Sunsetting Universal Analytics
Google Analytics is the backbone of understanding your website traffic. It is used to track website performance, audience demographics, and the various sources of your website's attention. Since 2012, Google Analytics has operated underneath the Universal Analytics system, but in July of 2023, it will stop collecting website data to push users to move to the new Google Analytics 4(GA4).
The Problem
After July, websites that haven’t set up GA4 will not pull in website data and will not be able to track website performance. Not only will you have to install the new Google Analytics to your site; but you’ll also have to rebuild your old reports in your new GA4 account to get the most out of the new system. Another issue with GA4 is that on the new system, Google will only hold website data for 2 months by default, and if your new account is not set up correctly you will have no way to compare website data more than 1 month back at a time.
The Solution
Over the next couple of months, we will begin transitioning all of our clients who pay for monthly SEO updates to GA4 for no additional charge. We will build out their new reports, and schedule website performance updates to be sent to their email monthly. During account setup we will also set up your new account to hold website data for 14 months instead of 2, allowing you to compare data over a much longer period. All of our other clients that want GA4 set up on their account, can either switch to monthly SEO updates or pay a one-time setup fee.
New Features and the Benefits of Switching
There are also many new features the new analytics has that the old analytics didn’t that will need to be set up and optimized, like tracking e-commerce data from your site and app data from IOS and Android.
E-commerce - The new analytics is a powerful tool for e-commerce and gives its users many ways to track sales, revenue, and individual product performance across their sites. This is a great asset for businesses of all sizes if they sell goods online, and finding all of this information in one place makes life much easier.
Website data and app data all in one place - Another useful feature of the new analytics platform is having all of your website data and app data easily accessible in one place. The new GA4 can link to Firebase and other app development tools to help you build comprehensive reports of all of your users, no matter what platform they are on.
For more information on the upcoming switch to GA4, or if you have any questions about the switching process, feel free to reach out to SEO@ermakretinggroup.com directly.
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