Just a few years after the emergence of the internet, the first analytics solutions appeared.  Since then, the data analytics industry has rapidly evolved.  By 2028, the data analytics market’s expected worth is an estimated $550 billion.  Web Analytics are essential; they are used to understand customer behavior and optimize web experiences.  Metrics for user behavior are used to optimize conversion rates and improve both page performance and user experience.  Marketers also use data analytics to create targeted advertising. 

Web analytics has quickly grown over the past decades.  In the late 1990s, it could take large businesses up to 24 hours to process their website data.  Now, these metrics are collected in seconds or less.  Today, an estimated 28 million active websites use Google Analytics for their data analysis.  Google Analytics emerged in 2005 after acquiring the top analytics provider, Urchin, for $30 million.  In 2012, Google Analytics introduced Universal Analytics.  Universal Analytics enabled the tracking of users across not only multiple platforms, but also various devices.  Universal Analytics utilizes user IDs to monitor offline behavior, gather demographic information, and get customer data. 

The evolution of the internet has not stopped, and to no surprise, Google Analytics has developed alongside these changes.  In October 2020, Google announced Google Analytics 4 (GA4) as their new analytics platform.  They are giving companies a few years to make the transition to GA4.  Google’s Universal Analytics will shut down on July 1, 2023.  Are you and your business ready to make the switch?

So, how is Google Analytics 4 different from Universal Analytics?  GA4 is specifically designed to combine web and app analytics in a single platform and is focused on user privacy while improving data insights.  GA4 considers every event a hit, automatically collecting all engagement data instead of just page views.  GA4 uses predictive analytics for customer behavior.  It can predict revenue expected for the next 28 days by looking at data from active users in the past 28 days.  Similarly, it employs purchase probability and churn probability. 

There is no straightforward upgrade path from Universal Analytics to GA4 and no method to transfer historical data.  While making this transition is beneficial to your business, approaching this transition may seem daunting.  InfoTrust provides expert help with your analytics transition, alleviating the difficulties merging your data.  Expert help allows businesses to realign their data strategy.  This means businesses will learn how data collection changed with GA4, recode their existing tags to work with this new technology, track new metrics by redoing their dashboarding, and more.  Transitioning to GA4 presents a perfect opportunity to improve your business through smart data analysis.

Source: InfoTrust

About the Author:

Brian Wallace is the Founder and President of NowSourcing, an industry leading infographic design agency in Louisville, KY and Cincinnati, OH which works with companies ranging from startups to Fortune 500s. Brian runs #LinkedInLocal events, hosts the Next Action Podcast, and has been named a Google Small Business Adviser for 2016-present. Follow Brian Wallace on Linked In as well as Twitter.