Farewell to Google Analytics?

Google announced on March 17th that it will be “sunsetting” Universal Analytics (also known as Google Analytics 3) next July. As of that time, Universal Analytics properties will no longer capture or process any data. You will have three months to export all of your historical data as you won’t be able to access it after that point.

Why is this such a big deal? And what are the specific implications for those working in PR and comms?

Let’s start with a brief history of Google Analytics. It started life as Urchin Analytics back in the late 1990s (listen to Aaron Dinin’s excellent podcast interview with Urchin founder Scott Crosby on the early days of web analytics. I’ve always been entertained by the fact that an English major was the originator of what became the most popular web analytics tool on the planet).

Urchin became popular in the early 2000s. In 2005, Google acquired the company and renamed it Google Analytics. And decided to give the tool away for free (echoes of Urchin live on to this day in Google Analytics - UTM stands for Urchin Traffic Monitor).

By 2012, Google Analytics was up to version 3 (also known as Universal Analytics). This is the version that most PR people will be familiar with if they have any exposure to it.

In many ways, Universal Analytics was just that – a one-stop data capture, analysis and reporting tool. But after 10 years, Google clearly feels it is no longer fit for purpose (and in many ways, it isn’t. Not least in the area of privacy. Google Analytics 4 is very much designed for a world that doesn’t involve storing user IP addresses for example).

Google is thus forcing anyone who wants to remain in the Google analytical camp to move lock, stock and barrel to the latest version – Google Analytics 4.

Is this a shock?

Judging by some of the reaction to this announcement, you’d assume it has come as a bit of a surprise. But in reality, it was obvious this day was going to come eventually. Google provided a beta version of Google Analytics 4 (Web + App) for nearly two years prior to officially launching the product in October 2020. So I’m sure they would argue that by the time next July swings round, we’ve had 5 years to prepare for the change. I suspect they hoped we'd all just switch over without any need for a carrot or a stick. But with no compelling reason to ditch what they were already using, people haven't seen the need to move. The level of uptake of Google Analytics 4 has clearly not been to Google's satisfaction, hence what seems to some the draconian step of imposing change.

Of course, it isn’t quite that simple. For a start, this isn’t a “migration” in the usual sense. To all intents and purposes, Google Analytics 4 is a completely different product to Google Analytics 3. You can’t just flick a switch shift your historical data from one platform to another. Google’s own advice since October 2020 has been to run Google Analytics 3 and 4 properties in parallel in your account. You are collecting data into two completely different data buckets. Many of the things that people will be familiar with from Google Analytics 3 will no longer be available in Google Analytics 4. Here are some examples.

Goodbye, Bounce Rate

Photo by the blowup on Unsplash

You will seek in vain to find any reference to bounce rate in Google Analytics 4. This staple metric (a single page visit) is no longer available. It has been replaced by a new one called Engaged Sessions. It is similar but different. One of the issues with bounce rate was that session duration was automatically zero for single page visits. Session duration was only ever calculated for multi-page visits (and even then, the time on the final page of the session wasn’t counted). A bounce visit could have seen someone on site for 1 second, 30 minutes or any time in between. There was no way of knowing. Engaged session is an attempt to address these issues. Nevertheless, it means you aren’t comparing like with like with your previous bounce rate data.

Where are my Views?

Google always recommended having at least 3 Views for any web property – a catch all view, plus a test view and a reporting view. It was a way to ensure you could have a “clean” version to run your numbers from.

Views no longer exist in Google Analytics 4. Now we have the concept of Data Streams. We can replicate the View functionality but you have to relearn how do to it.

Everything is an Event

In Google Analytics 3, page views and Events (any non-page view related interactions) were treated separately. In Google Analytics 4, everything is an Event. Page Views are just another kind of Event. One of the issues with Google Analytics 3 was that setting up Event Tracking (even using Google Tag Manager) wasn’t seen as the easiest task (and you had to understand the difference between Event tracking and treating Events as Goals).

Google Analytics 4 certainly makes setting up basic Events a much easier process. Also, it brings a lot more flexibility to naming events as well as the parameters that can be associated with them (every time I ran a Google Analytics training workshop, I could guarantee glazed expressions when trying to explain Category, Action, Labels and Values…)

No Goals. Only Conversion Events

I’ve spent over a decade telling PR people that without Goals, Google Analytics was running at half speed. Goals still exist in Google Analytics 4. But they are now known as Conversion Events. And assigning a value to a Conversion Event is a slightly more complicated affair than in the old version (this is a common refrain. Why are some things harder to do in the new version?)

What’s happened to all the standard Report formats?

This is something that many people will find tough (PR professionals especially). Google Analytics 3 offered a raft of pre-built report formats. Although ideally people should have been creating their own customised report formats, most just took the reports they were given.

In Google Analytics 4, there are a handful of very rudimentary off the shelf reports – but the basic message is - you now have to put some serious thought into exactly what report formats you want – and you will have to build them yourself. Strictly speaking, Google’s own advice for “reporting” is to use Google Data Studio. Google Analytics 4 should be used more as an intermediary “analysis” platform as opposed to a reporting tool.

Many third-party PR tools also have Google Analytics integrations with Universal Analytics. These now all have a very definite ?lifespan of 15 months. How many of these vendors will go the effort of rebuilding those integrations around Google Analytics 4?

So what should you do?

First - don't panic. This may seem like a major headache, but it doesn't have to be. But you will have make a strategic decision as to what role web analytics is going to play in your reporting and measurement framework. And plan and act accordingly. Your primary choices appear to be:

1.????Ditch Google Analytics

For some people, moving to Google Analytics 4 will be too much effort. There are plenty of alternatives. Matamo is a good example of rival product that will feel very familiar to existing Google Analytics 3 users and also offers good privacy and security features.

2.????Move to Google Analytics 4 ASAP

As already mentioned, Google has been urging people to run Google Analytics 3 and 4 properties in parallel since October 2020. If you haven’t already done so (and you intend to stick with Google), create a GA4 property NOW. If you don’t, you will have no historical data to run year on year comparisons when the GA3 switch off occurs next July.

What next?

In summary, it really is decision time with regard to Google Analytics. Certainly if you intend to stick with Google, you really do need to set up a Google Analytics 4 property now if you haven’t done so all ready. And you will need to bite the bullet and set aside some proper time to fully familiarise yourself with all the new aspects of the platform. I'm currently overhauling all of my Google Analytics training materials to reflect the fact that Google Analytics 4 is the mandatory version we will all have to start using. For example, my next CIPR Google Analytics for PR workshop on June 17th will have been completely revised to focus entirely on Google Analytics 4.

If you are looking for immediate advice on how to set up GA4 and get a “quick” (one hour) overview of what’s new, check out Julius Fedorovicious' excellent YouTube video below. He is also offering a lengthier, paid-for series of online training tutorials – but this is around 15 hours (!) of content. That gives a measure of the scale of what’s involved here.

What do you plan to do with regard to Google Analytics? Let me know in the comments below.

That’s it for issue #15. This newsletter is clearly a work in progress. So all feedback is gratefully received. Please do let me know what you think in the comments. I’m all ears for ideas and suggestions as to what to cover.

Thanks again for reading - and possibly subscribing. Until next issue.??????????????????