Conversion tracking

Learn how you can use Dub to track how your link clicks are converting to signups and sales.

This feature is only available on Dub Business and above.

Data is the lifeblood of any business. It helps you understand your customers, make data-driven decisions, and drive growth.

Whenever you run a marketing campaign, merely tracking link clicks is not sufficient to paint a complete picture of your customer acquisition funnel.

You need to track how those clicks are converting to signups & sales to be able to determine which campaigns/channels are performing the best.

This is where Dub comes in.

With Dub, you can turn any short link you create on Dub into a full attribution engine. This allows you to understand how well your links are translating to actual users and revenue dollars.

How does conversion tracking work on Dub?

The way conversion tracking on Dub works can be boiled down to 3 simple steps:

1. Click Event

   This is the first step in the conversion funnel. It can either be:

   • A link click on a social media post/ad
   • A link click in an email/SMS
   • A QR code scan for physical (or video) campaigns
2. Lead Event

   When a user performs an action that indicates interest in your product or service. This could be anything from:

   • Signing up for an account
   • Adding a product to cart
   • Joining a mailing list
3. Sale Event

   When a user purchases your product or service. Examples include:

   • Subscribing to a paid plan
   • Usage expansion (upgrading from one plan to another)
   • Purchasing a product

With this 3-step process, marketing teams can make better decisions about which content or marketing efforts to invest more in – backed by real-world conversion data.

How are conversions tracked?

Dub uses a simple first-party cookie and server-side event tracking to track conversions.

Step 1: Storing click ID as a first-party cookie

When a user clicks on a conversion-enabled link, Dub generates a unique dub_id query parameter and stores it as a first-party cookie on your domain (e.g. .dub.co).

This allows Dub to attribute any subsequent conversion events to the original click – and by extension, the link that was clicked on.

To enable this, you need to install the Dub Analytics script in your project.

This package will handle the detection of the dub_id query parameter and storing it as a first-party cookie.

Step 2: Attributing conversion events to the original click

Then, when a conversion event occurs (e.g. a user signs up for an account), you can check for the dub_id cookie and attribute the conversion to the original click.

For example, if you’re using a Next.js app with NextAuth for authentication, here’s how you can send lead conversion events for new user signups.

When sending a lead conversion event, you can include the following properties:

Property	Description	Required
clickId	The unique dub_id parameter that the lead conversion event is attributed to.	Yes
eventName	The name of the event. Example: “Sign up”.	Yes
customerExternalId	The unique ID of the customer in your system. Will be used to identify and attribute all future events to this customer.	Yes
customerEmail	The email address of the customer. If not passed, a random email address will be generated.	No
customerName	The name of the customer. If not passed, a random name will be generated (e.g. “Big Red Caribou”).	No
customerAvatar	The avatar URL of the customer. If not passed, a random avatar URL will be generated.	No

The lead event will serve as the source of truth for the customer’s identity and which link they came from. This means that all subsequent actions performed by the customer (e.g. upgrading their plan, purchasing a product) will automatically be attributed to the original link.

Step 3: Sending sale events

The final step in the conversion funnel is to track sale events and attribute them to the original link click. This can be done in 3 ways:

Option 1: Stripe integration (recommended)

At Dub, we have a native Stripe integration that you can set up in 2-3 clicks and automatically send sale events to Dub.

The way the integration works is as follows:

1. Install our Stripe integration in your Dub workspace. For security reasons, the integration will have read-only access to your Stripe account.
2. When a user creates a checkout session on your app, pass the user’s unique ID in your system as the dubCustomerId property in the metadata field.
3. This way, when the user completes their checkout session, Dub will receive a webhook from Stripe containing the dubCustomerId.
4. If the dubCustomerId matches a customer that came from a conversion-enabled link, Dub will track the sale as a result of that link.

Option 2: Shopify integration

We also have a native Shopify integration that you can install in 2-3 clicks and automatically track sale events with Dub.

The way the integration works is as follows:

1. Install the Dub Shopify app in your Shopify store.
2. When a sale is made, the integration will automatically detect and track a laed + sale event in Dub.

Option 3: Manually sending sale events

Alternatively, if you prefer to send sale events manually, you can do so using our server-side SDKs.

We expose a POST /track/sale endpoint that you can use to send sale events to Dub. Here’s an example using the Dub TypeScript SDK:

/api/billing/upgrade

import { Dub } from "dub";

const dub = new Dub();

await dub.track.sale({
  customerExternalId: "123",
  amount: 5900, // in cents
  paymentProcessor: "stripe",
  eventName: "Subscription creation",
});

Here are the properties you can include when sending a sale event:

Property	Description	Required
customerExternalId	The unique ID of the customer in your system.	Yes
amount	The amount of the sale in cents.	Yes
paymentProcessor	The name of the payment processor that processed the sale.	No
eventName	The name of the event. Defaults to “Purchase”.	No
invoiceId	The unique ID of the invoice in your system.	No
currency	The currency of the sale. Defaults to “usd”.	No
metadata	An object containing additional information about the sale.	No

How do I see the conversions?

All your tracked conversions will show up on your Analytics dashboard. We provide 3 different views to help you understand your conversions:

• Time-series: A time-series view of the number clicks, leads and sales.

• Funnel chart: A funnel chart view visualizing the conversion & dropoff rates across the different steps in the conversion funnel (clicks → leads → sales).

• Real-time events stream: A real-time events stream of every single conversion event that occurs across all your links in your workspace.

What can I build with Dub?

There are various use cases for Dub. Here are a few examples:

1. White-labeled affiliate/referral programs

With Dub Partners (built on top of Dub), you can track how well your affiliate/referral links are performing and display the real-time analytics directly inside your application.

For instance, here’s a screenshot of our very own Dub referral program – powered by Dub – that lives within the Dub dashboard:

With Dub’s real-time webhooks feature, you can also build custom dual-sided incentive structures – e.g. rewarding the referrer an additional 100 credits when a new user signs up with their link.

2. Influencer campaigns attribution tracking

You can also use Dub Partners to better understand the performance of your influencer campaigns – not just the number of clicks, but also the number of signups/purchases.

You can then use the data to make data-driven decisions about which influencers to work with and how to better allocate your budget to maximize your ROI.

Getting started with conversion tracking on Dub

To get started with conversion tracking on Dub, check out our quickstart guide.