Google is deprecating Universal Analytics at the end of June 2023 and replacing it with GA4. Here’s everything you need to know about this change, what you’ll need to do in Arlo, new GA4 functionalities, and how we can help ease the migration.
Google is deprecating Universal Analytics at the end of June and replacing it with GA4. You’ll need to manually migrate to GA4 before July 1st to continue tracking your site visitors and conversions. In this blog post we’ve laid out each of the steps you’ll need to take to manually migrate to GA4.
Or, let the Arlo Professional Services team take care of it for you.
Arlo supports GA4 on all plans and can manage the migration for you. Plus we have some additional services to help you unlock the full power of GA4 with Google Tag Manager and ecommerce conversion tracking.
More information on that later.
But first let’s look at some of the new functionalities that come with GA4.
New functionalities
With any major upgrade there comes new, modernised features and functionalities. And GA4 has some fantastic new functionality to help you in your training business. G4 focuses on the customer’s journey, so you can better track your users across channels, websites, and other integrated software, providing you with valuable information that will help you make better decisions for your business.
Here are four key functionalities that will be beneficial for training providers.
Data and privacy
Unlike Universal Analytics, GA4 does not rely exclusively on cookies and instead uses an event-based data model to deliver user-centric measurement. Google Analytics 4 will also no longer store IP addresses. These changes comply with new internet and government privacy regulations as well as meet the needs of users who are increasingly expecting more privacy protections and control over their data.
Events
Another difference between UA and GA4 is its underlying data model. In GA4, you can expand from “sessions” (think page views, pages per visit, average session time, etc.) to “events”. The benefit of an event-based model is that it offers deeper insights to marketers across all of their websites and mobile apps.
Here’s one example for Arlo customers:
When a registrant first enters the checkout the ‘arloCheckoutStarted’ event is fired. This includes the course code allowing you to analyze results on a course level. The ‘checkout’ variable lets you know which registration method the registrant is using (‘quick’ for quick registration and ‘order’ for order process). Once the registrant has successfully registered, the ‘arloCheckoutFinished’ event is fired. This event includes more details about the order including the overall order value, currency, region, and expected payment method.
Google Tag Manager
This event data can then be sent to Google Tag Manager. GTM integrates with your other systems, such as CRM or marketing tools and Arlo, allowing you to send Arlo transaction data to your various marketing and reporting systems. With GTM, you can put triggers in place based on an event, such as “every time someone registers on a course”.
Ecommerce Conversion Tracking
Use data-driven attribution to analyze the full impact of your marketing across the customer journey. It assigns attribution credit to more than just the last click using your Analytics data, and helps you understand how your marketing activities collectively influence your conversions. You can export that analysis to Google Ads and Google Marketing Platform media tools to optimize campaigns.
What you need to do to migrate to GA4
- Confirm what type of property you’re using. First up, confirm what type of property you’re using here. If you’re still using Universal Analytics, then you need to migrate to GA4 right away. FYI, Google will copy over your configurations. By now, Google will have created a new GA4 property for you (unless you opted out, or created one yourself). This new property will be connected to your existing Universal Analytics property and Google will copy over any configurations (e.g. goals, audiences, etc.) from your Universal Analytics property that you have not marked as complete in your GA4 property. So that bit is taken care of for you.
- Update the tracking code on your website. Replace the old Universal Analytics code on your website with the new GA4 tracking code. This enables basic GA4 functionality. For Arlo customers, we recommend Google Tag Manager and ecommerce conversion tracking. Keep reading.
- Set-up Google Tag Manager. Ensure your GA4 configuration tag, purchase event, and any other events you would like to track are set up and published via Google Tag Manager. Here’s how to do this in Arlo:
– Go to your Arlo platform Settings, and under Marketing, choose Google settings.
– Toggle on the Enable Google Tag Manager option
– Add your Google Tag Manager container ID to the Tracking ID field. You can get your container ID by going to your admin page in Google Tag Manager.
For more information check out the Arlo help centre article.
- Enable ecommerce conversion tracking. Arlo can send transaction data through to Google Ecommerce, allowing you to use the Google Ecommerce reports to analyze purchase activity on your site. We recommend this for all Arlo customers to get the most out of GA4. For more information check out the Arlo help centre article.
Additional steps
- Start using GA4, now! Google strongly encourages you to make the switch to GA4 as soon as possible – ie. start using that property instead of your existing Universal Analytics. Doing so will allow you to build the necessary historical data and usage in the new experience, preparing you for continuity once Universal Analytics is no longer available.
- Export data and reports. After July 1, 2023, you’ll still be able to access your previously processed data in your Universal Analytics property for at least six months, after which it will no longer be available. This data is still important to your business, so you’re going to want to export your historical reports during this time while you still have access to them.
- Set up cross-domain measurement, if needed. If your Arlo checkout isn’t using a custom domain, you will need to configure cross-domain tracking to allow GA4 to track people as they move between your website and the Arlo checkout. Here’s how to set-up cross domain measurement.
How the Arlo Professional Services team can help
The Arlo Professional Services team can take care of the migration for you.
Full migration from Universal Analytics to GA4. This setup will include regular page view tracking (allowing you to see what pages your users are visiting on your website as well as where they are coming from, how long they are staying, and much more). We will also set up standard ecommerce conversion tracking, allowing you to see purchases made via the Arlo checkout in Google Analytics. Cost: $288USD.
PLUS! We can add enhanced conversion tracking or abandoned cart automation.
Enhanced conversion tracking. Enhanced conversion tracking sends not just courses purchased to GA4 but also courses viewed and courses added to cart allowing you to track the full purchase journey and see where people might be dropping off. Cost: $432USD.
Abandoned cart automation. Abandoned cart automation allows you to increase purchases by automatically emailing people who start registering for one of your courses but then leave the checkout before completing the purchase. Please note abandoned cart automation requires a paid Zapier account as well as a marketing automation system (such as Mailchimp, HubSpot, or Marketo). Cost: $864USD.
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While basic migration to GA4 may seem simple enough, there’s a lot of risk to your business if GA4 isn’t set-up correctly. Plus, we recommend using Google Tag Manager and enhanced conversion tracking to get the most out of GA4’s new features. This will ensure you’re getting accurate data and intelligent reporting that will help you make smart business decisions.
Additional resources
- About Arlo’s Professional Services Team
- Introducing Google Analytics 4
- How to migrate to Google Analytics 4
- Prepare for the future with Google Analytics 4
- How to check whether you have Universal Analytics or Google Analytics 4
- Activate Google Tag Manager in Arlo
- How to set-up cross domain measurement
- Arlo website: Tracking codes settings
- Google Tag Manager and Arlo
- Enable Google Ecommerce
Let us manage your GA4 migration
The Arlo Professional Services Team take care of the migration for you for just $288USD.