Google Analytics has significantly evolved since its Universal Analytics (UA) version, leading to the development and launch of the newest iteration: Google Analytics 4 (GA4).

We’ll also share an example coaching & consulting funnel where conversion points must be added along the customer journey. These conversion steps can easily be added inside GA4.

But first… here is the simple summary of the key differences between these two versions (GA & GA4), along with their respective pros and cons.

Universal Analytics (UA)

Pros:

Matured Features: UA has a long-established set of features that are well-understood and widely adopted by marketers worldwide.
Advanced Segmentation: Users can create advanced segments to analyze specific data subsets.
Integration with Google Products: Seamless integration with Google Ads.
Goal Completions: Allows setting up goals to track specific user interactions.

Cons:

Limited Data Connectivity: It operates on a session-based model, which can limit the ability to connect data across platforms.
Inability to Track Across Devices: Struggles to provide a unified customer view across multiple devices.

Google Analytics 4 (GA4)

Pros:

Event-based Tracking: GA4 shifted to an event-based tracking system, allowing more flexible and comprehensive data collection.
Cross-platform Tracking: GA4 excels in unifying user experiences across different platforms and devices, providing a complete customer journey.
AI-Powered Insights: GA4 leverages AI to provide automatic insights, including data trends and anomalies.
Improved Audience Building: GA4’s analysis hub allows more sophisticated audience building and better integration with Google Ads.

Cons:

Learning Curve: As it’s a new platform, marketers may need to invest time in understanding and mastering GA4.
Incompatibility: Some existing UA features, like custom dimensions and metrics, don’t translate directly to GA4. (But you can create and customize once you learn how to).
Limited Historical Data: GA4 doesn’t import historical data from UA, making it challenging to compare current data with older data.

IMPORTANT: For now, Google is still supporting both versions, and you can run them side by side. But, as of July 2023, GA Universal is no more, and you must have migrated over to GA4.

HERE IS AN EXAMPLE OF A CONVERSION TRACKING APPROACH for consultants, experts and professional services.

You need a funnel and the ability to track and report on each step:

In a traditional consulting funnel, conversion tracking is pivotal to understand how well your marketing efforts are working and to optimize your funnel for maximum conversions.

The transition from lead to application and then to booking/appointment is a journey that needs to be carefully monitored and optimized.

In Google Analytics 4 (GA4), there are several critical points to track, but the top three are:

1. Lead Generation: This is the first conversion point in your funnel. It involves tracking whenever a potential client shows interest in your services by filling out a form, subscribing to your newsletter, downloading a free resource, etc.

In GA4, this can be tracked as a custom event, where the action of form submission or resource download triggers the event.

It provides valuable insight into how effective your initial call to action and lead magnets are.

For any funnels that use Google ads (Search, YouTube), import these conversion points, track them, and feed data back to Google for your MQL’s and SQL’s.

2. Application Submission: The next crucial conversion point is when a lead submits an application or request for your consulting services.

The key here is to track not just the submission but also the quality of applications. Lead scoring is important for tracking, optimizing and preparing leads for the sales team.

In GA4, you can create a custom event for application submission and use event parameters to gather more information about the applicants, such as service they’re interested in, their industry, company size, and further qualification questions, etc.

3. Booking/Appointment Confirmation: This is the final conversion point where a lead can become a possible client by confirming a booking or appointment for the sales team (“the closers”).

You can track this in GA4 by setting up another custom event that triggers when a user completes the booking process.

This data helps you understand which marketing efforts are resulting in actual bookings and allows you to calculate your conversion rate from lead to client.

For each of these conversion points, you should also track the source or channel that the user came from (e.g., organic search, paid ad, social media, etc.)

This will provide valuable information about which channels are driving the most valuable conversions.

Remember, the goal is to use this data to optimize your funnel, improve your marketing ROI, and deliver a better user experience.

Regularly analyze your conversion data, look for trends and patterns, and make necessary adjustments to your strategy.

If you need help, reach out and connect with us here.

6 Easy Steps to Migrate to Google Analytics 4 (GA4) For Small Business

If you’re one of the 28.1 million businesses that use Google Universal Analytics tracking, you are probably fully aware that on the 1st of July 2023, this is being switched off.

Before this date, you’ll have to make the switch to Google Analytics 4 (GA4) or run the risk of not being able to track any data on your site.

Unfortunately, GA4 Setup isn’t as straightforward, and just clicking a button and hoping it’s done. And if you’re lacking any technical know-how, then you might be putting this task off.

There’s no shortage of GA4 Starter guides out there, however, lots of them are filled with technical jargon that is impossible to get your head around.

In this article, we give you easy-to-follow steps on the migration process to Google Analytics 4. Read on to find out how.

Why Switch to GA4 Google Analytics Tracking?

You might be asking this question of why you have to switch. GA4 isn’t a redesign of the current Universal Analytics (UA).

Think of it as a whole new product. Naturally, there are similarities between the two – however, there are several major differences, including the user and reporting interface as well as what data is collected and reported on.

GA4 uses a significantly different data structure, data stream and ways to start collecting data.

Google Analytics 4 has everything built around users and a new event model, and not sessions. According to Google, this is the next generation analytics tool for data collection and presentment. It’s the new Google analytics, with enhanced measurement. Previous versions will be phased out, and the tool is a free version still.

Google Analytics 4 – GA4 Setup

We understand that the idea of setting up GA4 can seem daunting. Here’s our easy step-by-step guide on what to do.

Back-Up Universal Analytics & Your Site

Before you start any technical type of work, it’s a good idea to back everything up before you begin. Run a backup on your entire website, and if you’re not sure how to – then ask your host or a developer to help.

Before you make the switch to GA4, it’s worth backing up your analytics data. You can export this information manually to a range of supported formats, including Excel, CSV, and Google Sheets.

Although your UA data will be around for a while, Google has said they are only keeping this for six months after the July 1st, 2023, switchover date. Your data won’t be around forever.

With UA, you can pull up to two months of data at a time as a CSV. Depending on how long you’ve used UA, this could take a while. It might be quicker to use the Google Analytics Spreadsheet Add-On

Step 1: Create Your GA4 Property

After backing up, you’re ready to start implementing GA4. The first step is to create your new GA4 property.

Your new GA4 properties won’t contain any historical data. It only starts tracking traffic data from the time you create it. The good thing is that you can switch between UA and GA4.

The earlier you create your GA4 account, the sooner you can start populating data in the GA4 dashboard.

Step 2: Add GA4 Tag to Your Site

Although you can do this manually, the easiest way to do this is by using Google Tag Manager.

GA4 differs from UA. Universal Analytics only needed one tag type. GA4 needs two tags to track data. These are the Google Analytics Configuration Tag and the GA4 Event tags.

Using the Google tag manager ensures both of these tags are assigned correctly. After you’ve added the tags, GA4 will start to gather data. It might take a day or so to see anything appear on the GA4 interface.

Step 3: List Your Key Items

You’ll need to set up what you want to track on your new GA4 account. These are not pulled across from UA. In the first instance, the most common tracking items you’ll want to see are as follows;

Events
Goals (Conversions)
Content Groupings
Custom Dimensions/Metrics
Referral Exclusions
Product Link Connections
Audiences

There are differences in the wording between Universal Analytics and GA4.

Items that include hit types, such as views and sessions, have all been grouped under events. Also, conversions are now classified as goals. There are several other differences between the two analytics event tracking versions.

It will probably take you some time to go through all the items you want to track. Each of these will need to be set up to ensure the correct date is being gathered.

Step 4: Check Your Items Are Being Tracked

After you’ve been through each item in your new GA4 property, it’s time to double-check that everything is being tracked properly.

Although they aren’t the same, you can toggle between UA and GA4 to see if the data is somewhat correlating.

It will differ slightly; however, if there are major differences, this is a telltale sign that something isn’t set up properly.

Step 5: Decide on a Date That GA4 Will Be Your Single Source of Data

While Google Analytics is in this transition stage, organizations are most likely drawing from the two different sets of data for reporting purposes.

If you have a medium to large company, make sure that reports and data are all sourced from the same version of analytics.

By setting up GA4 early, you should have a solid backlog of data that you can draw on before UA gets switched off.

One thing to be aware of is that you will get skewed results if you’re comparing UA data for one year and then GA4 data for the following year as they aren’t a like-for-like comparison.

Step 6: Archive Your UA Data

You made a backup of your current UA data. You may or may not want to switch this off instantly. Google had confirmed it’s keeping the historical UA data until January 1, 2024. After this date, it will be deleted.

If you are running the two versions of analytics until UA gets switched off, be sure to make a backup before this date and archive it.

Looking For More GA4 Starter Guides?

Hopefully, this step-by-step guide has told you everything you need to know; however, if you still have questions about GA4 Setup or need more explanation about Google Analytics 4, then we’re here to help. Google provides a Google Analytics 4 setup guide here.

FREE Download: GA4 Migration Guide – Simple Steps (PDF)

And, at Chaosmap, we have on-hand experts ready to answer all your Google Analytics tracking questions.

We’ll provide you with actionable solutions, direct you to GA4 starter guides and resources. And, if you’re still unsure, we can do the technical work for you.

If you need to integrate and set up Google Ads, we do that as well. We provide detailed reports, have many reporting capabilities; ecommerce reports, cross device reporting, ROI reports, a migration checklist and we make sure everything is configured correctly. Make sure to start tracking with everything in the “plumbing” area working correctly, and that you have complete control going forward.

There is also a GA4 migration analytics starter page here.

Contact our professional team members today to find out how we can help.

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