How to take advantage of Google Analytics 4

After 10 years of service, Google Analytics reached a major milestone in July with the official transition from Universal Analytics (UA) to Google Analytics 4 (GA4). Announced back in 2019, this latest-generation platform has been a long-awaited release.

Built with privacy-by-design, this new version takes into account multi-device and multi-channel environments, in addition to offering more granular controls for the collection and use data.

Whether you’re finding your bearings with this new tool, looking to validate your configurations or ready to take it to the next level, our experts can ensure that you exploit GA4 to its full potential.

Indeed, our team has been using GA4 since 2020 in parallel with UA, so we understand what needs to be taken into account during the transition. We can also help you take advantage of GA4’s new functionalities, including:

Event-driven data collection: While UA required manual configuration of each specific event and limited the number of parameters, GA4 takes a more holistic and flexible approach by automatically including a range of user interactions as default events. In addition, the ability to add up to 25 event parameters—and 100 on GA 360—greatly opens up the possibilities for data collection and the potential for analysis and segmentation.

Better cross-platform integration: While UA was primarily focused on collecting data from a single platform, GA4 offers more robust and flexible data collection, capable of tracking complex user journeys across various platforms and devices.

Predictive analysis: Using machine learning and artificial intelligence, GA4 can provide predictive insights into future trends, helping businesses better anticipate customer needs. For example, it’s possible to create predictive user audiences and use those to test marketing campaigns. In an e-commerce context, this makes it possible to target certain consumers with personalized offers.

Consent and confidentiality: GA4 is also designed to better address growing concerns around data privacy and user consent, which is crucial in today’s business environment.

Some of the notable new features of Google Analytics 4 that we like include:

• The creation of audiences based on a series of sequential events at the user and/or session level.It’s now possible to create very sophisticated audiences that allow you to better segment customers on parameters or actions identified according to their navigation path, whether this takes place over one or several sessions.
• The potential for customization of event collection, with the capability of associating up to 25 parameters.
• Visualization of a customer journey funnel that is more flexible and permissive than in UA (with configuration by sequence of events or criteria that follow one another directly or indirectly). This provides functionality for analyzing abandonment rates versus conversions of a registration or purchasing process.

GA4 represents a major shift, fundamentally transforming the way data is collected and used. There’s a learning curve involved, so marketing teams that want to leverage GA4 to the fullest will need to train their users to ensure a smooth adoption process.

Whether you need to validate your event or audience configurations, manage external traffic exclusions, migrate and optimize dashboards or discuss your training needs, our team is available to facilitate your transition to GA4.