One constant in digital marketing is change. Google in particular makes numerous changes (some small, others not so small) to its various tools and products. Google Analytics, a tool you may use to track website performance, is changing in a pretty major way in 2023.
Google Analytics is sunsetting Universal Analytics. Starting on July 1, 2023, Google’s standard Universal Analytics properties will no longer process data. In place of Universal Analytics, they have rolled out Google Analytics 4 or GA4 for short.
GA4 offers enhanced data collection and works within the new third-party tracking (cookies) rules. There are many other differences between UA and GA4 (read more in our GA4 post).
The good news is that you can create your GA4 property now and start integrating the data into your current performance reporting.
How will this impact my business?
As of July 1, 2023, the UA tracking will no longer work. So, the data you rely on now to do things like— track the performance of your digital campaigns, gain insight into your customers’ behavior, and understand how people find your website—will become read-only. This means you’ll only be able to view historic data.
Not sure if you are using Google Analytics?
We can take a look at your website and determine what tracking is currently in place. And, we can help you create and install Google Analytics if you don’t have anything in place.
Need a game plan?
We are here to help you prepare for this change! The below plans give three entry points into setting up and integrating GA4 into your current reporting practices.
Setup Only
- Shift creates the new GA4 account and implements the tracking code (either directly on the website or through your Google Tag Manager account)
- Shift sets up basic reports in Google Analytics that you can refer to as needed
Plan price: $165 (one-time fee)
Monthly Basic
- Shift creates the new GA4 account and implements the tracking code (either directly on the website or through your Google Tag Manager account)
- Shift creates a real-time performance dashboard in Google Looker Studio with three pages – Monthly website performance summary, audience + behavior, and top pages
- Shift will complete monthly analysis of activities and provide key takeaways and recommended actions to take (when applicable)
Plan price: $495/month
Monthly Enhanced
- Shift creates the new GA4 account and implements the tracking code (either directly on the website or through your Google Tag Manager account)
- Shift creates a real-time performance dashboard in Google Looker Studio with three pages – Monthly website performance summary, audience + behavior, and top pages
- Shift will build additional 4 pages customized to the metrics you’d like to monitor
- Shift will complete monthly analysis of activities and provide key takeaways and recommended actions to take (when applicable)
- Shift will implement recommended actions from the monthly insights (up to 3 hours/month)
Plan price: $950/month