Omega Google Ads: Compliance - consent tracking

Omega automatically respects your shoppers' consent when sending tracking data to Google Ads and GA4. This guide explains how it works, where to see its impact, and how to verify your tracking.

What this feature does

Shoppers in privacy-regulated regions (EU/EEA, UK, and US states such as California) may decline tracking on your store's consent banner. Omega handles this for you automatically:

• Shoppers who accept consent → their events are sent to Google.
• Shoppers who decline consent → their events are not sent to Google.

Omega respects each consent purpose independently:

• Analytics consent controls GA4.
• Marketing consent controls Google Ads.

Before you start

Set up a consent banner in Shopify first

Omega Google relies on Shopify's Customer Privacy API to know which shoppers are in a regulated region and whether they accepted or declined.

1. In Shopify admin, go to Settings → Customer privacy.
2. Enable and configure a cookie/consent banner for your regulated regions.

If you don't have a consent banner configured, Shopify won't flag any visitor as "regulated", and Respect consent will have no one to apply to — everyone will be treated as trackable.

Set up a consent banner from a third-party app

If you don't use Shopify native consent banner and choose a third-party one, we still support consent tracking flow without any additional setup.

How it works

For each event, Omega gets the shopper's consent status from Shopify and decides per channel:

Where to see your consent impact

Consent no longer reduces data silently — you can see exactly what happened.
On the Home screen, the Event Overview card confirms "All events collected below comply with visitor consent" and has a View detailed analytics link.

In Analytics → Signal quality, you'll find ***(this is coming soon***)

• Consent breakdown — a donut showing your accept rate, the number of accepted vs declined events, and the order value that wasn't sent because of declined consent.
• Consent accepted rate by country — how often shoppers accept consent per market (EU/EEA is usually lower than the US).
• A Google Ads / GA4 toggle on each chart, so you can see the numbers per channel.
• A Consent recommendation if a meaningful share of events were blocked, with tips to improve your consent banner in low-acceptance markets.

How to verify your tracking

1. Run a real-time test event

Use our Test event feature to confirm your pipeline is connected. Test events are sent regardless of consent (so you can always verify setup) and are marked as tests — they don't count toward your real data.

2. Test the "Accepted" path

1. Open your store as a shopper (regulated region or a test profile).
2. Accept the consent banner.
3. Place a test event/test order.
4. Check: Confirm the event appears in GA4 → Realtime/DebugView and in Google Ads conversions.

3. Test the "Declined" path (the important one)

1. Open your store as a shopper in a regulated region.
2. Decline the consent banner.
3. Place a test event/test order.
4. Confirm the event does not appear in GA4 or Google Ads.
5. Check Analytics → Consent breakdown - the declined shopper should be reflected in the declined count / accept rate. ***(coming soon***)

FAQ & Troubleshooting

• My numbers dropped, is something broken? No. Omega now always respects consent, so shoppers who declined tracking are no longer sent to Google. This is expected and keeps you compliant. See Analytics → Consent breakdown to see exactly how much was affected.
• Declined orders still show in my table — is that a bug? No. Declined orders are shown (labeled Declined) so your totals stay consistent with Shopify. They are not forwarded to Google.
• Can I allow analytics but block marketing separately? Yes this is automatic. Analytics consent controls GA4 and marketing consent controls Google Ads, independently.
• Respect consent is on, but a declined shopper still seems tracked. Check that your consent banner is properly set up in Shopify (Settings → Customer privacy) or your third-party app. Without it, Shopify may not mark the shopper as regulated. If the issue persists, contact support with your store domain and the order ID.
• Does this make my store fully compliant? This feature helps you respect shoppers' consent choices, but overall compliance also depends on your consent banner, privacy policy, and store configuration. It's a tool to support compliance, not legal advice.
• Can I allow analytics but block marketing separately? Yes, this is automatic. Analytics consent controls GA4 and marketing consent controls Google Ads, independently.

Updated on: 04/08/2026