Google Analytics 4 - why upgrade now?

This means you will not be able to process any new analytics data unless you switch to the latest GA4 property in your Magento or Shopify store.

GA4 has been chosen by Google as its long term measurement solution; using an event based model rather than relying on cookies, this new property will resolve the ongoing issues with privacy and cookie-tracking that have impacted data collection and measurement following PCI legislation. 

Even though after the July 1st 2023 deadline you will be able to access your previously processed data in your Universal Analytics property for at least 6 months, Google has not yet confirmed any future date where existing Universal data will no longer be available.

We’re advising clients to make the switch now, so that they can export their historical reports and data and so create a historical data set in advance of the July 2023 cut off - thereby having all their performance figures in one place.

One word of caution; you may have received an email from Google stating they will automatically migrate your account to the new property. This may seem tempting, but as so often is the case with ‘too good to be true’ offers, there are drawbacks:

• the migration may not be complete so you could lose important data with no way to recover this – Google will only migrate a few basic settings and have stated this only includes ‘certain conversion events’ – so a full migration cannot be guaranteed.
• The automatic switch will take place in July of this year, so you won’t have any historical data already in the new property to run reports over an extended period i.e. you will have data to compare from now, if you decide to manually switch.
• The automatic migration will not reflect your businesses individual goals and objectives.
• If GA is integrated directly with your eCommerce website, then Google cannot edit this code.

With the new Google Analytics 4 property, there are a few new features and improvements:

1. Improved search for properties and accounts in Google Analytics 4 

2. New eCommerce dimension and metrics 

3. Personalise the Homepage 

4. Landing page reporting

5. New session metrics

Absolute have already assisted numerous Magento clients with setting this up using one of our preferred modules from Welt Pixel: https://www.weltpixel.com/google-analytics-4-ga4-with-gtm-support-for-magento-2.html

If this is something you would like help with, please get in touch.