The New Google Analytics 4: What It Means To Digital Marketing

Google Analytics 4, the fourth platform version, was released in October 2020. It replaced Universal Analytics (UA), which was launched in 2012. Google announced in March 2022 that it would shut down UA’s standard version by July 1, 2023, and UA 360 by October 1, 2023. This is probably why not all marketers have switched to GA4. However, it’s important to note that transitioning to the new version as soon as possible is wise. After all, the old version will cease to work by the end of next year.

Google Analytics 4: a new era

Google Analytics 4 is designed to keep up with modern customer data landscape changes. It gives marketers better insights into the increasingly complex cross-channel journeys of customers who prioritise user privacy. What makes GA4 entirely different is that it maximises customer touchpoints by providing more valuable insights and a closer relationship with Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML).

Over the last ten years, people have accessed the internet daily and from multiple devices. This makes it extremely important for digital marketing agencies in Indonesia to analyse each user’s journey across various platforms, products, and devices for marketers to know their audience better.

With the GA4 update, marketers will understand users not as a set of cookies but as persons. Through this new version, businesses will better grasp how users across different channels and why user profiles across platforms need to be connected.

Cookies will soon be a thing of the past. Although Google has delayed its plan to replace third-party cookies for advertising until 2024, they will no longer be reliable as a source of data for building an analytical platform when that time comes. This is why marketers must consider switching to Google Analytics 4 as soon as possible.

Google Analytics 4 and its benefits to digital marketing

Below are some ways the latest Google Analytics management tool takes your digital marketing strategy to the next level.

• It helps you predict sales.

One of the best features of the new GA4 is machine learning. This will help marketers gather large volumes of data and learn from it, allowing you to learn more about your audience and determine which will most likely convert based on past trends.

For example, customers that take a specific route in the customer journey are more likely to buy product “X.” So, by designing your digital marketing strategy to syphon leads through that particular journey, you can expect to get more sales for product “X.” This is something that you can’t find with Universal Analytics.

• It delivers identity spaces.

Identity spaces allow businesses to identify consumers without using cookies. When visitors opt into your site’s cookies, they are given a first-party cookie ID or set up with a user ID to track across all your channels, including your site and app.

On the other hand, if a user opts into ad personalisation, they will be tracked through the different browsers or devices they use. Identity spaces allow you to see better how users move across all your touchpoints.

• It allows you to attribute every touchpoint.

Unlike Universal Analytics, where you can only make educated guesses, GA4 lets you visualise how your audience moves through the sales funnel. It lets you determine precisely where and how to attribute each digital marketing message you distribute across different channels.

• It is capable of codeless event tracking.

You can track events as they occur using Google Analytics 4. When you log in to GA4, you can watch what’s happening in real-time. For example, you can track what your audience is looking at in your latest videos. You can do all that with GA4 and not even have to worry about having back-end code knowledge. This is because Google Analytics 4 is built with event tracking, giving users a more personalised experience with this management tool.

Conclusion

With Google Analytics 4, you’ll be able to predict the browsing habits of your prospective customers, allowing you to gather a richer pool of data to work from. While getting the hang of using this AI-driven management tool might take some time, it is a tool that many SEO services in Indonesia can benefit from.