling out forms, Meta can’t tell the difference. It just learns that those users are valuable, and keeps finding more like them. And if you optimise for ‘purchases’ across your entire site, but your campaign is only pushing one product, you’ll struggle to see whether it’s actually driving sales or simply riding the wave of other activity.

    Events aren’t just data points. They’re signals. And the quality of those signals determines whether Meta helps you scale or sets your money on fire.

    SO, WHAT SHOULD YOU ACTUALLY DO?

    Here’s the simplified step-by-step playbook:

    • Step 1: Add custom events to track the kind of engagement that actually signals interest.

      Don’t let valuable mid-funnel signals go dark.

    • Step 2: Layer custom conversions for campaign-specific tracking.

      Never settle for generic results again.

    • Step 3: Audit your setup regularly.

      Are your events still relevant? Are they firing correctly? Are you optimising for the right outcomes?

    • Step 4: Stop confusing event types.

      Custom events ≠ custom conversions. One tracks actions. The other filters results. Use both. Strategically.

    TIDAL’S TAKE: IF YOU CAN’T TRACK IT PROPERLY, YOU CAN’T OPTIMISE IT PROPERLY

    Meta is smart, but not psychic. If your events setup is vague, broad, or half-broken, you’re not just missing out on performance. You’re sabotaging it.

    The brands that win on Meta? They track what matters, optimise what matters, and leave the guesswork to their competitors.

    WANT TO KNOW WHAT YOUR EVENTS ARE REALLY TELLING META?

    If you’re not 100% sure, we should talk. TIDAL’s performance experts can audit your setup, fix what’s broken, and help you finally see what your data has  been trying to tell you all along. Let’s sort your tracking together.

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