How to Name Your GA4 Offline Conversion Events

This guide explains which event names to use, how to map your CRM stages onto them, and which parameters to send.

Tracking Specialist

Updated 29 August 2026 · 11 min read

The short answer

If you send offline lead events to GA4, use Google's recommended event names: generate_lead, qualify_lead, working_lead, disqualify_lead, close_convert_lead and close_unconvert_lead. GA4's built-in lead reports only recognise those names, and historical events cannot be renamed later.

Google's recommended events for lead generation: generate_lead, qualify_lead, disqualify_lead, working_lead, close_convert_lead and close_unconvert_lead, each with the user action that triggers it. — The six events as Google documents them, with the trigger for each. Source: Google Analytics Help.

How GA4 reads event names

GA4 stores every incoming hit as an event: a name plus a set of parameters. When your CRM sends a closed deal through the Measurement Protocol, GA4 records the name it receives. That name determines whether GA4 includes the event in its built-in lead reports.

Matching is exact and case sensitive, so Qualify_Lead and qualify_lead are two separate events. A name like qualified_lead still collects data and shows up in Realtime and in Explorations, but the Lead acquisition report stays empty, which usually gets read as a broken report rather than a naming problem.

Settle the names before you send the first event. GA4 does not rename events that have already been collected, and a custom dimension registered today does not backfill earlier data.

The six lead events

Google defines six events for the lead generation lifecycle. Five of them are meant to be sent from your CRM after the fact. Only generate_lead normally fires on the website.

Event name	Fire it when	Parameters Google defines
`generate_lead`	Someone submits a form or gives you their details offline.	`currency`Required if you send a value. ISO 4217, for example EUR. `value`Optional. Estimated worth of a raw lead. `lead_source`Optional. Google example: "Trade show".
`qualify_lead`	The lead is marked as fitting your qualification criteria.	`currency`Required if you send a value. `value`Optional. Pipeline value at qualification.
`working_lead`	A rep contacts the lead, or the lead contacts a rep. Fires more than once per lead as the deal moves.	`lead_status`Optional. Google example: "Started conversations".
`disqualify_lead`	The lead is ruled out, for example wrong country, no budget, a competitor or a bot.	`disqualified_lead_reason`Optional. Google example: "Not looking to buy".
`close_convert_lead`	The lead became a customer. This event carries the deal revenue.	`currency`Required if you send a value. `value`The actual deal value.
`close_unconvert_lead`	A lead that reached qualification was closed as lost.	`unconvert_lead_reason`Optional. Google example: "Never responded".

Sending these events populates two GA4 reports: the Lead acquisition report, which counts new, qualified and converted leads by source and campaign, and the Lead disqualification and loss report, which you add from the report library. Google's recommended events reference is the canonical list.

The GA4 Lead acquisition report, showing New leads, Qualified leads and Converted leads broken down by first user primary channel group, with the qualified and converted columns highlighted. — The Qualified leads and Converted leads columns only fill once `qualify_lead` and `close_convert_lead` arrive under those exact names.

Mapping your CRM stages

Most CRM pipelines have more stages than GA4 has lead events. The common mistake is to create a separate event name for every stage. Those events collect data, but they sit outside the built-in reports and the vocabulary grows until nobody is certain what each name means.

A workable rule is to give a stage its own event when it changes the state of the lead. Qualification, disqualification, won and lost all change the state. Booking a demo or sending a proposal are steps inside the sales process, so those go on working_lead with a different lead_status value.

CRM stage	GA4 event	Parameters	Why
Form submitted on the site	`generate_lead`	lead_source	The website-side event. Everything below comes from the CRM.
First call attempted	`working_lead`	lead_status: "Contact attempted"	A step in the process, so no new event name.
Discovery call held	`working_lead`	lead_status: "Discovery held"	Same event, different status value.
Marked Sales Qualified	`qualify_lead`	currency, value	A state change, and the first signal worth bidding on.
Proposal sent	`working_lead`	lead_status: "Proposal sent"	Still a step, even though it feels significant.
Wrong fit or no budget	`disqualify_lead`	disqualified_lead_reason	Fire this instead of dropping the lead silently.
Deal won	`close_convert_lead`	currency, value	Send the real deal value here.
Deal lost	`close_unconvert_lead`	unconvert_lead_reason	Only for leads that reached qualification first.

Three mapping mistakes account for most broken lead funnels.

1. Firing qualify_lead more than once per lead
A lead that moves back and forth through your pipeline fires the event again on every entry into the stage. The Lead acquisition report counts events, so the qualified count inflates and the qualification rate can pass 100%.
Trigger on the first transition into the stage. Most CRMs can store a "qualified at" timestamp, so fire only when that field goes from empty to filled.
2. Using close_unconvert_lead for leads that were never qualified
If every dead record is closed as lost, the event stops meaning "we tried and it did not close" and starts meaning "this record is no longer open". Those are different questions.
Send disqualify_lead for leads that never reached qualification, and reserve close_unconvert_lead for the ones that did.
3. Skipping generate_lead because a form event already exists
Many setups already send form_submit or a custom event from GTM. The Lead acquisition report reads generate_lead specifically, so marking an existing form event as a key event does not populate it.
You can keep both. Send generate_lead alongside whatever you already fire, and use the existing event for your own operational reporting.

How LeadTrackr handles the mapping

LeadTrackr maps each CRM stage to the correct GA4 event and to the matching Google Ads conversion action. You set the mapping once per conversion label and it applies to every lead after that, which keeps the naming consistent across accounts without a custom Measurement Protocol implementation for each one.

The GA4 integration covers the connection itself: measurement ID, API secret, and which stage sends which event.

Naming the parameter values

Consistent parameter values are just as important as the event names.

GA4 accepts any string up to 100 characters and does not normalise it. If your CRM sends Not looking to buy, not looking to buy and Not Looking To Buy, the report shows three rows for one reason.

Keep a closed list of values

Decide the permitted values for lead_status, disqualified_lead_reason and unconvert_lead_reason up front, write them down, and have the CRM offer them as a dropdown rather than a free text field. Five to ten values per parameter is usually enough.

A free text CRM field piped into GA4 causes the most trouble here. Every rep phrases it differently, cardinality rises, and GA4 starts grouping the long tail into (other).

Human-readable values, snake_case names

The Google examples set a reasonable convention: parameter names in lowercase with underscores, such as disqualified_lead_reason, and values written the way someone would say them, such as "Not looking to buy".

Which convention you pick matters less than applying it consistently, because a mixed convention produces duplicate rows that cannot be merged afterwards.

Send `value` only when you know it

On close_convert_lead, send the real deal value with a matching currency. GA4 requires currency whenever value is set, and a value without a currency is dropped from revenue reporting.

On generate_lead and qualify_lead, an estimated value is useful when your leads vary a lot in worth. A flat placeholder is worse than sending nothing, because it makes every campaign look equally profitable.

Register parameters as custom dimensions

A custom parameter arrives in GA4 but does not appear in standard reports until you register it as a custom dimension in Admin. Until then it exists only in the raw data and in BigQuery.

A standard property allows 50 event-scoped custom dimensions and a 360 property allows 125. Registration is not retroactive, so register the status and reason parameters when you go live rather than later.

GA4 naming limits

The GA4 constraints worth knowing before you settle on names.

Event name length: 40 characters. This matters most for key events, because GA4 appends _c internally and a name that then passes 40 characters is not reported as a key event.
Case sensitivity: qualify_lead and Qualify_Lead are separate events. Keep everything lowercase.
Parameter name length: 40 characters.
Parameter value length: 100 characters. Longer values are truncated without warning.
Parameters per event: 25. Rarely a constraint for lead events, but worth knowing before you attach a large CRM payload.
Distinct event names: Web data streams have no cap, so the discipline has to come from your own conventions.
Custom dimensions: 50 event-scoped on a standard property, 125 on a 360 property. Not retroactive.

Which events to mark as key events

Marking an event as a key event tells GA4 it is an outcome worth counting, and makes it available as a conversion in a linked Google Ads account.

Mark qualify_lead and close_convert_lead. Those two states carry commercial meaning: the lead was worth having, and the lead paid.

Think carefully before marking generate_lead. Most sites already count form submissions somewhere, and marking this event as well puts a form fill count back at the centre of your reporting. Leaving it unmarked keeps the qualified count as the headline number.

Leave working_lead unmarked. It fires repeatedly per lead by design, so as a key event it produces a number that rises without anything new happening.

Marking an event as a key event is not retroactive, but it is reversible. Unmark it and the historical data stays in place.

GA4 events and Google Ads conversions

Your GA4 event names and your Google Ads conversion action names are two separate naming schemes, and they do not have to match.

GA4 event names come from a fixed vocabulary you adopt so the built-in reports work. Google Ads conversion action names are free text, shown in the campaign interface and used in bid strategies. A descriptive conversion action name such as "Deal Won" or "Sales Qualified Lead" is easier for account managers to recognise and use than a snake_case event name.

Google Ads smart bidding reads the conversion category rather than the name, so set that to Qualified lead or Converted lead to match the stage. One CRM stage then produces one GA4 event and one Google Ads conversion action, each named for the people who read it. The GA4 integration sets both from the same conversion label, so the two stay in step.

A worked example

A closed deal sent from the CRM to GA4 through the Measurement Protocol. The client_id does the attribution work. It is the GA4 client ID captured on the website at form submission and stored on the lead record. Without it the event still arrives, but as an unattributed direct hit.

POST https://www.google-analytics.com/mp/collect
  ?measurement_id=G-XXXXXXXXXX
  &api_secret=<API_SECRET>

{
  "client_id": "1234567890.1587494389",
  "timestamp_micros": 1787921400000000,
  "non_personalized_ads": false,
  "events": [
    {
      "name": "close_convert_lead",
      "params": {
        "currency": "EUR",
        "value": 4800,
        "lead_source": "Google Ads"
      }
    }
  ]
}

Set timestamp_micros to the moment the deal closed rather than letting GA4 stamp the time it received the event, so a nightly sync still lands the event on the right day. GA4 accepts backdated events up to 72 hours old and discards the timestamp beyond that, which is a reason to sync daily rather than weekly.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

You can, and GA4 will collect them. What you lose is the Lead acquisition report and the Lead disqualification and loss report, which both match on the recommended names and cannot be pointed at a custom name. You would have to rebuild both as Explorations. If you have a reason to use custom names, send the recommended ones alongside them rather than instead of them.

Map state changes to events and process steps to the lead_status parameter on working_lead. Qualification, disqualification, won and lost are state changes and get their own events. Demo booked, proposal sent and contract out are steps, so they all become working_lead with a different lead_status value.

Not retroactively. GA4 cannot rename events that have already been collected, and custom dimensions do not backfill. Start sending the correct name and the reports fill from that point forward. Modify-event rules in Admin can rewrite incoming events, which helps when the wrong name is baked into a system you cannot change quickly, but they do not affect historical data.

Usually not. Most sites already count form submissions, and marking generate_lead as a key event puts that same count back at the centre of your reporting. Mark qualify_lead and close_convert_lead instead, and use generate_lead as the top of the funnel.

Data import handles some offline data, but it is batch-based and cannot attach an event to a session the way a client ID can. The Measurement Protocol sends the event server to server within seconds of the CRM stage changing, which is what makes near real-time lead reporting possible.

Send no value rather than a placeholder. GA4 requires currency whenever value is set, and a flat invented value makes every campaign look equally profitable and distorts any bidding that reads it. Send the real number on close_convert_lead once you have it.

LeadTrackr handles the CRM-to-GA4 mapping and sends each stage under the correct event name. Start a 30-day free trial and test it on your own campaigns.

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How to Name Your GA4 Offline Conversion Events

The short answer

How GA4 reads event names

The six lead events

Mapping your CRM stages

1. Firing `qualify_lead` more than once per lead

2. Using `close_unconvert_lead` for leads that were never qualified

3. Skipping `generate_lead` because a form event already exists

How LeadTrackr handles the mapping

Naming the parameter values

Keep a closed list of values

Human-readable values, snake_case names

Send `value` only when you know it

Register parameters as custom dimensions

GA4 naming limits

Which events to mark as key events

GA4 events and Google Ads conversions

A worked example

Frequently asked questions

Try it on your own campaigns

The short answer

How GA4 reads event names

The six lead events

Mapping your CRM stages

1. Firing qualify_lead more than once per lead

2. Using close_unconvert_lead for leads that were never qualified

3. Skipping generate_lead because a form event already exists

How LeadTrackr handles the mapping

Naming the parameter values

Keep a closed list of values

Human-readable values, snake_case names

Send value only when you know it

Register parameters as custom dimensions

GA4 naming limits

Which events to mark as key events

GA4 events and Google Ads conversions

A worked example

Frequently asked questions

Try it on your own campaigns

1. Firing `qualify_lead` more than once per lead

2. Using `close_unconvert_lead` for leads that were never qualified

3. Skipping `generate_lead` because a form event already exists

Send `value` only when you know it