SiliconRA have recently been involved in an end-to-end GA4 (Google Analytics 4) implementation.
GA4 is a massive booster
Companies can:
- Focus on core KPIs (events)
- Slice and dice around customer events with value added insight
- Improve conversion and audience definition
- Improve customer marketing and optimise site product metrics simultaneously
We think for E-commerce sites in particular the implementation syntax is better developed and flows seamlessly from viewing a product list or search to completing a purchase on a store.
Everything in the flow is described as an item (i.e. a product in previous Google UA parle) which when you have implemented end to end makes complete sense. Well done to whoever decided on the naming conventions and the syntax at Google for the new tweaked GA4 ecommerce model and events. 100% making the complex easy and understandable.
The way dimensions are handled is a significant improvement and are very easy to implement. Out with the custom dimension1 customdimension2 etc.
The checkout funnel is a significant improvement as it is standards out of the box with steps organised and can be customised further if required.
Dimensions also become cards on the dashboard to check and as an immediate follow on. This becomes so intuitive and easy to see key metrics at a glance.
We can see the attribution and data engine aspects of the platform will make insight generation and marketing insights more real time in what looks like an exciting platform for ecommerce and content generative sites alike.
SiliconRA would love to see
- A way to measure key navigation points on a site e.g. a Navigation Lookup inputs feature for CSS selectors in the GA4 UI so that you can attach these to click navigation to key areas of navigation within your site – such as top category navigation, brand Logos, home category block Images, featured products.
- Content interaction revenue contribution following on from the above point. Something out of the box showing a company how different parts of the site in addition to promos (e.g. navigation, CTAs, homepage product blocks etc.) are contributing to revenue would be a big win.
- The navigation summary – next and previous page paths – in a reinvented report view. We recently did something similar in a BI platform with next and previous path in a sunburst chart along with tabular % contribution of pageviews in tabular which worked well as a visualisation and along the lines of the navigation summary from GA4. Although not the full journey it helps stakeholders to visualise key traffic gateway points for a website. (we guess this can just be built in free form reports but having as a standard report would be nice)
- Network graphs with the ability to filter down by content area custom definitions for visualising flow.
In summary GA4
There are still many features and configurations on the reporting side to discover especially in the free form reporting, custom metrics and attribution , and as the platform builds.
Google has seen how their product has been used over the last five years and introduced what have been the improvement areas such as user focused metrics and event centric reporting. The platform, will be boosted further, when more features no doubt get added in the coming months, although we can see the clear advantages right now.
Look out for a more in-depth article describing a GA4 e-commerce implementation guide to follow.
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