Unlock Google Analytics [GA4]

Unlock Google Analytics GA4

Discover the next generation of analytics, Google Analytics 4 (GA4). GA4 gathers event-based data from websites and apps. This new type of property is designed to support the future of measurement. July 1st, 2023, standard Universal Analytics will no longer process data. Now Universal Analytics reports will be available for a period of time, as new data will only flow into Google Analytics 4 properties. 

Understanding GA4

• Allows you to get better understanding of the customer journey by collecting both website and app data 
• Uses event-based data instead of session based 
• Includes privacy controls such as cookieless measurement, and behavioural and conversion modelling 
• Prediction capabilities offer guidance without complex models 
• Direct integrations to media platforms support actions on your website or app

Benefits of GA4

• Enhanced customer journey tracking
• Undercover insights into the user behaviour 
• A free web analytics tool leverage the capabilities of GA4 without the burden of additional costs
• Data privacy by design approach 
• Improved user engagement analysis: Dive deep into user interactions, enabling data-driven optimisation and better user experiences  
• Powerful audiences for your advertising campaigns 
• More intelligent user privacy and tracking features: Balance user privacy concerns with valuable tracking capabilities for informed decision-making  
• Simplified goals and events setup: Streamline the configuration of goals and events, enabling quicker implementation and tracking

Considerations and drawbacks 

• Navigating Complex Reporting: Address the learning curve associated with building reports in GA4 to extract meaningful insights from your data.
• Very few standards reports out of the box
• Unfamiliar dimension and metric labels 
• No reporting views to isolate sub domain or country-level traffic 
• Must use BigQuery to process data beyond 14 months 
• Comply with GA4’s cookie consent policy, ensuring data collection adheres to privacy regulations 
• Configuration settings at the start could get confusing: Invest time in understanding GA4’s configuration settings for optimal setup and utilisation 

Conclusion

This research has demonstrated that GA4 could be a very effective platform for organisations to gather information on consumers. This would allow organisations to target a more powerful audience with a greater understanding of the customer journey. However, this new beginning of data analytics could cause confusion due to its unfamiliar dimensions. This could cause delay in productivity for organisations due to the lack of functionality within GA4. 

Sources 

Learn About The Benefits of Using GA4 Over Google’s Universal Analytics – Apache Interactive

[GA4] Introducing the next generation of Analytics, Google Analytics 4 – Analytics Help

The pros and cons of migrating to Google Analytics 4 (GA4) – Adido Digital (adido-digital.co.uk)

GA4 Problems – 4 Challenges With Google Analytics 4 (rootandbranchgroup.com)