Microsoft Advertising: campaigns, spend and Conversions API (UET)

Forward your AxiTrace conversions to Microsoft Advertising server-side, straight to your UET tag. Conversions arrive even when the browser UET tag is blocked by an ad blocker, a privacy setting or a consent banner, so Microsoft reporting and bidding keep working on complete data. Separately, AxiTrace can sign in with Microsoft and import your campaigns and spend.

On this page

• Campaigns only, conversions only, or both
• 1. What this integration does
• 2. Get your UET tag ID
• Do you need the UET tag on your site?
• 3. Get your Conversions API token
• 4. Get your customer ID (CID)
• Connect in AxiTrace
• 5. Create the conversion goals
• 6. Turn on Enhanced conversions per goal
• 7. Microsoft Click ID auto-tagging
• 8. Conversion windows
• 9. What AxiTrace sends
• 10. Deduplication
• 11. Import spend and campaigns (Sign in with Microsoft or Google)
• 12. Troubleshooting
• 13. Reporting latency
• 14. Shopify
• 15. Consent Mode and the browser tag

Official Microsoft references used in this guide:

• UET Conversions API integration guide
• Create a UET tag
• Get started (customer ID and account ID)
• Event goal reference
• Enhanced conversions
• Microsoft Click ID auto-tagging

AxiTrace sends each enabled conversion from its own servers to the UET Conversions API endpoint POST https://capi.uet.microsoft.com/v1/{tagId}/events, authenticated with a per-workspace Conversions API token (UET Conversions API integration guide). One conversion is one request.

The integration has two halves, and each is its own connection in AxiTrace. The first half forwards conversions to Microsoft through the UET Conversions API, described in sections 2 to 10 (the Microsoft Ads Conversions API card under Connections → Conversion destinations). The second half signs in with Microsoft and imports spend and campaigns from your Microsoft Advertising account (section 11; the Microsoft Advertising card under Connections → Ad accounts), so spend and campaign results sit next to the visits and orders AxiTrace recorded. You can use either half without the other.

AxiTrace sends custom events only. Every event carries eventType: "custom" and one of the ten fixed event names in section 5. AxiTrace does not send pageLoad events, so page views never reach Microsoft through this integration and a UET page-load goal is never fed by AxiTrace.

A browser bridge is part of the integration as well: the AxiTrace web SDK can push the same conversions into an already installed UET tag with the same event id, and it can fire Microsoft ID Sync so that the anonymous visitor id AxiTrace sends server-side is known to Microsoft. On Shopify the same two jobs are done by a Custom Pixel snippet (section 14). On websites running the AxiTrace web SDK the bridge needs no setup: the SDK detects an existing UET tag and pushes into it. Whether you need that tag at all is covered in Do you need the UET tag on your site? Microsoft documents ID Sync as a client-side pixel to https://c.bing.com/c.gif carrying a Red3 and a VID parameter, and states:

"Fire the pixel on as many pages as practical and at least once per session, preferably on the first page view."
"The VID used in ID Sync should match the anonymousId sent in CAPI events."
UET Conversions API integration guide

Microsoft's documentation shows no example URL for that pixel, so here is the request as AxiTrace sends it, observed live (the two values are the customer ID and the visitor id, nothing else):

GET https://c.bing.com/c.gif?Red3=BACID_123456789&VID=e0e36e33-ad39-4cd7-b5b5-31e2f51ce698

Microsoft answers with a 200 image/gif and sets its own cookie on bing.com. The server leg described below works on its own and needs no browser change.

If you do not have a UET tag yet, Microsoft describes creating one as:

"From the navigation menu on the left, hover over Conversions and select UET tag. Select Create and then enter a UET tag name. ... Select Save."
Create a UET tag

The UET tag ID is the numeric ti value inside that tracking code, for example ti: '123456789'. That number, digits only and without any prefix, is what AxiTrace needs.

Microsoft does not document where the tag ID is displayed in the current interface, so this guide describes only the tracking code. Reading the ti value out of the tracking code always works.

Do you need the UET tag on your site?

Not for conversions. AxiTrace sends every enabled conversion from its servers with the Conversions API token, and a conversion goal counts those events whether or not the UET tracking code is on your pages. You create the UET tag in Microsoft Advertising because the Conversions API is addressed by its tag ID and its token; pasting its tracking code into your site is a separate, optional step.

Install the tracking code on your pages when you want the browser half as well:

• Remarketing and page-visit audiences. AxiTrace sends no pageLoad events (section 1), so lists built on page visits are only populated by your own tag.
• A browser copy of each conversion. When the tag is present, the AxiTrace web SDK pushes the same conversion into it with the same event id, and Microsoft deduplicates the pair (section 10). Without the tag the SDK skips that push; the server event is still sent.

Microsoft describes adding the tracking code to a website as:

"In the table, find the UET tag that you want to use and, in the Action column, select View tag."
"Paste the UET tag tracking code on every page of your website, either in the head or body section."
Everything you need to know about setting up UET

Microsoft describes the click path to the token as:

"Find your existing tag or provision a new UET tag ID in the UET section of your Microsoft Advertising account. Select your existing UET tag by using the pencil icon. Select Save and next in the Edit UET tag section. In the Set up tagging section, select Use Conversions API. In the Conversions API section, select Copy Token, select Next, and then select Done."
UET Conversions API integration guide

There is one token per UET tag. The token belongs to the tag it was copied from, and a token from a different tag fails with HTTP 401. Copy the whole string: a truncated token also fails with HTTP 401 on the first conversion.

The customer ID is optional. It is used only by the browser ID Sync leg. Microsoft describes finding it as:

"sign in to the Microsoft Advertising web application and click on the Campaigns tab. The URL will contain a cid key/value pair in the query string that identifies your customer ID, and an aid key/value pair that identifies your account ID."
Get started

Observed on a live account, the address bar on the Campaigns overview looks like this (numbers replaced): https://ui.ads.microsoft.com/campaign/vnext/overview?aid=1234567&cid=987654321. Copy the digits after cid=; the aid= value is your account ID and is not needed.

Connect in AxiTrace

In AxiTrace open your workspace, go to Connections → Conversion destinations (the section Send your conversions to ad platforms), find the Microsoft Ads Conversions API card and click Set up (Settings once it is saved). This page only sends conversions; importing campaigns and spend is the separate ad account connection in section 11. Fill in section 1. UET tag and Conversions API token:

In section 2. Events forwarded to Microsoft tick the events you want sent. Keeping them all on is recommended, because Microsoft bids better on a complete funnel. Page views are shown disabled and are never sent in this version. Then save: saving validates and stores the settings and activates the connection.

Microsoft only counts an event that a conversion goal is watching for. You create one goal per event name you want counted. Goals match on Action, and optionally on Category, Label and Value (Event goal reference). AxiTrace never sends a category or a label, so a goal that also requires one of them can never match an AxiTrace event. Match on the Action alone.

Create the goal with the operator Equals and the Action exactly as listed:

The right-hand column lists every AxiTrace event name and alias that is sent under that event name, so a store that emits product.addToCart and a plugin that emits add_to_cart both land on the same goal. Sign-ups are sent as sign_up from registration form submissions and follow the lead tick in the connection form.

Microsoft's help articles document only the route to goal creation, "Conversions > Conversion goals > Create > Website > choose goal category and type" (Microsoft Advertising help). The individual field labels and the operator control of that form are not documented, so this guide gives you the values to enter rather than naming the boxes to enter them in.

AxiTrace sends the hashed email and the hashed phone number when it has them. Microsoft uses those only when Enhanced conversions is on for the goal:

"Turn on Enhanced conversions"
"Selecting Enhanced Conversion will only apply to the current conversion goal"
Enhanced conversions

There is no account-level switch. The setting applies to the goal you are editing and to nothing else, so repeat it for every goal you created in section 5. A goal you add later starts without it.

Microsoft documents that the setting is per goal but not where the control sits in the current interface, so this guide does not describe its position on the screen.

The Microsoft Click ID (msclkid) is the strongest match key for this integration: it ties a conversion to the exact ad click that produced it. Microsoft appends it to your landing-page URLs through auto-tagging, which is enabled by default. Microsoft documents the setting as:

"hover over Campaigns and select Settings > Account level options > Add Microsoft Click ID (MSCLKID) to URLs to allow conversion tracking"
Microsoft Click ID auto-tagging

If that option was ever turned off, turn it back on: without msclkid on the landing URL, AxiTrace can only match a conversion through the hashed email or phone number, and an event that carries none of the three is dropped before it is sent (see section 9). The AxiTrace SDK, the Shopify pixel and the plugins read msclkid at landing, store it on the visitor profile and attach it to later events from that visitor. Microsoft documents the value as a UUID and suggests keeping it for 90 days, which is what AxiTrace does.

The conversion window is a property of the goal, not of the integration: 30 days by default and 90 days at most (Event goal reference). A conversion that happens later than the window of its goal is not counted, no matter how it was delivered. If your buying cycle is long, raise the window on each goal when you create it. This window is separate from the 7-day limit on how old an event may be when it is sent, which is covered in section 9.

One request per conversion, with eventType: "custom", the event name from section 5, a unique eventId, the event time in seconds, and a userData object. AxiTrace identifies itself to Microsoft as the sending data provider and never asks Microsoft to keep a payload that failed validation.

Identifiers in userData

Hashing rules

Microsoft's rules, which AxiTrace applies before sending:

• Email: trim whitespace, remove all dots from the user portion, remove the +alias from the user portion, lowercase, then SHA-256 as lowercase hex.
• Phone: E.164 with country code, then SHA-256 as lowercase hex.

Both rules come from the UET Conversions API integration guide. A value AxiTrace cannot normalise, such as a phone number with no recognisable country code, is left out rather than sent as a hash Microsoft cannot match.

Identity floor

Event age, consent, value and limits

• 7-day event window. Microsoft requires the event time to be within the last 7 days. AxiTrace drops an older event before sending it and records the reason, so a replay of old data never marks the connection unhealthy.
• Consent. An event whose visitor granted marketing consent carries adStorageConsent: "G". An event whose visitor refused is never sent to Microsoft at all: your workspace consent policy blocks it before the request is made, so Microsoft never receives a denied conversion from AxiTrace. When the event reports no consent state the field is omitted and Microsoft's documented default (processed as granted) applies; whether such an event is forwarded at all is decided by Forward events that do not report a consent state in your workspace. See the Cookie consent guide.
• Value and products. Order value, currency and transaction id are sent on purchase, and value and currency on the other events that have them. Product details are sent as items where they exist, with Microsoft's caveat that the items array "is used only for specific advertising products and is not applicable to standard conversion tracking goals." (UET Conversions API integration guide)
• Rate limits. Microsoft documents a maximum of 1000 events per batch. AxiTrace sends one event per request, so that ceiling is never reached. No other rate limit is documented by Microsoft, so AxiTrace applies none of its own beyond retrying transient failures.

If you keep the browser UET tag and also send the same conversion server-side, Microsoft needs to recognise the two as one. Its rule is:

"When UET JavaScript and CAPI send the same conversion event, pass the same stable deduplication value in eventId and keep eventName compatible across both systems."
UET Conversions API integration guide

AxiTrace follows it on both legs: the browser bridge pushes event_id with exactly the value the server leg sends as eventId, and both legs use the same event name from section 5. For purchases that value is derived from the order itself, so a retry, a replay or a second page load never produces a second conversion.

The Conversions API half of this integration sends conversions to Microsoft. The second half reads your Microsoft Advertising data the other way: AxiTrace signs in with your Microsoft Advertising login (a Microsoft account, or a Google account if that is how you sign in to Microsoft Advertising), imports your accounts, campaigns, ad groups, ads and daily performance (impressions, clicks, spend and the conversions Microsoft reports), and shows spend and campaign results next to the visits and orders AxiTrace recorded. It is a separate connection from the UET Conversions API and does not replace it, and it works on its own: a merchant who only wants campaign and spend analytics connects this and skips sections 2 to 10.

Connect with Microsoft

In AxiTrace open your workspace, go to Connections → Ad accounts (the section Connect your ad accounts), find the Microsoft Advertising card and click Connect Microsoft Advertising. Sign in with the Microsoft account you use at ads.microsoft.com and approve the access AxiTrace asks for, then pick the Microsoft Advertising account to import from the list AxiTrace shows. If Microsoft offers an account you are already signed in with (for example your work account) and it is not the one you use for Microsoft Advertising, choose Use another account. AxiTrace requests the scope https://ads.microsoft.com/msads.manage offline_access, which it uses read-only: it reads accounts, campaigns, ad groups, ads and daily performance (impressions, clicks, spend and conversions as reported by Microsoft) and never edits campaigns, ad groups, ads or budgets.

Sign in with Google

If you sign in to ads.microsoft.com with a Google account (the Sign in with Google button on the Microsoft Advertising sign-in page), click Sign in with Google on the Microsoft Advertising card instead of Connect Microsoft Advertising, and sign in with that same Google account. You do not need to create a separate Microsoft account or add another user to your Microsoft Advertising account. AxiTrace asks Google only for your identity (the scopes openid email profile), never for access to Gmail, Drive or any other Google data; Microsoft Advertising uses that identity to decide which accounts you can reach, with the same permissions as when you sign in at ads.microsoft.com. The rest of the flow is the same: pick the account to import, and the access stays read-only. AxiTrace remembers how you signed in, so Reconnect takes you back to Google. To switch a connection from Google to a Microsoft account (or back), disconnect it and connect again with the other button.

Admin consent

Some Microsoft Entra tenants block user consent for third-party applications. In that case the sign-in shows Need admin approval and nobody in the workspace can finish the connection. A tenant admin opens the admin-consent link below and approves AxiTrace for the whole organization. Replace {tenant} with the organization's tenant ID or primary domain.

https://login.microsoftonline.com/{tenant}/adminconsent?client_id=6e6935be-9295-4921-b28e-58059dfe5c87

One account per workspace

A workspace holds one Microsoft Advertising account at a time. Picking another account replaces the first one.

Final URL Suffix

So that AxiTrace can tie a visit and an order to the campaign that produced it, Microsoft Advertising has to put the campaign, ad group and ad ids on the landing URL. In Microsoft Advertising set the Final URL suffix at account level (or per campaign) to:

ms_campaign_id={CampaignId}&ms_adgroup_id={AdGroupId}&ms_ad_id={AdId}

Microsoft replaces those dynamic text tags with the ids of the ad that was clicked, and AxiTrace's matcher reads the ms_campaign_id, ms_adgroup_id and ms_ad_id parameters from the landing URL. Keep MSCLKID auto-tagging on as well (section 7). The same suffix is described in the tracking URL parameters guide.

A missing suffix, or a URL tracking template that strips query parameters, breaks the match. Fix the suffix and wait for new clicks: clicks that already happened are not re-matched.

Conversions stay on the UET Conversions API

The Microsoft sign-in imports reporting data only. It does not create or upload conversion goals and it does not send conversions. If you want conversions in Microsoft Advertising, set up the separate Microsoft Ads Conversions API connection described in sections 2 to 10: an HTTP 200 from that connection and a matching event goal are what count a conversion in Microsoft Advertising.

Data latency and refresh

Microsoft reporting data can be up to about 3 hours behind. AxiTrace re-fetches the last 7 days on every sync, so a recent day's spend and conversions can still change and settle within a week. Judge a new connection after the first full sync rather than minute by minute.

Every delivery attempt, with the HTTP status Microsoft returned, is visible in the connection log in your workspace's Event feed. Start there.

Microsoft does not document whether an event with no preceding ad click is visible on the goal at all, or after how long, so the row above describes what AxiTrace can prove (delivery) and does not promise what the goal will show.

Because the timing is partner-reported rather than documented, do not use it to judge a setup on its first day. The connection log is the fast signal: a 200 there means Microsoft has your event, whatever Microsoft reporting shows so far.

On Shopify the AxiTrace app pixel already sends every conversion to our servers, and the server leg above forwards them to Microsoft. The optional Microsoft UET Bridge Custom Pixel adds the browser half: it pushes UET custom events from inside Shopify's Customer Events sandbox and fires Microsoft ID Sync on every page view. Both legs carry the same Shopify event ID, so Microsoft deduplicates the pair (section 10).

It is needed on Shopify specifically because the Custom Pixel sandbox cannot see scripts pasted into your theme. The snippet therefore loads Microsoft's official UET base code itself, using your UET tag ID. On every other platform the AxiTrace web SDK does the same job with no snippet at all.

The snippet also sends UET Consent Mode, taken from your store's own Shopify customer privacy state. It pushes ad_storage as granted only when Shopify reports that the visitor's consent allows marketing, and as denied in every other case, including when that state cannot be read; the default is pushed before the UET base code loads and updated the moment the visitor answers your consent banner. So if your consent banner is integrated with Shopify's customer privacy API, your Microsoft signals are correct for EEA, UK and Swiss visitors with nothing further to configure (section 15).

The snippet reads your AxiTrace workspace consent policy once at runtime, so one switch governs it too. With Respect cookie consent on, it loads Microsoft's UET base code only after the visitor allows marketing, and holds every Microsoft-facing action until then: no request reaches Microsoft before the decision. With the switch off, the base code loads as it always has. You never paste a new snippet because of that setting: flip it in AxiTrace and the snippet follows within 5 minutes.

Setup

1. Open your workspace's Microsoft Ads Conversions API connection page in the AxiTrace admin panel (Connections → Conversion destinations, then Settings on that card). A personalized version of the snippet, with your UET tag ID and your customer ID already filled in, is shown there once your UET tag ID is saved. Your Conversions API token is never part of the snippet.
2. In your Shopify admin, go to Settings → Customer events.
3. Click Add custom pixel and name it, for example "AxiTrace Microsoft UET Bridge".
4. Paste the snippet into the code editor.
5. In the Customer privacy box of the pixel, under Permission, choose Not required ("The pixel will always run"). With Required Shopify does not load the pixel at all until the visitor has granted the selected purposes, so declining or undecided visitors would get no Consent Mode signal and no bridge coverage while everything still looks "connected". Running the pixel unconditionally is what lets it report the visitor's real consent state to Microsoft (section 15): the snippet itself never sends anything Microsoft treats as personal data. This stays Not required even when your AxiTrace workspace requires cookie consent - the snippet does the gating itself, which is what lets it push the Consent Mode default before the tag loads. Leave Data sale at the value that matches your store's privacy policy.
6. Click Save, then Connect.

What the snippet sends

Storefront inquiry button

If your store has an inquiry or "ask about this product" form rather than a checkout for that product, you can report it as a lead. Publish one custom event when the inquiry form is submitted, with the email the visitor typed, so the lead carries a match key. Paste this before </body> in layout/theme.liquid and replace the form selector and field names with your theme's:

<script>
document.addEventListener("submit", function (e) {
  var form = e.target;
  if (!form || !form.matches("form.customer-inquiry-form__form")) { return; }
  var v = function (name) { var el = form.querySelector("[name=\"" + name + "\"]"); return el && el.value ? String(el.value).trim() : ""; };
  if (window.Shopify && window.Shopify.analytics && typeof window.Shopify.analytics.publish === "function") {
    window.Shopify.analytics.publish("axitrace_lead", {
      source: "product_inquiry",
      product_id: v("productId"),
      product_title: v("productTitle"),
      email: v("email"),
      phone: v("phone")
    });
  }
}, true);
</script>

Both the AxiTrace app pixel and the Custom Pixel receive that event. The app pixel forwards it to our servers as a lead, which the server leg sends to Microsoft as generate_lead; the Custom Pixel pushes the same generate_lead with the same event ID, so the two deduplicate.

Consent Mode governs your own browser UET tag. It is separate from the AxiTrace server leg, which carries its own adStorageConsent derived from your AxiTrace consent state (section 9) and is unaffected by what the browser tag does. On your own pages, Consent Mode has to be configured once, as high in the head as possible.

On Shopify you get it automatically. The AxiTrace Microsoft UET Bridge Custom Pixel (section 14) derives Consent Mode from your store's Shopify customer privacy state: it pushes the ad_storage default before the UET base code loads, defaulting to denied, and pushes an update when the visitor answers your store's consent banner. granted is sent only when your store's consent settings allow marketing for that visitor, so a merchant whose consent banner is integrated with Shopify needs no extra Consent Mode script for the bridge.

Microsoft's own requirements, quoted from its Consent Mode FAQ:

"Microsoft Advertising requires advertisers using our Universal Event Tag (UET) to provide user consent signals, by implementing either Consent Mode for UET or the IAB's Transparency and Consent Framework (TCF) on their websites."
Consent Mode FAQ

"Either Consent Mode or TCF can be used with Microsoft Advertising, but you should never use both simultaneously."
Consent Mode FAQ

"Yes, UET must be loaded before the user interacts with the consent banner, but the default setting for Consent Mode must be set to Denied to prevent processing information without consent. Once the user gives consent, this setting should be updated to Granted. If consent is not given, the Denied setting will remain as is."
Consent Mode FAQ

"Ideally, the UET Consent Mode script should be placed as high as possible within the head section of the webpage. The default needs to be set before the page is fully loaded."
Consent Mode FAQ

"Currently, we are only planning to enforce consent based on the ad_storage value."
Consent Mode FAQ

"If you are using UET, but have not implemented Consent Mode or the TCF, then we will stop tracking your UET-based conversions and populating your remarketing lists."
Consent Mode FAQ

To check that your own tag reports consent, Microsoft says to "check the asc parameter in the Page Load event once the UET tag is fired. This should be set to "G" when consent is granted and "D" when consent has been denied", and that window.uetq.uetConfig.consent.adStorageAllowed shows the current state in the browser console (Consent Mode FAQ).

What the AxiTrace consent switch changes here

Respect cookie consent (Workspace → Settings) governs what AxiTrace itself does in the browser. While it is off, nothing on this page is restricted: the UET bridge pushes its events and Microsoft ID Sync fires on every page view, exactly as before. While it is on:

• Microsoft ID Sync needs marketing consent. The sync request sets Microsoft's own MUID cookie, which is a third-party cookie write, so it is suppressed entirely until the visitor allows marketing. There is no anonymous variant.
• UET event pushes from the AxiTrace SDK (the browser half of the deduplicated pair) are suppressed the same way, and are never queued for a later retry.
• A withdrawal deletes the cached Microsoft customer id along with AxiTrace's own identifiers.

If your site uses an IAB TCF consent platform that reports that GDPR applies, a plain marketing grant is not enough for these two Microsoft side effects. AxiTrace additionally requires Microsoft's TCF vendor id 1126 and the purposes Microsoft names:

A TCF platform reporting gdprApplies === false is outside the TCF regime, so the marketing grant alone is enough there. Full details of the switch and of every consent signal AxiTrace reads are in the Cookie consent guide.