Moving from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4

The deadline’s almost here. Are you able to make the switch from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4 (GA4)?

In 2019, Google introduced Google Analytics 4 as an alternative choice to Universal Analytics. Users were free to make a choice from using standard analytics properties or jumping to the new edition. Now, Google plans to sunset Universal Analytics in only a couple of weeks — requiring all users to transition to Google Analytics 4.

Should you use Google Analytics and haven’t made the move yet, you’ll need to grasp what Analytics 4 offers and the way it’s different from Universal Analytics. Time is running out to acquaint yourself with the service and make the change before Universal Analytics ceases to operate — so start today, with this guide.

In this text, we’re going to speak about what Google Analytics 4 does in another way from its predecessors. We’ll also show you transition your account to Google Analytics 4 and discuss some tutorials and tricks to make it easier to get probably the most out of the platform. Let’s get to it!

What Is GA4?

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is the most recent version of Google Analytics. It’s designed to assist businesses and website owners understand their online audience, track user behavior, and measure the effectiveness of their marketing efforts. GA4 introduces several latest features and enhancements over the previous version, Universal Analytics (UA).

Getting To Know GA4

There are a couple of key areas where GA4 could be very different from its predecessor.

For a very long time, analytics has focused on helping you measure desktop web metrics, with mobile analytics data being almost an afterthought. Google Analytics 4 changes that approach by helping you unify multiple kinds of properties into singular user journeys:

With Google Analytics 4, you possibly can see measurements in your web sites and web and mobile apps. You too can gain insights from machine learning algorithms into optimize those properties.

One other key aspect of Google Analytics 4 is that it doesn’t rely solely on cookies. It offers an increased emphasis on user privacy.

“Universal Analytics was built for a generation of online measurement that was anchored within the desktop web, independent sessions and more easily observable data from cookies. This measurement methodology is quickly becoming obsolete.”

– Russell Ketchum, Director of Product Management for Google Analytics

Arguably, one in all the principal drivers behind the shift in how Google Analytics collects data comes from the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). The GDPR has had an enormous impact on how web sites and platforms can legally collect and store user data.

Cookies have come under fire lately resulting from increased privacy concerns, meaning many corporations are looking into alternative data collection streams.

With Google Analytics 4, measurements not depend on sessions. The platform is able to recognizing and measuring multiple kinds of human interaction “events”, including:

• Pageviews
• Scrolls
• Outbound clicks
• In-site searches
• Video engagement metrics
• File downloads

With previous versions of Google Analytics, measuring several metrics involved manually organising complex events. Now, the platform can routinely tag the events for you, which supplies you access to more data from the get-go.

Finally, Google Analytics 4 brings higher funnel reports to the table, including cross-platform evaluation. You should use the platform to discover key steps in the shopper journey and see where users enter and drop out. The service also allows you to understand what users are doing in-between steps within the funnel:

But why are all these changes happening? Why can’t users just keep their Universal Analytics properties that they already know?

Universal Analytics Will Sunset On July 1

For nearly a decade, Universal Analytics has been the usual for measuring performance and engagement for web sites. It has also been an important tool for determining the success of keyword strategies.

Nonetheless, the platform was designed for an era where we mostly interacted with sites through desktop computers. Although Universal Analytics may also measure mobile and app data, it doesn’t offer a unified experience for properties across multiple channels.

“People expect to interact with businesses when and the way they like, corresponding to browsing a brand’s website to research a product after which purchasing it later using the brand’s app. Getting insight into these cross-platform journeys is critical for businesses to predict customer needs and supply great experiences—but it could be very difficult.”

– Russell Ketchum, Director of Product Management for Google Analytics

Google Analytics 4 was designed to assist treatment that problem and improve privacy standards in collecting measurements. Since its introduction in 2019, it has existed alongside Universal Analytics in order that users could make a choice from each experiences:

Now Google plans to retire Universal Analytics, starting on July 1, 2023. Existing analytics properties will stop collecting data on that date. Should you’re using Universal Analytics 360, you get a couple of extra months of knowledge collection, with the service retiring on October 1, 2023:

That signifies that in case you still must move from Universal Analytics to GA4, the time is now. Before we speak about do this, let’s go over the changes to the service.

What Are The Differences Between Universal Analytics And GA4?

Briefly, there are rather a lot of changes, latest features, and latest suggestions and tricks to learn. Should you’re a UA pro but are unsure what to anticipate with GA4, here’s what’s modified.

GA4 Has A Whole Recent Dashboard

Probably the most obvious change (that even first-time and latest users are prone to notice right off the bat) is that GA4 has a complete latest dashboard. It’s a bit more streamlined than UA was — there are fewer reports on the principal page, and you will have a brand new menu bar on the left where you possibly can navigate to Home, Reports, Explore, Promoting, Configure, and Library.

GA4 Uses An Event-Driven Data Model

One other big change is GA4’s event-based data model, which allows for more flexible and detailed tracking of user interactions on web sites and apps. Events are actions taken by users, corresponding to pageviews, clicks, video plays, form submissions, and more. This model provides a more comprehensive view of user engagement across different platforms.

Event tracking means a number of latest metrics — like attribution, demographics, and more. And while you possibly can still view session-level reporting, events can help you break every little thing down by interaction, supplying you with more detailed and in-depth reports.

GA4 Offers Enhanced Cross-Platform Tracking

GA4 combines website and app data right into a single property, allowing businesses to trace user interactions across multiple platforms and devices. This unified view helps understand user behavior throughout their entire journey, from web to app or vice versa.

This implies having the ability to track the user experience throughout your entire lifecycle — from acquisition to engagement, monetization, and retention — across multiple platforms. That’s a game-changer.

GA4 Is All About User-Centric Measurement

Probably the most exciting changes in GA4’s event-driven model is the flexibility to trace engagement metrics, like engaged sessions, engagement rates, and engagement time.

This represents one in all the ways GA4 reflects how interested by web and app metrics has evolved: GA4 emphasizes individual users greater than sessions. It introduces a brand new metric called “User Engagement,” which measures users’ engagement level based on their interactions and conversions. This approach enables a deeper understanding of user behavior and the flexibility to personalize experiences based on individual preferences.

GA4 Embraces The Potential of AI

GA4 incorporates advanced machine learning and artificial intelligence (AI) to supply greater than just snapshots of your past data — it could now provide predictive insights. Furthermore, insights are automated, making them easy for even beginners to access and use.

GA4 also offers predictive metrics and audience discovery to assist businesses discover helpful segments and optimize their marketing strategies. For instance, you possibly can generate a report that shows churn probability and revenue predictions, which may fully optimize your retargeting efforts.

GA4 Has Recent (And Higher) Privacy Standards

GA4 addresses privacy concerns by providing more granular data control options. It’s designed to align with regulations corresponding to the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). GA4 supports data deletion, user-centric data controls, and provides options to handle user consent preferences.

GA4 Gives Marketers More Power And Control

And at last, one of the exciting changes: GA4 is made for digital marketers.

This can be a significant departure — UA was not a marketer’s tool, though it quickly became an ordinary a part of every marketer’s tech stack. GA4 comes filled with powerful features custom-made for marketers — like integration with Google Data Studio and custom segments based on trigger events. For instance, you possibly can create segments on all conversion events from a selected time period or location, allowing you to construct a much deeper understanding of your users and their behavior.

How To Move From Universal Analytics To Google Analytics 4

Although we’re talking about transitioning from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4, you need to use each services concurrently (for now.) Meaning you possibly can still collect data using cookies until Universal Analytics retires in 2023. At the identical time, you possibly can begin collecting data from events with Analytics 4.

Step 1: Create A Google Analytics 4 Property

Firstly, you’ll want to make sure you’re not already using Google Analytics 4. Should you arrange a property after October 14, 2020, it’s likely already using Google Analytics 4. To confirm this, access your Google Analytics account and have a look at your list of properties.

Properties using Universal Analytics can have a UA prefix of their analytics IDs. Properties using Google Analytics 4 will display G4A designations:

To start, select a property using Universal Analytics and access its ADMIN settings. Select the choice that claims G4A Setup Assistant under the property’s name.

Now click on the Get Began button under the message that claims, I would like to create a brand new Google Analytics 4 property:

After clicking on that button, Google Analytics will show you a temporary rundown of the setup steps. The platform will arrange a brand new property for you without deleting your Universal Analytics configurations. It’ll copy data from the Universal Analytics property and enable “enhanced measurements” immediately, which implies you possibly can start measuring complex events from the get-go:

Click on Create property to get the method began. You’ll return to the GA4 Setup Assistant tab, indicating the property is prepared.

Step 2: Configure Your Google Analytics 4 Property

Now click on See your G4A property to configure its settings:

To start using Google Analytics 4 accurately, you’ll must configure a number of data streams.

While you open a brand new Google Analytics 4 property, the platform will send you to the Setup Assistant page. Here, search for the section that claims Collection and choose the Tag installation option:

The Tag Installation option helps you to configure “data streams”. Each Google Analytics property can have streams of knowledge from web sites and apps. Typically, you’ll have one stream for the net and one each for iOS and Android devices in case you utilize apps:

While you select the Add stream option, the platform will ask you what style of stream you wish to arrange. Should you’re adding an online property, Google Analytics will ask for its URL, the positioning’s name, and which measurements you wish to track:

To verify that you just own the web site, Google Analytics will ask you so as to add a tag to it. You may complete this step by adding a JavaScript tag manually or by https://developers.google.com/tag-platform/tag-manager:

When you confirm ownership of the property, Google Analytics will start collecting data from it. Like with Universal Analytics, you’ll have the opportunity to trace all of that information from the dashboard.

Once you begin organising custom insights, you’ll get an idea of how big the difference between Universal Analytics and Google Analytics 4 is:

If you wish to experiment with Google Analytics 4 before organising a brand new property, there’s an official demo account that you could use. Moreover, take note that you could switch between Universal Analytics and Google Analytics 4 properties by choosing either option out of your list of properties.

Getting Up To Speed On GA4

Once your GA4 properties are up and running, you possibly can start exploring the brand new platform! Listed below are some good places to begin as you become familiar with GA4’s changes and latest features.

Get To Know Your Recent Dashboard

While you open your GA4 dashboard for the primary time, you’ll likely notice that the reports and visualizations you’re used to seeing aren’t where they was once.

The center of the dashboard offers a snapshot of your property. You’ll discover a Recently Viewed section below, with all of the reports you’ve accessed most recently. Below that’s the Insights section, which shows a few of the AI-driven insights Google thinks are most relevant to you and your properties.

On the left-hand side of the screen is a navigation menu, which you’ll use to access all the opposite areas of GA4.

Test Out The Powerful Recent Search Bar

Should you’re brand latest to GA4, an incredible place to begin is the search bar. Google has revamped it, and it has an especially powerful, useful latest feature: You may type a matter in plain English, and the outcomes will direct you toward the report, insight, or other page where you’ll find the knowledge you’re in search of.

Listed below are some search bar queries you possibly can check out to get the hang of the brand new search:

• What landing pages on my website are currently experiencing probably the most traffic?
• What’s the general bounce rate for my website?
• What’s the conversion rate for my hottest product?
• What are the highest traffic sources to my website?
• What’s the common session duration for my website?

Check Out The Reports Dashboard

From the left-hand menu in your dashboard, click the second icon from the highest (the one that appears like a graph). It will take you to your reports dashboard.

For longtime UA users, this dashboard will likely feel probably the most familiar. That is where you’ll find snapshots of all types of GA4 reports, including real-time site data.

Every report dashboard will look a bit of different because Google will select the default reports it thinks are most relevant to every site, but GA4 lets you customize reports in your dashboard – you possibly can see all the information that matters most to you (at a look!). Click the six dots to tug and reorder your snapshots, the X to remove cards, and the + so as to add latest cards.

Get To Know Explorations

Explorations mix the features of GA4’s custom reports with its AI capabilities, and can help you create extremely detailed, granular reports and visualizations from scratch.

Or, for more starting users, there’s the template gallery. It comprises a dozen pre-built reports exploring a few of the most useful metrics GA4 offers:

• Free form
• Funnel exploration
• Path exploration
• Segment overlap
• User explorer
• Cohort exploration
• User lifetime
• Acquisition
• Conversion
• User behavior
• Ecommerce
• Gaming

Explorations templates are an incredible place to begin once you arrange GA4 for the primary time. Mess around with different segments, dimensions, and events to see how they alter your reports and visualizations. You’ll get the hang of GA4 very quickly!

Common Issues With Google Analytics 4

Although transitioning to Google Analytics 4 is easy, users report some common issues when first using the “latest” platform. Let’s speak about a few of those issues and tackle them!

Configuring Google Analytics 4 Takes Time

GA4 definitely has a learning curve. While it routinely sets up tracking for several kinds of events once you configure it in your website, the platform really shines when and in case you take the time to establish custom events and reports.

Should you don’t configure Google Analytics to track custom events, you’re missing out on what is maybe probably the most powerful feature the platform offers. With custom events, you possibly can collect data on the measurements that matter probably the most to you, all without adding custom code to your site.

Moving Your Historical Data To GA4 Is Tricky

After UA sunsets, users can have temporary viewer access, in order that they won’t immediately lose all their historical data. Are you able to migrate that data into GA4 to select up where you left off? Unfortunately, not likely.

While GA4 offers some solutions for importing and migrating data, the 2 versions have different data collection models, so not all data from UA can have a direct equivalent in GA4. It’s something we’re hoping Google will eventually address, but for now, historical data in GA4 is proscribed.

Reports In Google Analytics Are Limited

Out of the box, reports in Google Analytics 4 are somewhat limited. For the platform to give you deeper insights into your customers’ behavior, you have to configure it to trace the particular events you would like and show that data in the way in which you wish.

Google Analytics 4 makes this process relatively straightforward, depending on what style of events you wish to track. Nonetheless, even after organising custom reports, accurate numbers may take some time to point out up in your dashboard, because Analytics 4 uses machine learning to enhance the way it reports information.

There Are Differences In Reports Between Universal Analytics And Google Analytics 4

Probably the most common complaints amongst latest Google Analytics 4 users is that the numbers you see within the dashboard won’t match your Universal Analytics property. This difference in data is because each services collect and count data in another way. Where Universal Analytics relies on cookies and sessions, Analytics 4 tracks events.

For now, you possibly can depend on metrics from each services to tell your decisions. Nonetheless, you’ll must get used to the Analytics 4 approach as we near the retirement date for Universal Analytics.

Google Analytics 4 Doesn’t Track Bounce Rate

There’s a whole lot of discussion about whether the way in which bounce rate is currently measured is smart or not. Google Analytics 4 does away with bounce rate entirely. As a substitute, it measures “engagement”:

Engagement reports use a broad range of metrics to supply a comprehensive overview of how users first perceive your website. If you wish to proceed measuring bounce rate, you need to use Universal Analytics while it’s still lively.

Ceaselessly Asked Questions About GA4

What Is Google Analytics 4?

GA4 is Google’s latest analytics platform, providing businesses with advanced analytics capabilities, cross-platform tracking, user-centric measurement, and machine learning insights to grasp user behavior and optimize marketing strategies.

What’s The Difference Between Universal Analytics And GA4?

Universal Analytics (UA) is the previous version of Google Analytics that primarily focuses on session-based tracking, while Google Analytics 4 (GA4) introduces an event-driven data model, cross-platform tracking, user-centric measurement, and enhanced machine learning capabilities for more comprehensive and personalized analytics.

Can You Use Each Universal Analytics And GA4?

Until July 1, you need to use each, but Google is sunsetting Universal Analytics for many users on that date. This implies, from then on, latest data will only be collected in GA4.

Should I Switch To GA4?

Yes. As of July 1, UA will begin the means of shutting down. GA4 represents the direction of Google Analytics and offers a more robust and advanced set of features. By transitioning to GA4, you possibly can benefit from the most recent tracking capabilities, gain deeper insights into user behavior, and stay ahead within the evolving landscape of analytics and marketing.

How Does GA4 Work With Google Ads?

GA4 works seamlessly with Google Ads to supply comprehensive insights and optimization opportunities. By linking GA4 with Google Ads, advertisers can directly access data-driven metrics and audience insights within the Google Ads interface. This integration allows for higher measurement and attribution of campaigns, as GA4 tracks user interactions and conversions across multiple touchpoints.

How Does Google Tag Manager (GTM) Work?

In Google Analytics 4 (GA4), Google Tag Manager (GTM) is a robust tool that simplifies the means of implementing and managing tracking tags on web sites and apps. GTM lets you deploy and update various tracking codes, including GA4 tracking codes, without directly modifying your website’s or app’s source code.

How Can I Learn More About Using GA4?

• Google Analytics Help Center: The official Google Analytics Help Center provides comprehensive documentation, guides, and tutorials on various topics related to GA4. It covers every little thing from implementation and configuration to reporting and evaluation.
• Google Analytics Academy: Google offers online courses through its Analytics Academy platform. These courses cover different facets of GA4, including implementation, data evaluation, and advanced topics. The courses are self-paced and freed from charge, providing a structured learning experience.
• Google Analytics YouTube Channel: The Google Analytics YouTube channel features videos and tutorials on GA4. It covers a wide selection of topics, including best practices, suggestions and tricks, and updates on latest features.

What The Future Holds For Google Analytics

Should you use Google Analytics, it’s essential to begin getting acquainted with Google Analytics 4 — time to migrate to the new edition is quickly running out.

In the approaching weeks, Universal Analytics will stop to gather data. It’s best to have a GA4 property arrange and configured by the point that happens. The most effective time to begin is now — so follow the steps above and ensure your data doesn’t get left behind.