Moving To GA4: For Style Or Effectiveness?

Ready for GA4 yet? Find out how GA4 is different to Universal Analytics and determine whether it’s right for you in this article.

By Shannon Mugford

Apr 27, 2022

By October 2023, businesses across the globe will be expected to migrate their Universal Analytics accounts to the newly developed Google Analytics 4 (GA4). The question is, how beneficial will this move be? And exactly what has changed in the world of analytics that businesses will need to get the hang of?

Continue reading as we delve deeper into the new world of GA4 and how this will impact businesses worldwide. Here at Soshell, we consistently advance our analytics skills to ensure that all campaigns are monitored and analysed post-launch to identify key performance indicators.

As a growing marketing agency in the UK, we understand the importance of using current systems and software to ensure that we deliver our clients the results they need and want. But does this mean updating our Analytics tool to GA4 at this point? Or are we still content with using the current setup?

What Does It Mean To Migrate?

While it may seem all hunky-dory with this development, users may find GA4 a little challenging to get the hang of. When accustomed to Universal Analytics, could you imagine adapting to a new layout? Many accounts will also need to rethink their strategies when forced to use this update in 2023.

GA4 Vs Universal Analytics

Let’s delve into the differences between GA4 & Universal Analytics.

1. EVENT TRACKING LIKE NEVER BEFORE

Firstly, GA4 will allow you to event track in a new fashion. GA Universal only gives you the option of tracking pageviews across properties. While this is customisable, you’d need advanced knowledge of Tag Manager & event tracking to be able to do this. But with GA4, you are given the immediate ability to track events from all origins.

2. CROSS TRACKING

Not only can you cross track devices, but platforms too. Combining both website and mobile app usage data allows you to understand buying behaviours, as opposed to separating the two. A feature that is a lot more powerful than the usual property analysing that Universal Analytics allows.

You can view, manage and track all data from both platforms all in one place. Before this, you’d need Firebase and Analytics integrated, which led to the challenge of understanding the relatability of both web and app data. However, now with GA4, it’s a seamless process while still using Firebase.

Without extra coding, you can track certain event types with GA4’s enhanced measurement feature. Not only that but an automatic debugging system and insight into the customer purchase journey is a benefit of this cross tracking feature.

3. BIGQUERY

What is BigQuery? BigQuery is a fully-managed data warehouse that takes analysis to new heights. With built-in learning capabilities, you can take advantage of scalable analysis. While this platform has only ever been accessible to GA 360 users, GA4 gives you a free connection to BigQuery. Allowing you to run SQL queries and access raw GA data.

4. ANALYSIS OF TIME

While time measurements aren’t necessarily seen as a valuable data source in Universal Analytics, GA4 enables marketers to temporarily and permanently exclude users based on specific conditions and behaviours. That being said, users can measure how long it takes a customer to reach a conversion using the ‘elapsed time’ feature. This is vital for businesses looking to improve their website development, for instance, to help customers achieve their desired designation sooner.

Will This Offer Much Benefit?

Now we know how this will affect our everyday analytical processes, will this offer many benefits to users, or is it Google’s way of staying fresh? Look, it’s no surprise that the above will allow us to establish powerful audiences for all marketing campaigns, but the system of GA4 events doesn’t necessarily benefit all types of marketers.

In fact, Universal Analytics gives you the key to most results within ‘audience’, ‘acquisition’, ‘behaviour’ and ‘conversions’, and this offers businesses the opportunity to influence campaigns accordingly. In comparison, GA4’s new functions are probably more suited to larger organisations that have hit a stand-still and need an even more thorough look into how they can improve.

With that being said, sticking with Universal Analytics, for now, won’t cause a detrimental effect on your analysation. It allows you to look into GA4 in the background and continue using your accustomed system.

Get Results With Soshell

So, what will your marketers do? Venture into the world of GA4? The great thing is that you don’t need to make any drastic decisions at this point. You have until the end of 2023 to enjoy your current Universal Analytics before it’s time to say goodbye.

Or, why don’t you leave it up to the experts to take on board this new system? Here at Soshell, we adapt to the current industry standards. As a fully-rounded marketing agency, we have the skills and knowledge to gain you results, analyse how we did so and report back to our clients why we saw success and how we can improve on this outcome further.

For further information on how we can help your business, get in touch with the Soshell team today on 01482 697190 or at [email protected], and we’ll answer any questions you may have.