I’m not too assured in Google Analytics 4 regardless of the excitement being handed by the Google Analytics crew. Corporations have spent thousands and thousands of {dollars} to reinforce and combine their websites, platforms, campaigns, occasions, and different measurement information inside Common Analytics solely to search out that it doesn’t mechanically work inside Google Analytics 4. Occasions are not any completely different…
It’s disappointing that Google continues to advertise the deadline for migration, with out truly offering any technique of automating the migration. Our shoppers didn’t funds for this work, so it’s an added expense in migration, coaching, and troubleshooting.
That mentioned, that is the place the group is available in and makes a distinction. As my digital transformation agency works emigrate our shoppers over, we’ll be sharing the work right here on Martech Zone. As all the time, be happy to remark, right us, or present us with a greater answer should you don’t consider we’re hitting the mark… we’re studying, too!
Common Analytics Occasions Versus Google Analytics 4 Occasions
All the idea of occasions has modified between Common Analytics (UA) versus Google Analytics 4 (GA4). In Common Analytics, an occasion was a guide document that needed to be triggered in your web site, and the knowledge handed into Google Analytics. There are 4 variables:
- Occasion Class – A required variable that should be handed. Eg. Kind
- Occasion Motion – A required variable that should be handed. Eg. Submitted
- Occasion Label – An elective variable that may be handed. Eg. /landingpage/demorequest
- Occasion Worth – An elective variable that may be handed for the worth of the occasion. Eg. 77
Google Analytics 4 takes extra of a data-agnostic view of occasions… which means there are each system-defined occasions in addition to occasions you’ll be able to add and customise. Google Analytics 4 even supplies suggestions on what these occasions needs to be. All of them move information in the identical format:
- Occasion Identify – A required variable that should be handed. Eg. generate_lead
- Parameters – Three elective parameters (parameter_x, parameter_y, parameter_z) you can move. For those who customise these, they should be added as customized dimensions in your GA4 occasion. You’re allowed as much as 50 event-scoped customized dimensions. You may archive unused ones as properly. (For those who use Analytics 360, the restrict is 125).
- Worth, Forex – An elective worth and the foreign money it’s measured in. Eg. 77, USD
So… the perfect implementation of occasions in Google Analytics 4 is to plan forward and unify your naming conventions so that you simply don’t run out of customized dimensions. It additionally implies that it’s not really useful emigrate your present occasions. You must deal with a Google Analytics 4 implementation as a brand new platform. Listed below are the steps that I’d suggest you’re taking:
Step 1: Allow Google Analytics 4 Enhanced Measurement
One factor to remember as you’re implementing Google Analytics 4 is that among the tagging we needed to manually implement prior to now for UA may be mechanically enabled in GA4. In Admin > Property > Knowledge Streams > [Your Stream], you’ll be able to allow scroll occasions, outbound click on occasions, web site search occasions, type interactions, video engagement, and file downloads!
Step 2: Doc Your Common Analytics Occasions to GA4 Advisable Occasions
Export your present occasions from Common Analytics right into a spreadsheet after which manually overview the really useful occasions from GA4 that you simply wish to migrate them to. This may reduce the necessity to construct out customized dimensions in your implementation. Google recommends the next occasions for all properties:
For e-commerce and on-line gross sales, these occasions will mechanically populate an Ecommerce Purchases report.
Step 3: Add Customized Dimensions for Your Customized Occasions
For any occasions that aren’t mapped to really useful occasions in Google Analytics 4, you’ll have to create them as customized dimensions. That is completed in GA4 > Configure > Customized definitions > Create customized definition:
An instance of this can be monitoring a chat bot getting clicked open. Identify your dimension, set the Scope as an occasion, present an outline, after which select a parameter or property from the listing… or enter the identify of a parameter or property you’ll gather sooner or later.
Step 4: Implement Google Tag Supervisor And Add GA4 Occasions
For those who haven’t already, you’ll completely wish to implement Google Tag Supervisor to handle all of the tags and occasions that you simply’re at the moment recording utilizing Common Analytics. Tag Supervisor lets you set off occasions seamlessly with out having to code occasions all through your web site… which is important as you migrate occasions to GA4.
With GA4, you’ll be able to add the particular occasions that you simply wish to document throughout your web site. For example, now we have a set off for a shopper that we constructed when somebody submitted a Hubspot Kind in Common Analytics. We have been capable of repurpose that actual set off to additionally document the GA4 Occasion generate_lead, passing the Hubspot Kind GUID that we will later monitor again to the shape identify.
In Step 2, you mapped your entire outdated occasions to GA4 occasions in a spreadsheet. For any occasions that aren’t mechanically captured utilizing enhanced measurement, you’ll wish to create GA4 Occasion Tags for every of the Occasion Names that you simply selected after which move the elective parameters, worth, and foreign money. For the customized dimensions you added in Step 3, you’ll wish to create customized GA4 occasions with the Occasion Identify the identical.
Be sure you take a look at your Google Tag Supervisor configuration and manually fireplace utilizing the preview device to make sure the information is being correctly despatched to GA 4. GA4, as with Common Analytics, isn’t all the time real-time in its information assortment.
Want Assist Migrating To Google Analytics 4?
Watch a Tutorial Video On Migrating UA Occasions to GA4
I wish to give a shout-out to Analytics mania, who supplied a terrific walk-through on migrating UA occasions to GA4. That is the place I discovered most of this info… it’s well worth the watch and I’m certain his course would offer all of the coaching you want:
