Sending Snowplow events to additional destinations
We’re extremely proud to announce the first release of Snowplow support in Google Tag Manager Server Side.
With this release, we have introduced a set of Templates to allow you to use your Snowplow data with Google Tag Manager Server Side, ultimately allowing you to relay your rich behavioral data to a variety of destinations.
Forwarding Events
When it comes to forwarding events, Snowplow has native integrations as well as this new support via Google Tag Manager Server Side from a variety of Snowplow, vendor and community authored destinations.
- Native Integrations (Indicative, Kafka, Azure Event Hubs)
- Google Tag Manager Server Side Snowplow Tags (Amplitude, Iterable, Braze (Coming soon), Mixpanel (Coming soon), etc)
- Google Tag Manager Server Side Vendor and Community Tags (Facebook Conversions, Google Ads, etc)
- Custom Integrations (AWS Lambdas, GCP Cloud Functions, Kinesis and PubSub Applications)
Google Tag Manager Server Side Support
We recommend you become familiar with the fundamentals of Server Side tagging.
Taking an approach with Snowplow and GTM SS offers many additional flexibility and control:
- Full visibility into all transformations on the data
- Ability to evolve sophistication over time
- All data remains in your private cloud until you choose to forward it
- Ease of setup due to rich libraries of tags and familiar GTM UI
Configuration Options
GTM SS with Snowplow can be setup in two different configurations.
Destinations Hub (Post-pipeline)
Use GTM SS to relay enriched events to destinations. Events are sent to GTM SS after being processed by your Snowplow Pipeline.
| Open Source | Snowplow BDP |
|---|---|
 (See documentation) |
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| Documentation | Request Setup |
Server Side Tag Manager (Pre-pipeline)
Use GTM SS to relay raw events before the Snowplow pipeline to destinations, including to your Snowplow pipeline.
| Open Source | Snowplow BDP |
|---|---|
|
|
Deploying Google Tag Manager Server Side
GTM SS must first be deployed before it can be used. This can easily achieved by deploying to GCP App Engine from directly within the GTM User Interface. Alternatively, docker images are available for other deployment options, such as on AWS or with Kubernetes.
Snowplow Client
To receive events in your GTM SS container, the Snowplow Client must be installed. This works for both events direct from the tracker, or enriched events from the pipeline.
The Snowplow Client populates the common event data so many GTM SS tags will just work, however it also populates a set of additional properties to ensure the rich Snowplow event data is available to Tags which wish to take advantage of this, such as the Snowplow Authored Tags.
Snowplow Tag
If using GTM SS as a Server Side Tag Manager for Snowplow JavaScript Tracker events, you will want to ensure you forward these events to your Snowplow Collector. The Snowplow Tag will automatically forward any events the Snowplow Client receives once it has been configured with your Collector URL. It can also construct Snowplow events from other GTM SS Clients such as GAv4.
Snowplow Authored Tags
Snowplow have created a number of GTM SS Tags which work best with the Snowplow Client and make use of the rich data available from Snowplow tracker or Enriched events.