Enhanced Conversions (Google)

Enhanced Conversions is Google's feature that sends hashed first-party data, like a customer's email, along with a conversion so Google can match it to the person who clicked your ad.

When someone converts on your site, the browser cookie that used to tie that action back to an ad click is often gone now. Enhanced Conversions fills the gap. It takes data the customer already gave you, such as the email at checkout, scrambles it into an unreadable hash, and sends that with the conversion. Google matches the hash to a signed-in user and credits the click.

In 2026 Google folded the old separate toggles into one unified Enhanced Conversions setting, so you turn it on once for your account. Say a lead fills your form with their email. That hashed email lets Google connect the lead back to the search ad they tapped three days earlier, even with no cookie in sight.

Hashing protects the data, but it does not excuse you from consent. You still need permission to collect and share that email, and the matching only works when the customer actually gave you real, accurate details. Junk data matches nothing.

The cookie died. The email address is the new handshake.