Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is the latest iteration of Google’s Analytics platform and provides users with insights into website visitor behavior and performance. The retirement of Universal Analytics on July 1, 2023, means that you must make the transition to GA4 before then in order to continue to track events on your website.
Google Analytics 4: The Future of Franchise Development Strategy Measurement
Are you ready? Your Google Analytics platform is changing.
In the digital media world, one thing is for certain – change is constant. Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is changing the way that businesses measure their franchise development strategy. It is the latest iteration of Google’s analytics platform and provides users with powerful insights into customer behavior and performance. With GA4, your business will have the ability to gain valuable insights into their franchise development strategy and optimize it for maximum success.
The retirement of Google Analytics Universal (UA) on July 1, 2023, means that you must make the transition to GA4 before then in order to track events on your website. For example, one of the key indicators of performance on a website for franchise lead generation is knowing the number of form submissions. Without that data, you won’t know if users are converting into a potential franchise opportunity lead. Since Google will not be supporting UA the switch to GA4 requires that you configure your conversion events in GA4 to record the data points that are important to your business. By implementing GA4 on your site today, GA4 tracking will begin to collect historical data for your site.
Why is this important? Imagine not being able to compare your data month-over-month or year-over-year. With the sunset of UA the historical data from years past will go away. You will be left with only the data gathered in GA4. This massive change is driving the urgency to install GA4 sooner rather than later. The good news is that you can still keep UA on the site while you upgrade. The key will be to pull down reports of this historical data prior to the deadline of July 1, 2023, to compare your new site performance metrics with GA4 prior to installation.
Read on and we’ll provide an introduction to GA4 and how it can be used to improve your franchise development strategy.
What is GA4?
GA4 is the latest version of Google Analytics, and it’s very different from the previous iteration, UA. GA4 uses a brand-new type of measurement based on events, meaning it will help measure the experience of users instead of a proxy. This will eliminate blind spots and provide more reliable data to inform decisions when planning franchise marketing strategies, lead generation and your other business objectives.
This new reporting interface allows for advanced analysis, creating specific funnels to identify where your customers are dropping off, and understanding customer segmentation. It also provides new metrics like purchase probability, churn probability and revenue probability. Because the new Analytics can measure app and web interactions together, it can include conversions from YouTube views that occur in-app and on the web in reports. Seeing conversions from YouTube video views alongside conversions from Google and non-Google paid channels, and organic channels like Google Search, social and email, will help you understand the combined impact of all your marketing efforts.
All of this makes GA4 an essential tool for business owners and franchise marketers who want to get the most out of their analytics data.
What are the benefits of GA4?
The new reporting interface of GA4 is much improved, allowing users to easily visualize, explore and analyze their data. Advanced analysis tools are also available to allow for deeper insights into user behavior. Additionally, GA4 provides several new metrics that were not available in UA. These metrics are incredibly helpful when it comes to franchise marketing, lead generation and optimization.
Migration from UA to GA4 can be a complex process and requires a lot of planning. However, once the migration is complete, the advantages of GA4 far outweigh those of its predecessor.
How do I migrate to GA4?
The process of migrating to GA4 must be done carefully. It is important to remember that you should run both UA and GA4 in parallel so that you can access historical data and benefit from the new features of GA4. Migrating to GA4 is an important step if you want to leverage data-driven insights to gain a competitive edge in franchise marketing.
When you’re ready to migrate to GA4, there are a few key things to keep in mind. First, since GA4 is a new platform, you won’t be able to import your previous data from UA. This means that if you want to analyze your data year-over-year, you should start now. Additionally, you can enjoy the benefits of having better data now, so you can make more informed marketing decisions based on enhanced visitor reports and take advantage of improved conversion rates to grow your lead generation pipeline or understand your customer journey to a B2C purchase. Finally, consider this a learning period. This way, you can take your time and get used to the changes instead of experiencing the shock of a sudden change, making sure your goals are tracked correctly and everything is set up as intended and needed.
GA4 is designed to help with attribution tracking and is going to become the new standard for brands and franchise marketing analytics. The time to start benefiting from the new system is today. Are you ready?
There’s no need to panic
Confused? Anxious? We get it.
Having a well-thought-out strategy for tracking visitors as they journey and interact on your website will set your business up for success. Hot Dish has created smart GA4 integrations that align with our client goals. There are a lot of changes in data collection and ways to implement and test the analytics. This new reporting interface takes time to become familiar with it. For your franchise marketing digital ads, it is vital to have up-to-date and accurate data. That is why we are now recommending the transition to GA4 as soon as possible. This way, you can start building a wealth of historical data before the official sunsetting of UA
We can show you how to implement best practice digital strategies and get performance metrics that matter. Let’s chat.
