5 suggestions to get your GA4 training to deliver.

What are the best GA4 features to get training on?

There is a pressing issue we need to discuss regarding <whisper> GA4.? Maybe as you read this, the first July deadline has passed? Maybe the 2024 deadline approaches? Look, you have to stop trying to evade the inevitable. Reticence to accept Universal Analytics (UA) is gone, and GA4 is the source of truth is understandable. The prospect of a major change in infrastructure is not to be taken lightly.? How will you manage a major change like this?

Change management is hard to do well.? Education and training are two key ingredients to managing change successfully. An obvious challenge regarding training is that you don’t know what you don’t know. How can anyone make an educated request regarding training when you don’t know what the training ask is?

It’s very complicated, as analytics as a whole, and GA4 in particular, is a feature rich environment. There’s a lot to learn, so where do you start? Which training topics are necessary to achieve “business as usual” (BAU), and which ones will get you ahead of the curve regarding future roadmapped functionality? Training budgets are finite so how do you spend your money wisely and get the best results?

The suggestions listed below need to be on your shopping list. If your training provider can deliver quality education based on this menu then you’ll be off to a flying start. You need to put the hard yards in though. Training isn’t a passive exercise so see this list as a primer for your curiosity. See where you need to spend time, dig, learn a new or different vocabulary.

If your training provider can’t, then drop me a DM and we’ll hook you up with the best of the best ??

1: Data Differences

What is it?

If you try to compare metrics in reports in UA and GA4, you’ll see different numbers. Don’t expect absolute parity. There will be an expectation that the data in reports will be the same across the systems and when this isn’t the case, this can cause friction and slow the pace of adoption through trust erosion.

You will need to understand how app and web data differ - where the data comes from, how it gets collected (ask about data streams, and properties), processed and how users are identified across devices. This is a major change and huge improvement from GA360.

Why is it important?

This is more change management than technical training.? Learn the “why”, and be able to answer the “how” and “what” for your stakeholders.

Education and training in how and why data might differ in each system will help you understand which metrics to focus on. You’ll have the knowledge to know when your numbers aren’t right, and what’s quite normal.? This topic is essential to maintaining trust in analytics data. Without trust, the data loses value.

2: Report Collections

What is it?

This is one of the many things that GA4 can do that GA360 couldn’t. Learn how to modify the left hand reports menu.? Learn how to modify the reports, themselves. Build collections of reports that are exactly what your users want. Build new reports from scratch, modify existing reports. Make sure the reports contain only and exactly what’s needed - organic search data from Google Search Console, ecommerce, paid advertising, affiliates, conversions - you decide.? Ask for the full story on comparisons and how segmentation has changed in GA4 - it’s significant and very powerful - you need to know this.

Why is it important?

GA4 becomes more useful by presenting only the reports that matter. Your stakeholders don’t have to learn to navigate through menu items that have little value, or may end up being confusing. You can tune the reporting interface to the exact needs of the users. That’s powerful and will accelerate acceptance, and reduce the time to deliver value.

Extracting data and insights requires new skills in driving the UI.? This is actually a general point that will help you get more from the reporting interface than was ever possible with UA.? You’ll get that a lot - believe it - the list of “GA4 does this better” is long and growing.

3: Create and Modify events

What is it?

Yes, you can update data in Google analytics after it’s been collected - awesome! This is a killer feature in GA4 - how, when, why to use it needs to be understood.? It’s a powerful feature and with great power comes great responsibility - use this power well, don’t waste it.? Used well, this feature can reduce data collection complexity and improve data quality.

Why is it important?

The event creation functionality ties in really nicely with setting up conversions mentioned later - it’ll clean up and simplify your data collection.? Event modification is an answer for data quality we’ve asked for for ages. It’s open to terrible abuse in the wrong hands.? You need to know the technicalities and how to build a process around it to achieve proper governance over your data.

4: Essential configuration

What is it?

Okay - this one is a bit of a cheat - there’s a set of very important configuration choices you need to make to get the best from GA4.? You’ll need to do this once, but get it right by fully understanding what’s on offer.

Why is it important?

Out of the box, GA4 has a broad range of functionality possibilities - if you don’t know what’s available and what’s possible, you’ll fall into the thought camp of “it doesn’t do what I want”.? Don’t get bewildered by the range of options. The more you understand what’s important up front, you can quickly achieve a useful setup. This helps avoid making changes downstream that will change the data and further complicate full adoption of the tool.

Conversions

Naturally, as part of the migration from UA to GA4, you’ll want to copy over your conversions - formerly known as goals.? Expect to have transactions replicated quite easily but you’ll need to understand where ecommerce reports differ, and how they’re going to change.

Setting up goals is different but a lot easier. Goal metrics will differ - again for the better. More flexibility allows the data to better represent your business and user behaviour.

You need to make sure you fully understand the conversion counting options - this can help smooth the transition from “old GA” to GA4.

Custom Channel Grouping

This is an essential part of setting up ready for BAU. The channel names will remain consistent between the systems but the resolution is better in GA4 - there’s more power available to define channels. This means you might see different numbers in the reports, and you’ll need to know why so you can explain that the data is different because it’s better.

Enhanced Measurement

Even as a minimum viable product (MVP) GA4 is capable of doing an amazing amount of measurement without you having to do any tagging. Learn what GA4 can do automatically. Learn the use cases where you might want to make changes - in a single page app (SPA) for example, how to change it at a property and stream level, and the importance of recommended event names when you do your own tagging.

Integrations

GA4 on its own is a powerful platform. Don’t live in a data silo - learn what integrations are available, what’s coming, how to connect and what that means to your data.

Even in the free version of GA4, you can connect to BigQuery. Learn how, what options are available and how to manage the data.? Learn how to migrate your existing integrations from GA360 to GA4.? This is hugely important if you’re using the free version of GA for Google Ads optimisations.

Learn what new integrations are available now, and what’s coming on the roadmap.

5: Explorations

What is it?

This is better described as the multiple reporting surfaces of the Google Marketing Platform. You need to learn about the standard reporting interface, the data thresholds, the advantages and when to use a different reporting surface.??

Why is it important?

Explorations has huge power, and being able to fully exploit it releases citizen data professionals to be able to self-serve analytics, and surface insights quickly and easily. Making the right reporting surface choice will liberate stakeholders like never before.? From fast aggregated reports to expanded data sets, to Explorations, Looker Studio, Looker Studio Pro, BigQuery, and beyond - unleash the data ??

6: Privacy and Modelling

What is it?

Not another cheat - yes, it says 5 suggestions, but this is an instruction - you must learn about privacy controls, and data modelling in GA4.? GA4 is built with privacy in mind but the responsibility for data collection, storage and activation is with you. This responsibility and accountability requires you to not be ignorant of the task

Learn how data is collected, processed, transferred, redacted, deleted and stored by the system. Learn about what consent mode does and what it means with respect to regulation in your region. This will guide your data collection and activation strategy.?

Why is it important?

Privacy first, first class, first party data is the goal of many organisations. A full and complete understanding of the system capabilities to help you deliver this will put you ahead of the curve - privacy first is a competitive advantage.

Working hand in hand with your stakeholders includes privacy and legal teams. They will rely on you to bring essential knowledge that will help all stakeholders be responsible data professionals.