Google Analytics: How Does GA4 Affect Marketing Activities of Online Store?

Google Analytics is an essential tool for any business at any time. With it, you get insight into your website’s performance and where you need to improve. And to keep it from being a helpful tool, Google keeps updating it.

And today, the latest version is GA4 (aka Google Analytics 4). But how is it different from the current version, and is it worth the upgrade? All of that and more will be discussed in this article.

What are GA4 and UA?

As mentioned in the introduction, GA4 is the latest version of Google Analytics. It does a few things differently, which we’ll cover in the next section. If you want, you can switch to it today.

But what’s UA then? Well, it’s a pronoun for universal analytics. The current version of Google Analytics used to be known as GA3 (Google Analytics 3).

3 Main Differences Between Google Analytics 4 and Universal Analytics

Now you might be wondering what’s so different between these two versions. While there are hundreds of changes, there are three main ones:

#1 - Every Engagement is Now an Event

Before GA4, Google tracked your website’s data differently. In UA, you track engagement in various hit types, like page hits or event hits. While this works well, it’s restrictive as every event is limited to its category, action, and label.

But now that every engagement is an event, you can capture more information and have much more customized opinions. It will also give you a better understanding of your users.

#2 - Data Organization and Reporting Are Different

Another main difference is how all of your data is organized. In the UA version, you have your Google Analytics account, which stores your websites or apps and views them as separate properties.

However, in GA4, this is different. Now all of your apps and websites are on one property. That makes it easy to navigate through and see how each one performs. It also adds yet another functionality.

If you want to, you can use data streams as filtered views. That means you can segment your data into separate streams. For example, you could separate your blog from your main website.

#3 - Goals are now named “Conversions”

And lastly, now you can track your conversions. Instead of having to create a “goal,” you now find your conversion rates in a more appropriately named tab called “conversions.” And to track things, all you need to do is set up an event, and you’re done.

3-Step Guide to Switching from UA to GA4

So now that you know the two differences, you might wonder how you could upgrade from universal analytics to GA4. Fortunately, it isn’t hard if you follow the guide below. And while you’re not obligated to switch from UA to GA4 yet, I highly recommend you do it.

That’s because Google will be discontinuing the current version in July 2023. And after that, you'll only be able to access your historical data. So while you might have more than a year to switch, it’s better to do it sooner rather than later as it helps you familiarize yourself with the changes before others.

Here’s how you can do it:

• Set Up Your GA4 Properties: First, you must set up your GA4 properties. This way, you can keep your essential information like the name, domain URL, and timezone.
• Go Through the GA4 Setup Assistant: Now that you’ve set up your GA4 properties, it’s time to migrate into GA4. For this, click on GA4 Setup Assistant and select “Get Started with a new Google Analytics 4 Property.” Then follow the prompts.
• Install your Global Site Tag Code: Now that you’re in GA4, it’s time to install your global site tag code on your website. Click on “Data Streams” and copy the global site tag code. Then implement this on your website.

Conclusion

Congratulations! Now you know everything you need to know about GA4. So to recap, GA4 includes three significant changes:

• Every engagement is now an event.
• Data is organized differently.
• And now “Goals” is given a more appropriate name, “Conversions.”

E-commerce platforms like Shopify and Shoplazza have integrated GA into their background to help store owners monitor statistics more conveniently. Instead of letting this information collect dust in your brain, why not start your switch to GA4 now? That’s the only way to get familiar with the new version before anyone else!

(Contributed by Andreas Ojala & Hermes Fang)