Question

Has anyone set up custom events for Meta Pixel through Google Tag Manager? I tried to follow a video tutorial, but it is only working when I test it in Google Tag Manager and not outside of that.

I would like a custom event to be sent to my Meta Pixel through GTM. From my understanding of the video I watched, this is possible.

I set it up exactly as the guy in the video did. When I test in GTM, I can see that the trigger is firing when I view the page. When I test in Events Manager, the event does not come through. However, sometimes a few come through significantly later, but its definitely not counting all. I know that it should be counting more views because I just ran an ad with this page as the landing page, and the ad result was 370 landing page views.

Do I have this set up correctly? If so, what is going wrong?

Answer 1

Your custom event in GTM is firing in preview but not reliably showing in Meta due to:

- Pixel base code fires after the event → event is lost

- Wrong fbq('trackCustom') format

- Triggers not matching live page

- Consent issues or blockers (cookies, iOS, ad blockers)

- Tag fires too early—use “Window Loaded”

Fix It Checklist:

 - Make sure your Meta Pixel base code is firing before the custom event.

 - Use Custom HTML tag with fbq('trackCustom', ...) syntax.

- Set the tag to fire on Window Loaded to ensure Meta Pixel has initialized.

- Avoid relying only on preview; check real data in Meta Events Manager.

- Temporarily turn off cookie banners or blockers while testing.

- Use Test Events tool in Events Manager with a Test Code added to GTM: