SignalHost for BigCommerce: install the app, confirm once, and track every sale server-side

• A BigCommerce store on a Stencil theme. That is where the scripts run; a headless storefront, Catalyst included, renders neither the scripts nor BigCommerce's data layer, so it needs the code added to it directly.
• A SignalHost account. The free plan is enough to try it: 10,000 requests a month and one container. You can create the account during the install.
• A store that is not launched yet can be connected too. SignalHost just cannot check the storefront until it is.

Open SignalHost in the BigCommerce App Marketplace and install it. BigCommerce lists the permissions the app asks for: Content, to write its scripts through Script Manager; Checkout Content, so they also run on the checkout and the order confirmation; and Information & Settings, for your store's name and currency and to switch on the data layer. Confirm, and the app's page opens inside your control panel. Later you find it in the Apps menu.

Press Connect with SignalHost. A new tab opens on signalhost.io; sign in, or create a free account (the app's page has a Create a free account button for that too).

The next screen lists what the app will and will not do. It will add tracking to every page of your store, checkout included, and keep it up to date, and send your store's product views, cart, checkout and purchase events to the container. It cannot read your customers' contact details, use your Google account or see your billing.

Pick an existing container, or choose New container and go through the short wizard. A container is your own tagging server, built in your own Google account, so it stays yours. Building a new one takes a few minutes; you can connect straight away, and the app adds tracking as soon as it is ready. Press Connect. The tab then says Almost done: confirm in BigCommerce.

Go back to the app's page in your control panel. It notices by itself that you are back and shows Confirm the connection, with your account and the container you chose. Press Confirm. No script is added to your store before you do.

The page then says Tracking starts in a few minutes, and Tracking is live once the scripts are in place. If the request has expired by the time you get back, press Connect with SignalHost again.

Open your storefront, look at a product, add it to the cart and start the checkout. The app's page counts the last 7 days: Page views, Added to cart, Checkouts and Purchases. Once tracking is live, it also reports SignalHost's own look at your storefront; Found on your storefront's home page means the scripts are there.

Open statistics & settings takes you to the container page, where the Recent tab of Enhanced analytics covers the last 30 minutes. From the Growth plan up, Live event monitoring also shows each event by name as it arrives.

Two scripts in Script Manager, both written and kept up to date by the app:

• SignalHost, in the head of every page, checkout included: the Google Tag Manager loader, pointed at your own tagging address instead of googletagmanager.com. It loads your Tag Manager container from there.
• SignalHost events, in the footer of every page, checkout and order confirmation included: it turns BigCommerce's data layer into Google Analytics ecommerce events. Category and product views become view_item_list and view_item, the cart add_to_cart, remove_from_cart and view_cart, and the checkout begin_checkout, add_shipping_info, add_payment_info and purchase, with the order number, tax, shipping and coupon.

The events script reads products, amounts and the order number, never a customer's name, email address, phone number or address. A reloaded confirmation page does not count an order twice in the same browser.

The data layer is a store setting, off until somebody turns it on. The app switches it on for you; that adds BigCommerce's own event script to the storefront and changes nothing your shoppers see. If BigCommerce refuses, the app's page says where the switch is.

Both scripts are in the Analytics consent category: if your store shows BigCommerce's cookie banner, SignalHost runs only for shoppers who allow analytics cookies. Every request leaves the browser in a form ad blockers do not recognise, and your tagging server forwards it to Google Analytics 4 and to the ad platforms you set up on the container page: Google Ads, Meta, TikTok and others.

Your container starts on an address under signalhost.io. On a paid plan, Set up your own domain on the container page walks you through using a subdomain of your own site instead, such as sgtm.yourstore.com, which survives filter lists and keeps click cookies first-party. When it goes live, the app switches your store over by itself within a few minutes. There is nothing to replace by hand.

You can add the loader without the app. On the container page, find the code in the Install on your site card and press Copy. In your control panel, open Storefront › Script Manager and add a script with that code, in the head of all pages and, if your store shows BigCommerce's cookie banner, in the analytics category. Then press I have done this on the container page.

That gives you page views and nothing more. The events script, the data layer switch, the storefront check and the automatic move to your own domain come only with the app; when your tagging address changes, you replace the script yourself with the new code SignalHost emails you. Use one or the other: with the app installed as well, the loader would run twice.

The app's page shows your plan and this month's requests. The plan is billed on signalhost.io, not by BigCommerce, and Upgrade plan opens it there. On the container page, the install card reads Installed by the BigCommerce app, and Manage leads to Settings, Connected sites.

Disconnect, at the foot of the app's page, asks for a second press, then removes both scripts within a few minutes. Disconnect in Connected sites does the same. Your container and its statistics stay, and you can connect the store again from the app's page.

Uninstalling the app under Apps › My Apps removes both scripts too: BigCommerce deletes them itself, because they were created to go with the app, and SignalHost ends the store's connection.

• The scripts are not on your storefront's home page: they run on Stencil themes. A headless storefront needs the code added to it directly.
• Your storefront could not be checked yet: usually the store is not launched. The scripts are in place and run as soon as it is.
• Page views arrive but no carts or purchases: the data layer is off. Turn it on under Settings › Data Solutions › Data layer. Shoppers who declined analytics cookies in BigCommerce's banner are not counted at all.
• Your container has no Google Analytics property yet: finish setting it up on signalhost.io.
• SignalHost is not set up for this store yet: remove the app under Apps › My Apps and install it again.
• The page has been open for a long time: open SignalHost again from the Apps menu.
• The last update did not go through: it is retried automatically.
• Anything else: write to hello@signalhost.io with your store's address.

SignalHost is an independent product of Algorithmo GmbH and is not affiliated with or endorsed by BigCommerce, Google, Meta or TikTok. Google Analytics, Google Ads and Google Tag Manager are trademarks of Google LLC; Meta is a trademark of Meta Platforms, Inc.; TikTok is a trademark of ByteDance Ltd.; BigCommerce is a trademark of BigCommerce Pty. Ltd.