Google Analytics (GA4) is a multifunctional tool that allows you to improve various metrics on your website. If you want to increase the number of customers and sales from your website, you should definitely implement it.
In this article, we will explain how to register and set up Google Analytics, as well as explain all the basic usage methods. We will also explain the terms you need to remember when using Google Analytics, so please use this as a reference.
What is Google Analytics (Google Analytics, GA4)?
Google Analytics is Google’s website analysis tool. It is a tool that allows you to see at a glance what actions users take after visiting a website, such as the time spent on the page, bounce rate, exit rate, and other indicators.
The current official name is “Google Analytics 4 = GA4”, and the reason for the upgrade is that the previous version of GA4, UA (Universal Analytics), was no longer able to respond to user behavior.
Additionally, there is a tool called Google Search Console that is often used in conjunction with Google Analytics. To briefly explain the difference between the two, Google Analytics is a tool that analyzes “after a user visits a website,” while Google Search Console is a tool that analyzes “before a user visits a website.”
In other words, both are indispensable tools, and when used effectively together, more detailed data can be obtained.
How to register, log in, and set up Google Analytics
We will explain how to register and set up Google Analytics. There are three main steps.
Let’s look at each step in turn.
Log in to your Google account and access Google Analytics
First, log in to your Google account and access Google Analytics. There is no problem with the Google account you usually use, or you can create a new one.
Create a Google Analytics account
Next, create a Google Analytics account using your Google account. You can create one by simply entering the URL of the website you want to analyze, so there is no need to take any special precautions.
Google Analytics properties
Google Analytics properties refer to applications that collect and analyze data. A property is created in your Google Analytics account and is a unit that represents specific data.It is data that indicates how many people visited your website and what actions they took.
Property overview
Setting and managing properties
Create and install tracking code
Finally, when you create a Google Analytics account, a “tracking code” specifically for the website you create is automatically created. Place this created tracking code in the “body tag” of your website.
Once installed, measurements will usually start within a few hours to a day, so there is no problem if you know that the installation is properly done once measurements start.
What is Google Analytics360 (paid version)?
Google Analytics has a free version and Google Analytics360 (paid version). The former name was “Google Analytics Premium” and the name changed to Google Analytics 360 in 2016.
The following section explains the differences between the paid and free versions and which one you should use.
Differences between Google Analytics360 and the free version
Google Analytics 360 (paid version) can collect up to 1 billion pieces of data, compared to the 10 million pieces of data in the regular version. In other words, if you have a large site that needs this data, it is well worth using Google Analytics 360 (paid version).
There are the following differences between Google Analytics 360 and the free version.
Differences in data update frequency
There are differences in the frequency of data updates between Google Analytics 360 and the free version. Data update frequency refers to the time required for Google Analytics to collect and process events.
Furthermore, an event refers to an action taken by a user within a website, and Google Analytics 360 reflects these “activities = user activity status and action history” as real-time data in a short period of time.
In the free version, it is usually about 24 hours, but with Google Analytics 360, updates are guaranteed within a few minutes to an hour at the earliest, and within 4 hours at the latest.
Differences in the upper limit of the number of hits
There is also a difference in the maximum number of hits between Google Analytics 360 and the free version. The number of hits is the smallest unit of data processing in Google Analytics. This refers to the number of times data is requested on a web page. Google Analytics 360 guarantees up to 2 billion hits per month.
This means that more accurate data analysis can be performed. On the other hand, the free version has an upper limit of 10 million hits per month, and any amount exceeding this limit may not be processed properly as it is not covered by the warranty.
If you know that your company’s website receives a lot of accesses, you can use the paid version of Google Analytics 360 for more accurate data analysis.
Differences in non-sampling range
There are also differences in the non-sampling range between Google Analytics 360 and the free version. The paid version of Google Analytics 360 guarantees up to 100 million hits, but the free version is limited to 500,000 hits.
Sampling is a technique that extracts only a portion from a huge amount of data and uses that data to estimate the overall value based on statistics. In other words, the values derived through sampling are not true values, but are only estimated values, so errors may occur. On the other hand, “unsampled” means a value that is not sampled.
In other words, it only targets events that actually occur on the website by users, so it is the true value of access analysis. The free version only counts up to 500,000 hits of these unsampled true values, but the paid version of Google Analytics 360 guarantees up to 100 million hits.
If you want to perform more precise web page analysis, we recommend choosing Google Analytics 360.
Differences in support system
There are also differences in the support systems between Google Analytics 360 and the free version. The free version does not have Google support, so you can only contact the help center using a form or ask other users on the community forum.
However, there is no guarantee that you will receive a response even if you ask in the help center or community forum, and even if you do receive a response, it may take several months. Therefore, it can be said that there is virtually no support. Google Analytics 360, on the other hand, has a good support system.
In addition to the customer center, we also provide support for installation settings and educational training, and if you contact a Google representative, you will receive an answer. In order to master Google Analytics, which is one of the most difficult types of access analysis, having a support system like this is extremely important.
Can be linked with BigQuery
Google Analytics360 can be linked with BigQuery. By exporting the data acquired and accumulated with Google Analytics 360 to BigQuery, you can analyze and process huge amounts of big data.
Exporting data to BigQuery tabulates it by date, making it easier to manage. You can also use data before it can be linked with BigQuery.
By the way, BigQuery is a fully managed serverless data warehouse provided by Google Cloud Platform. Scalable analysis in units of petabytes (one terabyte above) is possible.
Google Cloud Platform offers over 20 other cloud computing services, including “Cloud Storage”, “Compute Engine”, and “Cloud Build”, and BigQuery is one of them.
A data warehouse is a data server that acquires and stores data from various media such as systems, applications, and the cloud. This enables data to be used across businesses.
Looker Studio is also available in the free version
Even the free version of Google Analytics allows you to use Looker Studio (formerly Google Data Studio, formerly Google Data Portal) to visualize data.
Looker Studio is a “BI tool = business intelligence tool” that Google has provided free of charge since May 2016. BI tools are tools that aggregate, analyze, and visualize the vast amounts of data that companies have acquired and accumulated in the course of their business operations.
BI tools help you visualize information to gain insights and make data-driven decisions. Looker Studio is thus a powerful yet flexible self-service tool.
As explained above, Google Analytics has a wide range of functions that are essential for web marketing, and if you want to take advantage of it, we recommend using the paid version of Google Analytics 360.
Below is a table summarizing the differences in features between the paid and free versions.
| Comparison table of paid version and free version |
Google Analytics360 (Paid version) |
Google Analytics (Free version) |
| Maximum number of hits | 2 billion hits/month | 10 million hits/month |
| Non-sampling range | 100 million hits | 500,000 hits |
| Add custom dimension | up to 200 pieces | up to 20 pieces |
| Update frequency | Within 4 hours (guaranteed) | 24 hours (no guarantee) |
Conclusion: Consider implementing 360 when you get close to 10 million hits per month
The maximum number of hits for Google Analytics 360 (paid version) is 2 billion hits. Once you get close to 10 million hits per month, we recommend that you consider switching from the free version depending on your needs such as revenue, number of monthly hits, data retention period, etc.
Basic functions and usage of Google Analytics
So far, we have provided an overview of Google Analytics. From here, we will explain the basic functions and how to use them.
User attributes
In user attributes, you can check information about user attributes such as country, city, gender, interest category, age, and language.
Google Analytics is a tool that allows you to obtain various information from users’ purchasing behavior on the Internet. You can understand the genres and categories of interest based on the number of purchases, purchase frequency, web page viewing trends, etc., and reach more users with information about your products and services.
By using information on user attributes, you can understand the type of user you should be dealing with, and it can be used to help formulate personas that should be designed for marketing.
Related materials:
technology
In the “Technology” section, you can check information about the technology, such as platform information such as the OS and device used by the user, as well as the type of internet browser, screen resolution, and version of the app used. It is mainly useful as information to understand the entire environment used by users.
Information analyzed in technology can also be used to improve websites. For example, if there is a tendency for more access from mobile devices such as smartphones and tablets than from PCs, strategies such as running campaigns for mobile devices and responsive design can be developed to make products and services easier to sell on mobile devices. You can
Attract customers (user acquisition/traffic acquisition)
In the “Customer acquisition” section, you can check “Overview”, “User acquisition”, and “Traffic acquisition”. In addition to the customer acquisition summary, the overview shows the number of new users, number of users per minute, and number of engaged sessions.
You can also check the trends in the number of new users under User Acquisition, and the trends in the number of users under Traffic Acquisition. Regarding traffic acquisition, the concept is the same as the “Customer acquisition menu” of UA (Universal Analytics), but user acquisition is a new item added from GA4.
The difference between the two is that traffic acquisition is based on sessions, while user acquisition is based on the number of new users. In GA4, the approach has changed from the session axis, which was the main focus of UA, to the user axis, so consideration has been given to making it possible to compare the aggregated results of the two.
The meaning of each item in English is as follows.
| Organic Search | Search inflow (If you strengthen SEO measures, the proportion of organic search will increase) |
| Organic Social | Inflow from SNS |
| Organic Video | Traffic from videos |
| Paid Search | Inflow from listing advertisements, etc. |
| Paid Socal | Inflow from SNS advertisements |
| Paid Video | Traffic from video ads |
| Paid Shopping | Traffic from advertisements on shopping sites |
| Direct | Inflow through bookmarks and direct URL entry |
| Referral | Inflow from other sites (backlinks, etc.) |
| Traffic from email | |
| Affiliates | Inflow from affiliates |
| Display | Inflow from banner ads |
| Unassigned | Other inflows |
By analyzing these customer acquisition routes, you can develop future channels such as strengthening SEO measures if Organic Search is weak, strengthening communication on SNS if you want to increase inflow from Organic Social, and using SNS advertising. It is possible to consider.
engagement
In addition to “Overview”, “Engagement” includes items such as “Events”, “Conversions”, and “Pages and Screens”, which mainly allows you to check “what actions users take on your website”. Examples include number of page views per user, average dwell time, bounce rate, and exit rate. These metrics also affect things like the number of deals and inquiries.
As explained in the section “Attracting customers (acquiring users/traffic),” engagement is a concept that was born after the user axis became the main focus, and is a newly added metric from GA4. When we talk about engagement in business, we are familiar with the term “employee engagement,” which is often used in the human resources field (e.g., a feeling of attachment to the company one works for and a sense of loyalty to the company), but engagement in GA4 refers to “user engagement with sites and apps.” Google defines it as “the operation of.”
Reference page:
Analytics Help Engagement: Definition
If you want to strengthen SEO measures in web marketing, it is essential to analyze indicators related to user behavior.
Monetization
In addition to “Overview”, “Monetization” includes items such as “Number of e-commerce purchases” and “Purchase route.” This is primarily provided as a function for e-commerce, and collects revenue data such as “total revenue,” “number of purchasers,” “average purchase revenue,” “number of items purchased,” and “number of purchases per coupon.” You can check the report.
We mainly understand things like “which products are selling well,” “are we generating revenue from advertising,” and “are we acquiring new users through coupons?”
Advantages and disadvantages of Google Analytics
While Google Analytics is convenient, it can also be difficult to use. We will explain its advantages and disadvantages in detail below.
Advantages of Google Analytics
Although Google Analytics is basically a free tool, it has advanced analysis functions. You can clearly see where visitors come from, what pages they visit/view, how many pages they view, how long they stay, and the impact on sales.
Another advantage is that because it is used by many people, there is a wealth of information available on the Internet. If you have any questions, just search and you’ll quickly find the answer.
Additionally, it can be integrated with other tools such as Google Search Console and Google Ads, making it easy to implement and improve your web marketing.
Disadvantages of Google Analytics
There are many items on the Google Analytics screen, and there are many words that are difficult for beginners in access analysis to understand.
Site analysis is possible with just the basic settings, but some customization is required for more effective analysis. Therefore, you will need time and effort to deeply understand and configure each feature.
Also, while Google Analytics is good at roughly tracking user movements, it is not suitable for analyzing detailed actions on each page.
What is a Google Analytics report?
Google Analytics has a feature called reports. It is possible to obtain only the information that the person in charge wants to know at once. There are also two types: “User Report” and “Custom Report”. Next, we will explain each function.
User report
User reports allow you to place visual widgets such as tables, maps, and graphs. This can be useful when you want to check the status of the entire website at a glance.
custom report
A custom report is a report that allows you to narrow down information more specifically than a user report.
For example, you can narrow down the target of analysis like “XX prefecture → XXX city → XXX town.” It’s a good idea to check the whole thing with the user report, and check the parts you want to dig deeper into with the custom report.
Terms to remember when using Google Analytics
There are some terms that are useful to remember when using Google Analytics. These terms are often used in web marketing, so it doesn’t hurt to remember them. There is no doubt that it will be useful for future web-related work.
| bounce rate | Rate of users leaving after only one page |
| Attrition rate | Percentage of times the page was the last page viewed by the user |
| Migration rate | The percentage of pages visited per visit (also known as page per session). Calculated by number of page views ÷ number of sessions |
| Average dwell time/Average engagement time | How many minutes did the user spend on the page? From GA4 to “Engagement Time” |
| Number of users (UU) | Number of users visiting your website. UU stands for “Unique User” |
| Number of page views (PV) | Number of pages visited by 1 user |
| Number of sessions (SS) | The entire process from visiting to leaving is counted as “1 session”. Number of visits |
| channel | Inflow route |
| Landing page (LP) | The first page a user accesses. Sometimes abbreviated as LP |
| Conversion (CV) | The final results and goals of user actions on the website, such as closing deals, making inquiries, and requesting information. |
Access analysis using Google Analytics
Here are five specific site examples that utilize Google Analytics.
BtoB website
On BtoB websites, the process typically begins with an online inquiry, followed by interviews, business negotiations, and offline sales activities before a contract is concluded. After closing a deal, the site is used for a variety of purposes, such as reading FAQs and considering additional options.
Therefore, it is necessary to identify different user statuses (e.g. unconcluded, in negotiation, purchased a specific product), analyze site usage patterns according to each status, and formulate behavioral hypotheses. .
A specific approach is to change the email link parameters depending on the customer’s status and investigate which content is being viewed through which parameters.
E-commerce site
For e-commerce sites, set up enhanced e-commerce and enable order data to be measured using Google Analytics. In addition to sales, we also obtain metrics that are not measured in the order database, such as the number of times a product is viewed, added to the cart, removed from the cart, and accessed the purchase form.
This allows us to evaluate product performance from multiple angles and identify issues to improve sales of specific products. By visualizing sales data, the ROI of digital marketing becomes clear and it becomes possible to select effective measures.
FAQ page
On FAQ pages, it’s common to measure the quality of the answers as well as the number of views the questions and answers have.
To measure the quality of answers, we set up a button to get user feedback such as “helpful” or “not helpful” and measure the number of clicks. We will review and improve the answers from FAQs where most of the feedback is “unhelpful” or which have been viewed a lot.
Analysis before and after website renewal
In recent years, websites have become more sophisticated in design, and at first glance it can be difficult to determine where the problem lies. However, you must avoid the mistake of “conversions decreased after the renewal.” The first step is to identify the purpose of a visitor’s visit to your website and set a goal page accordingly.
Next, we conduct a survey on the website and combine the survey results with Google Analytics data to measure the goal achievement rate for each objective.
Portal/media site
Portal sites and media sites often do not have specific conversion points, so page views (PV) tend to be the main KPI. However, by analyzing the factors behind PV in detail, we can see the direction of various measures.
Google Analytics is used as a tool to evaluate current KPI scores and the effectiveness of measures.
Points to note when using Google Analytics
Simply setting up Google Analytics will not optimize your website. Consider the following three key points to effectively analyze access.
Don’t make analysis report creation your final goal.
When using Google Analytics, the goal is often to create analytical reports only. However, the true purpose of access analysis is to uncover site issues and improve them. It is important to not only set the goal of completing a report, but also to clarify how it will lead to results.
Identify important data
Even the free version of Google Analytics allows for multifaceted site analysis. With so many features on offer, you need to decide which data is really important. To get effective results, you need to identify the most important metrics and focus your analysis around them.
receive feedback from many people
It is important to have a diverse group of people check the report you have created and gather their opinions. For example, on days when the number of accesses spikes, it may be difficult to identify the cause using only Google Analytics data.
By asking for opinions from members of other teams and departments, you can explore the cause by considering a variety of factors, such as events being held, flyers distributed, market fluctuations, etc. We recommend holding regular meetings to share and discuss reports.
About privacy policy and terms of use
When collecting access logs of users who visit a site using Google Analytics, Google has clearly stated that it is necessary to disclose to users that the visitor’s behavior is being collected by Google Analytics and the processing mechanism. .
In other words, it is necessary to describe user information using Google Analytics on the privacy policy of your site and the terms of use.
Reference site:
Policy on the disclosure of analytics help privacy
If you have not stated your access log collection on a corporate site, Google may be judged as a reliable site.
For sentences that disclose the use of Google Analytics, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism website will be helpful.
Reference Site:
Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism National Land Mathematics Information Download Site Privacy Policy
In addition, Marketrunk clearly indicates the privacy policy on the following page, so please refer to it.
About Personal Information Protection Policy / Disclaimer, Copyright | Profuture Co., Ltd.
What you can do with Google Analytics add -on
An add-on is an extension, which is written in English as “add-on” and means “add”.
With Google Analytics add -ons, we have a variety of advantages, such as the efficiency of web -aggregation using Google Spreadsheets. The following explains the add -ons that can be used in Google Analytics.
Automation of report creation
Good news for those who are working on human power, such as downloading the data obtained in Google Analytics with CSV and pasting it on a spreadsheet! With Google Analytics add -on, you can automatically create access analysis reports on Google Spreadsheet.
It is easy to do the first necessary settings, so it will be updated automatically. You will be able to reduce the effort to analyze access analysis, and you will be able to turn management resources for other tasks.
Information can be shared within the same team
Google spreadsheets can share and edit information by multiple people. If you share information within a company team and work with multiple people, you will be able to reduce inconsistency in analysis work, which will be more efficient.
You can easily link even if you can’t program
Before the provision of Google Analytics, we needed to use script platforms such as script editor and Google Apps Script to link Google Analytics. 。
However, now, even those who have no knowledge of programming can easily cooperate.
Google Analytics Ad -on introduction procedure
The procedures for introducing Google Analytics add -ons are as follows.
1. Log in to Google and start Google Spreadsheet
2. Click “Extension” from the menu at the top of the screen
3. Select “Add -on” → “Get add -on” from the pull -down menu
4. The screen “Google Workspace Marketplace” is displayed. Enter “Google Analytics” in the search window and click the magnifying glass button.
5. Select “Google Analytics” from among them because some Google official add -ons appear.
6. Click the install button to start installation
7. When a authentication screen saying “Google Analytics has requested the next permission”, click “Permit”
This completes the installation of Google Analytics add -on.
summary
Analyzing user behavior on Google Analytics will help you refer to SEO guidelines, increase inflow of each channel, improve conversions, and renew them.
In order to increase customers and sales from websites, first master how to use Google Analytics described in this article.