How can I validate my Meta (Facebook) data?

Introduction

By following this guide, users will be able to validate that the Facebook Pixel is receiving the correct data.

When setting up tags within Google Tag Manager, we will need to test that Facebook is receiving the correct data. This means confirming that the data received by the Facebook Pixel matches the data that we expect to be received. 

There are a variety of tools that one can use to validate tags which include a range of platform-specific tools, and also Google Chrome Extensions. For this document, we shall focus on the platform-specific tools. However, a list of Google Chrome Extensions has been provided in the Appendix of this document. 

Official documentation regarding Facebook Pixel events testing can be found in this Test your app or web browser events using the test events tool article.

Time Required

30 minutes

Tools and Equipment Required

• Internet access
• Facebook Business Manager account

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On this page:

  Validating data received using the Facebook Pixel's Test Events

  Appendix

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Validating data received using the Facebook Pixel's Test Events

• If you haven’t checked whether the Google Tag Manager tags for Facebook/Meta are working correctly, follow How can I validate Google Tag Manager tags? first to confirm that they are indeed working well. 
• Open Facebook Business Manager.
• At the top left, open the burger menu, and from the panel that opens up click on Events Manager, see reference screenshot below.

• On the far left menu, click on Data Sources.
• On the middle panel, search for the Pixel/Data set you would like to debug and click on it. 
• In the panel on the right, at the top menu, click on Test events.
• A box prompting the user to enter a website URL should appear. 
  • If you do not see this, you may be using a Data set. In this case, click on Confirm that your website’s events are set up correctly.
• Enter https://booking.zerolatencyvr.com/book-now in the text box provided.
• Click Open Website.
• A new tab will open up showing the webpage of the booking portal.
• Select the location of the venue’s Facebook Pixel you would like to debug. 
• Go through some of the booking processes, at least until adding the product to the cart to get some data. Alternatively, if you are testing for a specific event, such as a purchase, carry out that action from within the tab that opened up. 
• Go back to your Facebook Pixel/Business Manager tab on your browser. 
• On your Test Events tab which you should be on, you shall see a list of events received listed in chronological order similar to the screenshot below.

• If you would like to get additional information about the data sent with a specific event. You may click on the event name of the event you would like to review. This will open up another section underneath the event that shows the parameters sent with the event. The screenshot below shows an example of this in action.
  

• Check any relevant and applicable parameters for the event to validate that the implementation is correct.

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Appendix

• Facebook Pixel Helper
  
  • Helps with Facebook Pixel Debugging.

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Meta
Facebook
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Facebook data
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Google Tag Manager
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