A marketer wants to segment Meta Ads purchase data into “New Customer” and “Returning Customer” audiences to improve ad optimization, since Meta’s standard Purchase event doesn’t differentiate between the two.
Proposed Solution:
Use backend logic to determine customer status at checkout
Fire distinct custom events to Meta Pixel based on this determination
Recommended Implementation (via J_mah):
Configure Facebook Pixel and Conversion API through Google Tag Manager (GTM)
Set up a custom data layer that captures customer status using cookies/session data
Use data layer variables in GTM to send different purchase events based on whether the customer is new or returning
Three implementation screenshots were provided showing the data layer configuration with “new customer: true/false” logic
Follow-up Questions:
Whether a Shopify developer should handle the implementation
If alternative methods exist beyond the GTM/data layer approach
The discussion remains open with the original poster seeking clarification on implementation options.
Summarized with AI on October 23.
AI used: claude-sonnet-4-5-20250929.
To distinguish between new and returning customer you need to configure the pixel events through Google Tag Manager GTM.
To configure the Facebook pixel and conversion API through Google Tag Manager you would need a custom datalayer where we can get custom data based on cookies and session data.
When we have customer data, we can send different purchase event to facebook pixel with the help of datalayer and Google Tag Manager using datalayer variable.
Here I have attached an image where i configured datalayer for one of my clients with new customer data true or false.
