Updated: 12 June 2025 for Release v214
This article outlines settings in the Peppered Platform related to the integration with Google Tag Manager (GTM).
GTM & Consent levels
Visitors of your website can give different levels of consent through a cookie banner. This can be a third party cookiebanner, or when using the included Peppered Cookie banner.
The Peppered Cookie banner uses four Cookie consent levels:
- undefined: the user did not supply a level of consent
- default: only cookies required for the Peppered Platform website to function
- limited: some cookies are allowed, for embedded content and anonymous statistics
- all: all cookies, including ad-tracking etc. are allowed
Different consent levels can trigger different tools in the Google Tag Manager. To properly set-up consent levels, check out the article.
Setting up Google Tag Manager (GTM)
All Google Tag Manager settings are found in System > Control Panel > Marketing > Google Tag Manager.
- Google tag manager code Place your GTM code here
- Custom script source Place any other custom scripts here
- AdPage Pixel Domain When using AdPage server side tracking, insert the Pixel domain here. More information about Server side tagging
- Load Tag Manager always ”Yes” will load GTM directly, even when no consent has been given. Make sure to only fire tags suited for level 1 consent.
- Legacy datalayer When active, it uses an older version. Not suited for newer implementations.
- Hashed visitor email This is used for ad retargeting. This must be clearly explained in your cookie banner and will only come into effect if "all" consent is given when our cookie banner is used. When using a third party cookie banner, this data is always passed, as consent is handled elsewhere.
- Hashed full details This allows Google to create more complete user profiles. This must be clearly explained in your cookie banner and will only come into effect if "all" consent is given when our cookie banner is used. When using a third party cookie banner, this data is always passed, as consent is handled elsewhere.
Loading GTM
For Levels 3 and 4 we always load the Google Tag Manager. The two levels can be differentiated in Tag Manager by using the Data Layer (version 2) variable "cookieConsent". It will have the value of either "limited" or "all".
Using triggers
If you want to add tags that require consent for "all" cookies, e.g. if you want to re-target, you will need to split your tags by trigger.
First, set up the variable by adding a new user-defined variable (type "data layer variable", name "cookieConsent", version "Version 2").
You can set a default value here to "limited" (since GTM does not work at all unless the consent level is "limited").
In Triggers, you will have to set up (at least) two triggers:
- Page Views with limited cookies
- Page Views with all cookies
The first (limited) can be used for all tags where the visitor remains anonymous. In most cases, basic Google Analytics and E-commerce tracking should fit this level of consent.
The second trigger can be used for all tags that go further than that, like Google Adwords.
How to properly use Third party content on your Website
Third party embeds like Youtube, Vimeo, Spotify, etc use third party cookies. That means every time you embed third party content, these cookies are set. In order to make sure this complies with the given consent by the visitor, all dedicated third party content fields in the Dashboard already take consent levels into consideration, and will not load the third party content unless consent level 3 has been set.
These fields are:
- Primary video URL
- Embed URL
- iFrame
To comply with GDPR rules, only embed third party content via these designated fields. This guarantees the third party content will only be shown (and only third party cookies will be used) in cookie consent level 3 and higher.
If the appropriate consent level was not given, the third party content is replaced by the cookie banner:
- Note that this option is not suitable for embedded content with third party tracking cookies, since that would require a level 4 consent.
- Also note that any third party content embedded via any general text/HTML editor cannot be blocked in the cookie settings and will violate GDPR rules when the third party uses cookies.
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