Module 10

Web Analytics
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
Module Structure: Web Analytics
1. Understand Google Analytics (GA) 16. UTM Campaign Tracking
2. Set Up GA Account 17. Shorten UTM Campaign Link
3. Modify Data Retention 18. Engagement Reports
4. Exclude Internal Traffic 19. Monetization Reports
5. Users & Permissions 20. Retention Reports
6. Dimensions & Metrics 21. Technology Reports
7. Events 22. User Attributes Reports
8. Enhanced Measurement Events 23. Enable Google Signals
9. Recommended Events 24. Firebase Report
10. GA4 Interface 25. Key Events
11. GA4 Home 26. Create Custom Key Events
12. Analytics Insights
13. Reports Snapshot
14. Realtime Reports
15. Acquisition Reports
Understand
Google Analytics (GA)
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 What is Google Analytics (GA)
• A free website analytics tool that helps digital marketers better understand their site’s overall
performance.
• Unlike Google Search Console, which provides detailed data about how users discover
websites through Google organic search, Google Analytics deals with all traffic sources.
Including organic search, paid search, social media, and more.
• Beyond telling you how your users arrive on your site, it has data that tells you what they do
after they arrive. That includes which pages they view and what actions they take.
• Universal Analytics (UA) is no longer the current version of Google Analytics. But it is the
version that made Google Analytics famous.
• It became widespread across the digital marketing world after the beta version was released in
2012.
• Various versions of Google Analytics have a greater than 70% share of the web analytics software
market, according to Statista.
• But you won’t see Universal Analytics now. That’s because UA was set to stop processing
new data in standard accounts on July 1, 2023. So marketers started adjusting to the new
Google Analytics 4.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 4
 What is Google Analytics 4 (GA4)
• With the introduction of GDPR laws in Europe and enhanced privacy online, it’s
becoming more difficult to track users with cookies.
• As a result, third-party cookies are being phased out. Firefox and Safari already
block them by default. By 2025, Google plans to do the same.
• GA4 is promoted as a privacy-centric digital analytics tool and has been designed to
work without cookies.
• By leveraging Machine Learning (ML) and other protocols, GA4 can fill in data gaps
as the digital world becomes less dependent on cookies.
• E.g., if only 60% of your Google Ads conversions are tracked (via cookies), GA4 will
apply machine learning models to attribute the remaining 40% of conversions for which
the data is not available.
• But, this is not an alternative to third-party cookies, but rather a way to compensate for
the loss of data from users not consenting to third-party cookies, or using web browsers
that block them by default.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 5
 3 Underlying Tracking Technologies of GA4
• Firebase Analytics
• Be the backend for Google Analytics 4. This means that data captured across both
websites and mobile apps share a single format.
• Use the “event-driven data model” to better describe behavior and measure user
engagement.

• Google Signals
• Be the identity software that uses Google accounts to recognize logged-in users. It is the
same method that Google uses behind the scenes to create audiences.
• GA4 can use this feature to recognize users instead of relying on first-party cookies.

• Global Site Tag

• Allow you to make changes in the user interface that actually change the code that is
deployed to your website.
• E.g., with GA4 you can flip on a feature to track when users play a YouTube video, and
the code to do this will be automatically deployed to your site.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 6

 Data Protection (GDPR) for GA4
• IP anonymization is set up by default for GA4 by Google. Google states that
“Automatically enabled IP anonymization cannot be disabled.”
• Opt-out cookie needs to be available in your privacy policy for GA4 as well.
• Data Retention controls give you the ability to set the amount of time before user-
level and event-level data stored by GA4 is automatically deleted.
• Retention of user-level data, including key events (conversions), can be set to a
maximum of 14 months.
• For all other event data, you can choose length of retention: 2 months or 14 months.
• In GA4 Property setting, you can also find “Deletion Requests for Data” in order to
delete certain data.
• You can find the deletion requests under “Admin” > “Property Settings” > “Data Collection
and Modification” > “Data Deletion Requests.”
• While the changes are not permanent for 7 days, you can see the results of what you are
deleting immediately within your data, so you get a sense of if the deletion is meeting
your needs.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 7
Hierarchy of GA4 Account
• Accounts (Users)
• Gateway to GA4, and provide
the container for your Analytics
properties.
• Each account can contain up to
100 properties.
• GA4 users are identified by
Google email addresses.
• When you sign in, you have
access to all of the accounts
and properties that your email
address is associated with.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 8

Hierarchy – Properties & Data Streams
• Properties
• Containers for your reports based on the data you collect from your apps and sites.
• Use the concept of separate data streams for the customer touchpoints that send data to
the property.
• Achieve this by letting you collect data from your mobile app (using Firebase) and your
website (using the Global Site Tag).

• Data Streams
• Each GA 4 property can have up to 50 data streams (any combination of app and web
data streams, including a limit of 30 app data streams).
• Data stream is a flow of data from a customer touchpoint (e.g., app, website) to GA4.
• You can add multiple data streams to a property, e.g., a stream from your Android app,
one from your iOS app, and one from your website.
• When you create a stream, the reports for that property show data from the creation date
of the stream forward.
• E.g., if you create a stream on June 1, then reports will include data from June 1 forward,
but will not include any data collected prior to June 1.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 9

 For a Brand New Website

Set Up
GA Account
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Google Analytics – Google Marketing Platform
• Make sure you have a Google account (i.e. Gmail account).
• Go to [Link]/analytics
• Click “Get started today” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 11

 Step 01. Confirm to GA Set Up
• Click “Start measuring” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 12

 Step 02. Name Your Account
• Input your account name, and select your favourite options of “Account
Data Sharing Settings”. Then, click “Next” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 13

 Step 03. Input Property Details
• Enter your property name, reporting time zone, and currency. Then, click
“Next” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 14

 Step 04. Enter Business Information
• Select your industry category and business size.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 15

 Step 05. Choose Your Business Objectives
• How do you intend to use Google Analytics with your business? Select the topics most
important to you.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 16

 Step 06. Agree Terms of Service Agreement
• Check statement boxes to agree Google Analytics Terms of Service Agreement.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 17

 Step 07. Pick Your Data Stream
• Select your data stream. For most online merchants, it will be “Web.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 18

 Step 08. Input Website URL
• Provide the “Website URL,” name the stream, and choose the interactions to track
automatically.
• Select all options, even if you presently do not have some of those activities, such as Videos
or File Downloads. Then click “Create Stream.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 19

 Step 09. Set Up Tagging
• You will see your data stream details. Then, click on “View Tag Instructions.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 20

 Step 10. Insert Google Tag
• Use “Install with a website builder" if your site using a CMS platform like WordPress.
• If you choose to install manually, go to the “Install manually” section. Copy and paste your
entire Google tag snippet in the code of every page of your website, immediately after the
<head> element.

Just Copy it!

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 21

 Step 11. Validate GA Property
• It may take up to 30 minutes for data collection to start. You can then use the Realtime report
to verify that you‘re receiving data.
• If “Users in Last 30 Minutes” is more than “0”, then GA tracking is valid.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 22

Modify Data Retention
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Step 01. Head to Admin
• There is a Data Retention setting
within GA4 that lets you choose
how long GA retains user and event
data before automatically deleting it.

• Go to “Admin” > “Property Settings”

> “Data Collection & Modification” >
“Data Retention.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 24

 Step 02. Modify Event Data Retention
• Recommend bumping it up to 14 months, the maximum amount allowed.

• Changes to these settings take effect after 24 hours.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 25

Exclude Internal Traffic
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Step 01. Choose Data Stream
• By default, GA4 will automatically create a Data Filter to exclude internal traffic. But, it is up
to you to configure the internal traffic to be excluded.
• Navigate to “Admin” > “Property Settings” > “Data Collection & Modification” > “Data
Streams.”

Select your stream in “Data

Streams” listing.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 27

 Step 02. Select Tag Settings
• In “Web Stream Details” tab, click on “Configure Tag Settings.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 28

 Step 03. Define Internal Traffic
• Click on “Show More” > Select “Define Internal Traffic” > Hit “Create” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 29

 Step 04. Configure Traffic Filter Rule
• In “Configuration” tab, enter a descriptive “Rule Name” and enter the IP
address to be excluded. Then, click on “Create” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 30

 Step 05. Open Internal Traffic Filter
• Navigate to “Property Settings” > “Data Collection & Modification” > “Data Filters.”
• Select the “Internal Traffic” filter that GA4 created.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 31

 Step 06. Select Filter State
• The Filter details don’t require changes with a standard IP exclusion. But, there are 3
options in “Filter State” that are new with GA4:
• Testing – Filter does not
permanently change the data but
can be identified with the
dimension name “test data filter.”
• Active – Filter permanently
changes the data.
• Inactive – Filter is not considered
for processing the data.

• If you are certain that the IP Filter

should permanently be excluded
from the data, select “Active” as
filter state. Then, hit “Save.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 32

Users & Permissions
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
Step 01. Navigate to Admin Tab
• You can add users to an GA account.

• When you add a user, you identify that

person by an email address that is
registered in Google accounts, and you
assign the appropriate permissions.

• Sign in to Google Analytics > Click Admin

icon > Select “Account Settings” > “Account”
> “Account Access Management”.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 34

Step 02. Add Users
In the Account Permissions list, click blue + button, then select “Add users”.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 35

 Step 03. Input User Email & Permission
• Enter the email address for the user's Google Account.

• Select Notify new users by email to send a message to the user.

• Select the
permissions you
want.

• Click “Add” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 36

Permission Roles
• Administrator – Full control of Analytics. Can manage users (add/delete users, assign any
role or data restriction). Can grant full permissions to any user, including themselves, for any
account or property for which they have this role. Includes permissions of the Editor role.
• Editor – Full control of settings at the property level. Cannot manage users. Includes
permissions of the Analyst role.
• Marketer – Can create, edit, and delete audiences, key events (conversions), events,
attribution-models, and conversion windows. Includes permissions of the Analyst role.
• Analyst – Can create, edit, and delete certain property assets. Can collaborate on shared
assets. Includes permissions of the Viewer role.
• Viewer – Can see settings and data; can change which data appears in reports (e.g., add
comparisons, add a secondary dimension); can see shared assets via the user interface or
the APIs. Cannot collaborate on shared assets. For example, shared explorations can be
viewed, but not edited, by those with a Viewer role.
• None – User has no role for this resource. User may have a role for another resource.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 37

Dimensions & Metrics
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 What are Dimensions
• Dimensions are attributes of your data that might be a feature of a user, website,
product, or event. It's usually text as opposed to numbers.
• Help you better describe and understand your data, so it makes sense to look at it as
a qualitative variable.
• Every report comes with a
pre-selected primary
dimension.
• Examples of Dimensions:
• “Country” indicates the
country like India or The
US, from which a
session originates.
• “Page Title” indicates the
title of a page that is
viewed.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 39

 What is Secondary Dimension
• Google gives you the option to segment dimension data further by adding a “Secondary
Dimension.” It gives you the opportunity to designate a primary dimension, then view the
related data by a secondary dimension within the same table.
• Whole process is as simple as clicking on the “+” button next to the primary dimension.

• E.g., add a secondary dimension “Device category” into Demographics Details Report and
break the table down in “desktop”, “mobile”, and “tablet.”
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 40
 What are Metrics
• Metrics are quantitative measurements, such as an average, ratio, percentage, and
so on.
• Be always a number as opposed to text. You can apply mathematical operations to
them.
• Examples of Metrics:
• “Users” is the total
number of unique users
who triggered at least
one event.
• “Pages/Session” is the
average number of
pages viewed per
session.
• “Event Count” is number
of times users triggered
an event.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 41
Events
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 How Events Work
• An event allows you to measure a specific interaction or occurrence on your website or
app. E.g., you can use an event to measure when someone loads a page, clicks a link,
or completes a purchase, or to measure system behaviour, such as when an app
crashes or an impression is served.
• Let's say someone clicks a link on your tagged website that takes them to an external
website. The following illustrates what happens when the user clicks the link:

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung Source: Google 43

 Event Types in GA4
• Automatically Collected Events: Collected automatically with basic data collection.
• Enhanced Measurement Events: Collected automatically if you have enabled
Enhanced Measurement.
• Recommended Events:
• Events that you implement yourself, but that have Google-predefined parameters.
• Events recommended for: Retail, Ecommerce, Education, Real Estate, Travel, Games.
• Doc: [Link]/analytics/devguides/collection/ga4/reference/events
• Custom Events
• Events that you name and implement yourself.
• Only create a custom event if no event in other 3 categories will work for your use case.
• Doc: [Link]/docs/analytics/events
• Note: Event names are case-sensitive; 2 events whose names differ only in case will
result in 2 distinct events.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 44

 View & Manage Events
• Triggered by basic interactions with your app or site. As long as you use the Firebase SDK or
Global Site Tag, you don't need to write any additional code to collect these events.
• To manage events (e.g., mark as key event, create event), click “Admin” icon in the left menu >
Select “Property Settings” > Choose “Data Display” > Click “Events.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 45

 Automatically Events Categories for Web
Event Automatically triggered... Parameters
click Each time a user clicks a link that leads away No parameters are collected
from the current domain. Collected by default
via enhanced measurement.

file_download When a user clicks a link leading to a file (with a file_extension, file_name
common file extension) of the following types: link_classes, link_domain,
document, text, executable, presentation, link_id, link_text, link_url
compressed file, video, and audio.
Collected by default via enhanced
measurement.

view_search_result Each time a user performs a site search, search_term, optionally

s indicated by the presence of a URL query ‘q_<additional key="">’ (where
parameter. Collected by default via enhanced <additional key=""> matches an
measurement. additional query parameter you
specify to be collected under
advanced settings)

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 46

 Automatically Events Categories for Web (cont.)
Event Automatically triggered... Parameters
first_visit The first time a user visits a website with
Analytics enabled.

session_start When a user engages the website.

page_view Each time the page loads or the browser history page_location (page URL),
state is changed by the active site. page_referrer (previous page
Collected by default via enhanced URL), engagement_time_msec
measurement.

scroll The first time a user reaches the bottom of engagement_time_msec

each page (i.e., when a 90% vertical depth
becomes visible). Collected by default
via enhanced measurement.

user_engagement When the webpage is in focus for at least one engagement_time_msec

second.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 47
 Automatically Events Categories for Web (cont.)
Event Automatically triggered... Parameters
video_start When the video starts playing. video_current_time,
For embedded YouTube videos. Collected by video_duration, video_percent,
default via enhanced measurement. video_provider, video_title,
video_url, visible (boolean)

video_progress When the video progresses past 10%, 25%, video_current_time,

50%, and 75% duration time. video_duration, video_percent,
For embedded YouTube videos. Collected by video_provider, video_title,
default via enhanced measurement. video_url, visible (boolean)

video_complete When the video ends. video_current_time,

For embedded YouTube videos. Collected by video_duration, video_percent,
default via enhanced measurement. video_provider, video_title,
video_url, visible (boolean)

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 48

Enhanced Measurement
Events
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 What is Enhanced Measurement
• A feature in GA4 that allows you to automatically collect data about the actions
people take on your website.
• By enabling this feature, you can collect more insights into how people engage with
your web content. And the best part – no code changes are required.
• Enhanced measurement events are collected only for websites (web stream).
• Page Views: Each time the page loads or the browser history state is changed by the active
site
• Scrolls: The first time a user reaches the bottom of each page (i.e., when a 90% vertical
depth becomes visible).
• Outbound Clicks: Each time a user clicks a link that leads away from the current domain.
• Site Search: Each time a user is presented with a search results page, as indicated by the
presence of a query parameter in the URL like “q”, “s”, “search”, or “query.”
• Video Engagement: User starts to view a video, progresses past predefined percentages
(10%, 25%, 50% and 75%), and reaches the end of the video.
• File Downloads: This event is triggered when a user clicks on a link that contains a file
extension including .ppt, .pptx, .doc, .docx, .pdf, .xls, .xlsx, .csv, .zip, .mp3, .mp4.
• Form Interaction: The first time a user interacts with a form in a session, or when the user
submits a form.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 50
 Step 01. Select Your Data Stream
• Navigate to “Admin” > “Property Settings” > “Data Collection & Modification” > “Data
Streams.”

Choose your data stream.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 51

 Step 02. Enable Enhanced Measurement
• Under “Enhanced Measurement”, turn on the switch to enable all options.
• Click “Settings” icon to edit individual options later if necessary.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 52

 Step 03. Configure Enhanced Measurement
• Depending on what you want to see in
your reports, you can turn these
automatic events on or off.

• Other than page view events (that

cannot be disabled), you can enable or
disable each of the other events
individually by clicking on the toggle
buttons.

• E.g., if you don’t want to track scroll

depth on your website, then you can
turn that automatic event off for your
data stream.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 53

Recommended Events
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
For All Properties
Event Trigger when
ad_impression a user sees an ad impression, for app only
earn_virtual_currency a user earns virtual currency (coins, gems, tokens, etc.)
join_group a user joins a group to measure the popularity of each group
login a user logs in
purchase a user completes a purchase
refund a user receives a refund
search a user searches your content
select_content a user selects content
share a user shares content
sign_up a user signs up to measure the popularity of each sign-up method
spend_virtual_currency a user spends virtual currency (coins, gems, tokens, etc.)
tutorial_begin a user begins a tutorial
tutorial_complete a user completes a tutorial

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 55

For Retail, Ecommerce, Education, Real Estate, Travel
Event Trigger when

add_payment_info a user submits their payment information

add_shipping_info a user submits their shipping information
add_to_cart a user adds items to cart
add_to_wishlist a user adds items to a wishlist
begin_checkout a user begins checkout
generate_lead a user submits a form or a request for information
purchase a user completes a purchase
refund a user receives a refund
remove_from_cart a user removes items from a cart
select_item a user selects an item from a list
select_promotion a user selects a promotion
view_cart a user views their cart
view_item a user views an item
view_item_list a user sees a list of items/offerings
view_promotion a user sees a promotion 56
For Games
Event Trigger when
earn_virtual_currency a user earns virtual currency (coins, gems, tokens, etc.)
join_group a user joins a group to measure the popularity of each group
level_end a user completes a level in the game
level_start a user starts a new level in the game
level_up a user levels-up in the game
post_score a user posts their score
select_content a user selects content
spend_virtual_currency a user spends virtual currency (coins, gems, tokens, etc.)
tutorial_begin a user begins a tutorial
tutorial_complete a user completes a tutorial
unlock_achievement a user unlocks an achievement
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 57
GA4 Interface
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Main User Interface Report shows data for the last 28 days by default. You
can adjust the date range using the drop-down menu in
the top right of the report.
1

2 3

5 6 7 8
4

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 59

 Glossary of Main User Interface
1. Search Bar
• Search for reports and help content. Here you can search for analysis
questions directly, such as “how many new users this year.”

2. Navigation Menu
• Home – Surface information that's relevant to you based on your behaviour in
GA4.
• Reports – Reports Snapshot, Real-time, Life Cycle, and User.
• Explore – Gain deeper insights about your users and their journeys.
• Advertising – See your advertising performance at a glance.

3. Report Menu
• Reports Snapshot – Overview report of your GA4 account..
• Real-time – Monitor activity on your app or site as it happens.
• Life Cycle – Acquisition, Engagement, Monetization, and Retention.
• User – User Attributes, and Tech.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 60
 Glossary of Main User Interface (cont.)
4. Report Widgets
• Dashboard overview for each category has links to the rest of reports in the category.
• See different overviews of your data, and drill in to more detailed reports.
• Reports use either the dashboard or explorer template to display data.
5. Edit Comparison – Adapt reports based on dimensions, e.g. device category, or
country.
6. Share Reports – Reports can be shared or exported here.
7. Insights
• Predefined analysis questions (Machine Learning) on 6 categories, including “general
performance”, “demographic characteristics”, “statistics for user acquisition”, “traffic
analysis”, “technology” and “ecommerce.”
8. Customize Reports
• Create and edit reports to show the data most important to your business.
• Each property can have up to 200 custom reports.
9. Admin – Edit Account and Property.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 61
 Report Menu
• Start with a summary of your business that mirrors marketing
funnel of acquiring, engaging, monetizing, and retaining
users:
• Acquisition – Sources, mediums, and campaigns through
which you acquire users.
• Engagement – User engagement by events, pages, and
screens.
• Monetization – Buyer volume, and revenue by items,
promotions, & coupons.
• Retention – Retention by new and returning users, cohorts,
and lifetime value.
• In addition to a collection of reports that mirror the funnel,
Analytics also offers reports that cover:
• User Attributes – User volume by demographic dimension.
• Tech – User adoption of app releases and the technologies
used to engage your content.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 62
GA4 Home
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Home Page Interface 1 2
• Provide information that's relevant to
you based on your behavior in GA4.
• Use the Home page to monitor traffic,
navigate around Analytics, and get 3
insights about your websites and
mobile apps.
4
• Provide more personalized content as
you continue to use Analytics.
• If your property isn't receiving data yet,
you'll see a banner along the top with
instructions to create a data stream or
5
set up data collection.
• Once your property receives data, the
data appears in the Home page cards.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 64
 1. Overview
• Show metrics that are relevant to you with a trendline for each metric.
• GA4 updates the metrics in the overview card based on your behavior in GA4.
• E.g., if you regularly look at the Total revenue metric, GA4 adds a tab to the
overview card with how much revenue changed in the last 7 days.
• You can click the tab to see a trendline (solid line) with a data point for each day in
the last 7 days compared to data points for the previous 7 days (dashed line).

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 65

 2. Realtime & 3. Recently Viewed
• Realtime
• Show activity as it happens using data from the Realtime
report.
• Display the number of users in the last 30 minutes (per
minute) with up to 5 countries from which the activity
originates.

• Recently Viewed
• Provide links to parts of your GA4 account that you visited most recently.
• E.g., if you recently viewed the Admin page, the Home page includes a link to the Admin
page along with when you last visited the page.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 66

 4. Suggested for You
• Include cards that you view often, even if you haven't viewed them recently.
• E.g., GA4 displays a Sessions by Session Default Channel Group card if you
regularly view the card in the Traffic acquisition report.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 67

 5. Insights and Recommendations
• Insights: Show unusual changes, emerging trends, and other insights about site or app.
• E.g., seeing specific anomalies can help you more quickly identify changes in data that may
warrant further analysis and action.
• Click “Expand” icon to open an insight or “View all insights” to open all insights.

• Recommendations: Provide tailored suggestions to help you get the most useful and
accurate data and take advantage of new features as they become available.
• Google surfaces
recommendations by looking
at your property's history,
your settings, and trends
across GA4.
• You might not see any
recommendations if your
property recently started
running, but be sure to check
back again soon.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 68

Analytics Insights
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 What is Analytics Insights
• A set of features that uses Machine Learning and conditions you configure to help you
understand and act on your data.
• Detect unusual changes or emerging trends in your data and notifies you automatically,
on the Insights dashboard.

Click “Load more” to

see older insights.
Insights are retained
for 1 year after they
are generated.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 70

 Insights Dashboard
• Show the most recent automated and custom insights for your property. You can click the
cards to see full details.
• Every time you interact with an insight, Analytics Intelligence learns which ones you’re most
interested in and ranks your new insights accordingly.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 71

Reports Snapshot
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
Reports Snapshot
• First page you see after logging in to GA4.
• Summarizes key areas of your website:
traffic, engagement, key events, and
revenue into different summary cards
(widgets).
• Health monitor that check the page
periodically to see if everything is behaving
as expected.
• Starting point for deeper investigations of
your data.
• If you’re tracking metrics for mobile,
Firebase Analytics will provide similar stats
for your apps.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 73

Card Controls – Dimension / Metric Picker
• If a card has dimension or metric pickers across the top, you can click
those to change which data is displayed in the card.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 74

Card Controls – Link to Underlying Report
• Most cards use data from existing Analytics reports.
• To open associated report, click the link at the bottom of card.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 75

Card Controls – Date Range
• Some of the cards include an option to select different date ranges.
• The date ranges vary by data type.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 76

Realtime Reports
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
Realtime
• Let you monitor activity on your
website or app as it happens, and
how they behave once they're in the
conversion funnel:
• Number of users during the last 30
minutes (per minute).
• Users by source, medium, or
campaign: where your users are
coming from.
• Users or new users by audience:
who your users are.
• Users by page title or screen
name: which content they engage.
• Event count by event name: which
events they trigger.
• Key events by event name: which
key events they complete.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 78

Ways to Use Realtime
• Immediately and continuously monitor the effects that new campaigns and
site changes have on your traffic:
• See whether a one-day promotion is driving traffic to your site or app.
• Monitor the immediate effects on traffic from a blog post, a social media post,
or a paid ad.
• Monitor whether new and changed content on your site is affecting traffic.
• Verify that the tracking code is working on your site or app.

• Things to keep in mind

• App Data
• App data is batched to conserve battery life, so you may notice delays. Batching
typically occurs on the order of minutes.
• No Data
• If you don’t see any data in your Realtime report, it’s possible that there are no
active users.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 79

 Life Cycle Section

Acquisition Reports
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Acquisition Overview
• Dashboard overview of how you acquired users and sessions by medium / source /
campaign, and user activity by day / week /month.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 81

 User Acquisition – Acquiring New Users
• Get insights into how new users find your website or app for the first time.
• Differ from the Traffic acquisition report, which focuses on where new sessions came from, regardless of
whether the user is new or returning.
• First user primary channel group (Default Channel Group) as primary dimension – Indicate digital
channel by which users first arrived at your site/app.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 82

 User Acquisition – Metrics
1. Total Users – Number of unique users who triggered any event in the specified date range.
2. New Users – Number of users who interacted with your site or launched your app for the
first time.
3. Returning Users – Number of people who have visited your site or app before in the
specified date range.
4. Average Engagement Time per Active User – Average time that your website was in focus
in an active users (any user who has an engaged session) in specified date range.
5. Engaged Sessions per Active User – Average number of engaged sessions per active
user.
6. Event Count – Number of times an individual event was triggered, or the overall number of
events triggered.
7. Key Events – Number of times your users triggered a key event which is an event that
measures an action that's particularly important to the success of your business.
8. User Key Event Rate - Number of users who completed a key event action divided by the
total number of users yields this metric.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 83

 Primary Dimension – Default Channel Group
• Rule-based definitions of traffic sources that let you monitor the performance of all of
channels sending traffic to your website.
• Direct – Be the result of a user entering the URL into their web browser or using a
bookmark to directly access the webpage. If the medium is defined as “(none)” or
“(not set)”, the traffic will be considered as direct traffic.
• Organic Search – Define traffic coming from search engine like Google, or Yahoo.
• Paid Search – Traffic coming from PPC ads which appear on search engines.
• Organic Social – Traffic coming to your website or mobile app from social media
platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or LinkedIn.
• Paid Social – When users arrive on landing page using a link via a paid social
campaign like Facebook ad, such traffic will be attributed to “Paid Social.”
• Display – When a user clicks on display ads (GDN only) and lands on the webpage,
such traffic is attributed to “Display” channel.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 84
 Primary Dimension – Default Channel Group (cont.)
• Referral – Group the users coming from sources outside of search engine and
social media. When a user click a link on a website to navigate to a new webpage,
GA4 will track the link as “referral” to the new webpage.
• Affiliates – Traffic from affiliate marketing efforts. If you have a list of affiliates, you
can ask them to include affiliates definitions to tag your landing URLs.
• Organic Video – Traffic coming to your website or mobile app from video platforms
like Dailymotion, Disney+, Netflix, iQiyi, Vimeo, YouTube, and Youku.
• Paid Video – When a user clicks on paid video ads (GDN only) and lands on the
webpage, such traffic is attributed to “Paid Video.”
• Organic Shopping – Traffic coming to your website or mobile app from shopping
sites like Alibaba, Amazon, Ebay, Etsy, Shopify, and Yahoo Shopping.
• Paid Shopping – When users arrive on your landing page using a link via a
shopping ad campaign like Google Shopping and Amazon ads, such traffic will be
attributed to “Paid Shopping.”
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 85
 Traffic Acquisition – Re-engaging Existing Users
• Help you understand where your website and app visitors are coming from.
• Differ from the User acquisition report, which shows where new users come from.
• Session primary channel group (Default Channel Group) as primary dimension – Indicate
digital channel by which users arrived at your site/app when they initiated new sessions.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 86

Traffic Acquisition – Metrics
1. Sessions – A session is initiated when an app is opened in the foreground or when a webpage is
opened. There is no limit to how long a session can last. A session ends after 30 minutes of
inactivity on the part of the user.
2. Engaged Sessions – A session that lasts longer than 10 seconds, has a key events, or has at
least 2 pageviews or screenviews.
3. Engagement Rate – Percentage of sessions that were engaged sessions. (Engagement rate =
engaged sessions / total sessions).
4. Average Engagement Time per Session – Average time that your website was in focus in a
user's browser or an app was in the foreground of a user's device during each session.
5. Events per Session – Average number of events per session.
6. Event Count
7. Key Events
8. Session Key Event Rate – Number of sessions in which a significant event occurred divided by
the total number of sessions is how this metric is computed.
9. Total Revenue

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 87

 Engagement Rate vs Bounce Rate
• You can use the engagement rate and bounce rate metrics to measure engagement on
your website or app. Both metrics are defined in terms of engaged sessions.
• Engagement rate is the percentage of engaged sessions (i.e., lasts longer than 10 seconds,
has a key events, or has at least 2 pageviews or screenviews) on your website or app.
• Bounce rate is the percentage of sessions that were not engaged. Thus, bounce rate is the
opposite of the engagement rate.
• In other words, engagement rate helps you measure the percentage of visits to your
website or app that involved some form of meaningful engagement.
• Example:
• A user visits your website, reads some content for less than 10 seconds, did not trigger any
events or visit any other pages, and then leaves.
• Because this user did not match any of the criteria of an engaged session, the session
would not count as an engaged session.
• If this were the only session on your website, the engagement rate would be 0% and the
bounce rate would be 100%.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 88

 Pay Attention to Your Engagement Rate
• When your engagement rate is low, you should consider using reports in Google
Analytics to dig deeper to see whether it's uniformly low or whether it's the result of
certain channels, source/medium pairs, pages or screens, or something else.
• If a few pages or screens have a low engagement rate, see whether:
• the content correlates well with the marketing campaign you use to drive users to those
pages or screens; or
• those pages or screens offer users easy paths to the next steps you want them to take.

• If a certain channel has a low engagement rate, review your marketing efforts for that
channel. E.g., if users who come from display are bouncing, make sure your ads are
relevant to your site content.
• If the problem is more widespread:
• Take a look at your measurement code to be sure that all the necessary pages are tagged
and that they are tagged correctly.
• If you're collecting data from an app, make sure you've set up the Google Analytics for
Firebase SDK correctly.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 89
Traffic Acquisition – Switch to Session Source/Medium
• If you change the primary dimension from “Session Default Channel Grouping” to “Session
Source/Medium”, the report will show where users were before they arrived on your site or
app, such as paid search like “google / cpc”, or another site like “[Link] /
referral”.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 90

Create Comparison Report View
1. Click the “Add comparison” icon at the top of the page to edit the “Build comparison.”
2. For example, type ”Device category” into the “Dimension” field.
3. Select “mobile” from the “Dimension value” dropdown and hit “Apply.”

1
2

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 91

 Create Comparison Report View – Result
• Data of mobile users will be displayed side-by-side with all user data in the same report.
• Let you examine trends in your data across dimensions, e.g. device categories.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 92

UTM Campaign Tracking
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 What is UTM Campaign
• Sometimes traffic is lost because Google Analytics cannot accurately determine the
traffic source the user came from due to lack of detail.
• Examples:
• Email Traffic – You might look at your Traffic Acquisition report and expect to see email
traffic listed. Not there? Then it’s likely muddled in with your direct traffic, or it could be
coming through as referral traffic.
• Social Traffic – While you might see Facebook traffic coming through as a Social visit,
how do you know if this is through an organic or paid post link that you shared?
• By using a normal URL with Urchin Tracking Module (UTM) parameters appended to
the end, you can detect the traffic from email, or paid social campaigns.

• Try to use UTM campaign links when you are directing traffic to your website from an
outside channel like social media ads, non-Google PPC & display ads, native ads,
and email campaigns.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 94
[Link]
flights-from-hong-kong-to-sapporo?
utm_medium=DISPLAY&utm_source=GBL-
TEADS&utm_campaign=20230508-WW-
PROGRAMMATIC_PROSPECTING&utm_content=ALW
AYSON_PROSPECTING_SAPPORO&utm_term=V1_EN
&auctid=c924920c-5ed1-47a3-8c54-
5807115e51bd_bbebbc1f-df27-4249-a253-
af5a0eba0110&dclid=COeBzbXXn4oDFflYDwIdIwc5Vg

95
 Types of UTM Parameters – Must-haves
• Campaign Source – utm_source
• Identify ad network, website, or online publication that is sending traffic to your
property.
• E.g. “yahoo”, “facebook”, “email”, or “enewsletter”.

• Campaign Medium – utm_medium

• Indicate type of marketing medium the users clicked through from.
• Paid Social / Paid Search – “cpc”, “ppc”, or “paid”.
• Display Ad – “display”, “banner”, “expandable”, “interstitial”, or “cpm”.
• Email – “email”, “e-mail”, or "e_mail”.
• Affiliate – Affiliate

• Campaign Name – utm_campaign

• Indicate the campaign name, slogan, or promo code for a product.
• E.g. “january_boots_promo”, or “summer_crazy_sale_june_2024”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 96

 Types of UTM Parameters – Optional
• Campaign Term – utm_term
• Keyword parameter allows you to track which paid search term a website visitor
came from.
• If you're manually tagging non-Google paid search campaigns (e.g. Yahoo
search ads), you should use utm_term to specify the paid keyword.
• Campaign Content – utm_content
• Used to differentiate similar content, links, or buttons within the same ad.
• If you have 2 CTA links within the same e-newsletter, you can use utm_content
and set different values for each, so you can know which CTA link is more
effective.
• Or this can be used to indicate the display ad size, e.g. “medium_rectangle” vs
“leaderboard”.
• Note: Recommend to use transparent names and keep track of what campaigns
each value relates to.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 97
 Campaign URL Builder
1. Head to Campaign URL builder: ga-
[Link]/ga4/campaign-url-
builder/
2. Enter the URL of the page you want
to link to, then enter the values for the
parameters you want to track.
3. Scroll down to find the automatically
generated campaign URL.
4. Click “Copy URL” icon.
5. Paste your link into your e-newsletter
as CTA link or button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 98

Find UTM Campaigns in Traffic Acquisition Report
• When you navigate to “Acquisition” > “Traffic acquisition”, you'll see that report
organized by Users by “Session default channel grouping” by default.
• Change the primary dimension to “Session campaign” to see your data organized
according to “utm_campaign” (or “Session source” or “Session medium” to display your
data according to “utm_source” or “utm_medium.”)

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 99

 Use Case – E-newsletter with Multi-CTAs
1. [Link]/?
utm_source=enewsletter&utm_medium=email&u
tm_campaign=welcome-
email&utm_content=headerbutton

2. [Link]/?utm_source=enewsletter 1 2
&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=
welcome-email&utm_content=image

3. [Link]/?utm_source=enewsletter
&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign= 3
welcome-email&utm_content=footerbutton

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 100

 Use Case – Blog Post with Multi-CTAs
• utm_source e.g. “blog”, or “blog-post”
• utm_medium e.g. “cta”, or “url-feature”
• utm_campaign e.g. “link”, “button”, or “banner”
• utm_content e.g. “middle’ or “end”

.../ ?
utm_source=blog&utm_medium=cta&
utm_campaign=download-
banner&utm_content=end
.../?
utm_source=blog&utm_medium=cta&ut
m_campaign=download-
link&utm_content=middle

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 101

 Use Case – Social Media Campaigns
• Paid Social Traffic
• utm_source e.g., “facebook” or “[Link]”
• utm_medium e.g., “cpc”, “ppc”, or “paid”
• utm_campaign e.g., “spring-sale-2024”, or you can use the post title, or post ID.
• utm_content Use to differentiate between different images or captions for the ad.

• Influencer Campaign Traffic

• utm_source e.g., “facebook” or “instagram”
• utm_medum e.g. “influencer_x” or “influencer_y”
• utm_campaign e.g. “influencer_campaign_oct_2024”

• Messenger (Dark Social) Traffic

• utm_source e.g., “whatsapp”, “telegram”, or “signal”
• utm_medium e.g., “messenger” or “messaging_app”
• utm_campaign e.g., “summer-sale-2024”, or ”new_year_coupon_2024”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 102

 Use Case – Non-Google Search & Display Ad Campaigns
• Yahoo Paid Search Traffic
• utm_source e.g., “yahoo” or “[Link]”
• utm_medum e.g., “cpc”, “ppc”, or “paid”
• utm_campaign e.g., “iphone_case_promo_jan_2024”
• utm_term e.g., “iphone_15_pro_max_case”

• Non-Google Display Ad Traffic

• utm_source e.g., “[Link]” or “[Link]”
• utm_medium e.g., “display” or “banner”
• utm_campaign e.g., “spring-discount-offer-2024” or ”summer_collection_promo_2024”
• utm_content e.g., “medium-rectangle” or “leaderboard”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 103

 Life Cycle Section

Shorten
UTM Campaign Link
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Step 01. Head to Bitly Account
• Go to [Link] > Click on “Get Started for Free” button to create account.
• Click “Create New” (+) button, and then select “Link.”

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 105

 Step 02. Enter UTM Campaign Link
• Copy your UTM campaign link and paste it onto “Enter Long URL” field on right sidebar.
• Then, click “Create” button to generate a shortened link starting with [Link].
• Hit “Copy” icon to utilize it.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 106

 Life Cycle Section

Engagement Reports
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
Engagement Overview
• Dashboard overview of active
user engagement with your
business from the perspective
of:
• engagement time (session
duration);
• pages/screens;
• events (e.g., screens viewed
most often, events triggered
most often).

• An active user is someone

who has had at least 1
engaged session during the
date range that you’ve
selected.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 108
Engagement Overview – User Activity & Stickness
1. User Activity Over Time – Number of active users per 1/7/30 days.
2. User Stickiness – Ratios of active users per relative time periods.
• Daily active users (DAU) / Monthly active users (MAU)
• Daily active users (DAU) / Weekly active users (WAU)
• Weekly active users (WAU) / Monthly active users (MAU)

1 2

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 109

 Events
• Display events, and engagement and campaign metrics per event or screen.
• Event Name as primary dimension – Default or user-defined name of the event.

1 2 3 4

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 110

 Events – Metrics
1. Event Count
• Number of times your users triggered an event.
• An event is a user's specific action on your site, such as clicking a button,
playing a video, or submitting a form.
• By tracking events, you can gain insights into user behaviour and measure the
success of specific actions on your site.

2. Total Users – Number of users (count of unique ids) who triggered any
event.

3. Event Count per Active User – Average number of events triggered by

each active user.

4. Total Revenue

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 111

 Pages and Screens
• Show pages/screens, and engagement and campaign metrics (e.g., Event count, Screen
views per user, Engagement time, Key events, Revenue) per event or screen.
• Page Title and Screen Class as primary dimension – Web-page title & app screen class.
1 2 3 4 5 6 7

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 112

 Pages and Screens – Metrics
1. Views
• Number of mobile app screens or web pages your users saw.
• Repeated views of a single screen or page are counted.
2. Users
3. Views per Active User
• Average number of mobile app screens or web pages viewed per active user.
4. Average Engagement Time per Active User
5. Event Counts
6. Key Events
7. Total Revenue

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 113

Landing Page
• Show you the first page a visitor lands on when they visit your website, and identify which
pages are performing well and which ones need improvement.
• Landing Page as primary dimension – Page path and query string associated with the first
pageview in a session. 7
1 2 3 4 5 6

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 114

 Landing Page Metrics
1. Sessions
• Number of mobile app screens or web pages your users saw.
• Repeated views of a single screen or page are counted.
2. Active Users – Number of unique users who engaged with your site or app
and has an engaged session in the specified date range.

3. New Users.
4. Average Engagement Time per Session
5. Key Events
6. Total Revenue
7. Session Key Event Rate

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 115

 Life Cycle Section

Monetization Reports
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Monetization Overview
• Dashboard of e-commerce activity from perspective of revenue, purchases, items, coupons.

1 2 3 4 5

6 7 8 9

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 117

Monetization Overview – Metrics
1. Total Revenue – Show the total amount of revenue generated from ecommerce purchases, in-app
purchases, subscriptions, and advertisements, minus any refunds given.
2. Purchase Revenue – Show the total amount of revenue generated from ecommerce and in-app
purchases.
3. Total ad revenue – Show the sum of the advertising revenue from your users in your mobile app.
Total ad revenue comes from Google AdMob, Google Ad Manager, or the ad_impression event when
the data comes from a third-party integration.
4. Total Purchasers – Number of users that logged purchase events for the time period selected.
5. First Time Purchasers – Number of users that completed their first purchase event.
6. Average Purchase Revenue per User – Show the average amount of revenue generated from
purchases per user, where purchase revenue is the total amount of revenue generated from
ecommerce and in-app purchases.
7. Items Purchased by Item Name – Show the top most purchased items and the number of times the
items were purchased.
8. Items Purchased by Item List Name – Show the item lists associated with the most purchased items
and the number of times items were purchased from the lists.
9. Items Viewed in Promotion by Item Promotion Name – Show item promotions associated with the
most viewed items and the number of times items were viewed after seeing a promotion.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 118
E-commerce Purchases
• Show information about the products or services you sell on your e-commerce store.
• Data in the report comes from the recommended ecommerce events.
• Item name as primary dimension – The name of an item (e.g., a product you sell).

1 2 3 4

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 119

E-commerce Purchases – Metrics
1. Item Viewed – Number of times the item list was viewed.

2. Item Added to Cart – Number of times users added items to their shopping
carts.

3. Item Purchased – Number of units for a single item included in e-commerce

events.

4. Item Revenue –
• Total revenue from items only, excluding tax and shipping.
• Item revenue = price x quantity
• Price is the price parameter for an item in the items array.
• Quantity is the quantity parameter for an item in the items array.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 120

In-app Purchases
• Show information about the purchases made through your app. The event is triggered by
versions of your app that include the GA for Firebase SDK.
• Product ID as primary dimension – Product code of item sold.

1 2 3

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 121

In-app Purchase – Metrics
1. Quantity –
• The number of units purchased.

2. Product Revenue –
• Sum of revenue from purchases made on your website or app.
• Purchase revenue = purchases + in-app purchases + subscriptions - refund

3. Average Product Revenue

• The average purchase revenue over the specified time period (i.e., total product
revenue / number of products sold).
• Purchase revenue is the sum of revenue from purchases made on your website
or app.
• Purchase revenue = purchases + in-app purchases + subscriptions - refund

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 122

Publisher Ads
• Show you each advertisement you include in your app and the engagement and revenue
associated with each advertisement.
• Ad unit as primary dimension – The name you chose for an ad unit. When you integrate with
Google Ad Manager, this dimension represents Ad unit (all levels).

1 2 3 4

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 123

Publisher Ads – Metrics
1. Publisher Ad Impressions – Number of times users are shown an
advertisement.

2. Ad Unit Exposure – Time that a given ad unit was shown to a user (in
milliseconds).

3. Publisher Ad Clicks – Number of times an ad was clicked on the

publisher's site.

4. Total Ad Revenue – Sum of the advertising revenue for a user.

Note: The above metrics are populated automatically when you integrate with AdMob
or Google Ad Manager.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 124

Promotions
• Show the impact of each promotion on purchases and revenue. A promotion is a way of
encouraging users to buy a product through an incentive like discounts on products.
• Promotions are often advertised on a website's home page or in product catalogs.
• Item promotion name as primary dimension – The name you specify for a promotion.

1 2 3 4 5 6 7

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 125

Promotions – Metrics
1. Items Viewed in Promotion – Number of items viewed in a promotion.

2. Items Clicked in Promotion – Number of items clicked in a promotion.

3. Item Promotion Click Through Rate – Number of users who selected a

promotion divided by the number of users who viewed the same promotion.

4. Items Added to Cart – Number of items that were added to cart.

5. Items Checked Out – Number of items that were in the cart during
checkout.

6. Items Purchased – Number of items purchased.

7. Item Revenue

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 126

Purchase Journey
• Help you identify steps in your purchase funnel that need improvement. E.g., if users often drop off
between beginning checkout and purchasing, you might look into whether shipping costs are too high or
certain buttons or links don't work.
• Device category as default primary dimension – Type of device from which user activity originated.
1 2 3 4 5
B

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 127

Purchase Journey – Steps in the Funnel
1. Session Start – Number of users who triggered the session_start event.

2. View Product – Number of users who triggered the view_item event.

3. Add to Cart – Number of users who triggered the add_to_cart event.

4. Begin Checkout – Number of users who triggered the begin_checkout

event.

5. Purchase – Number of users who triggered the purchase or

in_app_purchase event.
• Note: The report uses a closed funnel. A closed funnel is a funnel that provides data for only
users who complete each step in the funnel. Users are only counted in the steps they
complete in the specified sequence. If a user misses a step, the user falls out of the funnel
and isn't counted in later steps.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 128
Purchase Journey – Metrics
A. Abandonment Rate
• Percentage of users who you retained between the current step and then next
step in a funnel.
• Appear below each bar that has a next step in the funnel.

B. Retention Rate
• Percentage of users who came from the previous step.
• Appear in the header of the next step.
• E.g., if 200 users begin a session (the current step) and only 140 users view a
product (the next step), then the retention rate above the next step would be
140 (or 70%).

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 129

Purchase Journey – Dimensions Options
• Device category – Type of device from which user activity originated.
Device categories include “desktop”, “mobile”, and “tablet”.

• Browser – Web browser from which user activity originated. Typical browsers
include “Chrome”, “Edge”, “Firefox”, “Opera”, and “Safari”.

• City – City from which user activity originated.

• Country – Country from which user activity originated.

• Language – The name of the language of a user's browser or device.

• Region – Geographic region from which activity originated.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 130

Checkout Journey
• Show the number and percentage of users who began checkout on your ecommerce website or app and
completed each of the subsequent steps in the checkout funnel.
• Device category as default primary dimension – Type of device from which user activity originated.

1 2 3 4 B

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 131

Checkout Journey - Where Data Comes From
• In order to see data in the Checkout journey report, you must implement the
ecommerce events in your store. These include:
1. begin_checkout, which populates the Begin checkout step;
2. add_shipping_info, which populates the Add shipping step;
3. add_payment_info, which populates the Add payment step;
4. purchase, which populates the Purchase step.

• This report can help you identify bottlenecks in the checkout process.
• E.g., if you notice a large drop off between the Add shipping and Add payment
steps, then you might look for issues during the shipping step, such as high
shipping costs or requiring users to login without an option to checkout as a
guest.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 132

Checkout Journey – How to Interpret Report
A. How Many Users Abandoned Each Step
• Abandonment rate is shown below each bar that has a next step in the funnel.
It shows the percentage of users you lost between the current step and the next
step in a funnel.
• E.g., if 200 users complete the first step and only 140 users complete the next
step, then the abandonment rate below the current step would be 60 (or 30%).
B. How Many Users were Retained After Each Step
• Retention rate is the inverse of abandonment rate. It refers to the percentage of
users who came from the previous step.
• The header of the next step shows the retention rate. In the previous example,
the header in the next step would be 70%.
• When you hover over a step in the report, you can see the number of users who
completed the current step. In the previous example, when you hover over the
current step, you will see 200 users and when you hover over the next step, you
will see 140 users.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 133

 Life Cycle Section

Retention Reports
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
Retention Overview
• User Retention is a key metric to measure the growth of digital products.
• Look at first-time users within a specific time frame (typically one week), and calculates the
percentage of those users that return in subsequent time periods.
• Show you how 1 2 3
frequently and
for how long
new users
engage with
your website or
app after their
first visit.
4 5 6

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1. New & Returning Users
• New users are users who visited your site or app for the first time.
• Returning users are users who have visited your website or app before.
• Google Analytics identifies users based on the reporting identity selected in
Admin.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 136

2. User Retention by Cohort
• Show how well your site or app retains users by cohort.

• A cohort is a collection of users who are grouped by some criteria. In the GA4
case, cohort is the day the user was acquired.

• Chart includes up to 3 lines, one for each cohort.

• The "Day 1", "Day 7" and "Day 30" lines show the average amount of time spent
on your site or app after 1, 7, and 30 days since they were first acquired.

• Example:
• 4 users visit your site on October 1.
• By October 2, 3 users return so the "Day 1" line on October 1 will be 75%.
• By October 8, 2 users return so the "Day 7" line on October 1 will be 50%.
• By October 31, 1 user returns so the "Day 30" line on October 1 will be 25%.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 137

2. User Retention by Cohort – Example
• Following chart shows that by August 30, 5.8% of users returned to the website, and
by September 5, 0% of users returned to the website.
• Data in this chart suggests that the website or app is not retaining users
successfully.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 138

3. User Engagement by Cohort
• Show the average amount of time users spend engaged on your site or app after they
were first acquired.
• Example:
• Following chart shows that by
August 29, users spent an
average of 1 minute and 47
seconds on the website.
• It also shows that by September
5, users average 0 minutes and
00 seconds on the website.
• Data in this graph suggests that
the website is not retaining users
successfully.
• If users found the website more
useful over time, you would see
an increase in engagement 7
days later.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 139
 4. User Retention
• Show the percentage of users who return each day in their first 42 days.
• Chart starts with 100% user retention when all users visit for the first time.
• It decreases from the first day as users drop off.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 140

 5. User Engagement
• Show the average engagement time of users who return in their first 42 days.
• GA4 includes only returning users in the average engagement time.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 141

 6. Lifetime Value
• Show the average revenue generated by new users over their first 120 days.
• Chart can help you determine how valuable users are based on the additional
revenue you generate.
• E.g., a user purchases a shirt and
then purchases pants the following
week. Lifetime value (LTV) includes
both purchases, indicating the overall
success of the acquisition.
• In general, the graph seems to be
leveling off.
• Re-engagement rate, churn rate, and
when users monetize all affect this
curve.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 142

 User Section

Technology Reports
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Tech Overview
• Dashboard of the different platforms, devices, browsers, operating systems, and app
versions by which users engage with your content.

1 2 3

4 5 6

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 144

Tech Overview Cards
1. Users by Platform – Percentage of overall users to your app or website by platform.
Example: web, iOS, or Android.
2. Users by Operating System – Oerating systems used by visitors to your app or website.
Includes mobile operating systems. Example: Android or iOS.
3. Users by Platform / Device Category – Platform and device on which your app or website
ran. Example: web / desktop, android / mobile, or ios / tablet.
4. Users by Browser – Show the break down of active users by the browser from which user
activity originated. Typical browsers include 'Chrome', 'Edge', 'Firefox', 'Internet Explorer',
'Opera', and 'Safari’.
5. Users by Device Category – Show the break down of active users by the device category,
which is the type of device from which user activity originated. Device categories include
'desktop', 'mobile', and 'tablet’.
6. Users by Screen Resolution – Show the break down of active users by the screen
resolution, which is the width and height (in pixels) of the screen from which user activity
originates. Examples include '1920x1080', '1440x900', and '1366x768'.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 145
 Tech Details
• Help you identify the technology people use to access your website or app, including their
web browser, screen resolution, app version, and operating system.
• Browser as the primary dimension - Web browser from which user activity originated.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 146

 Tech Details – Dimensions Options
• App Version – The mobile app's versionName (Android) or short bundle version (iOS).
• Browser – Web browser from which user activity originated. Typical browsers include
'Chrome', 'Edge', 'Firefox', 'Internet Explorer', 'Opera', and 'Safari’.
• Device Category – Type of device from which user activity originated. Device categories
include 'desktop', 'mobile', and 'tablet'.
• Device Model – The device model name (e.g., iPhone 15, Samsung S22).
• Operating System – Operating system used by visitors on your website or application (e.g.,
Android, Chrome OS, iOS, Windows)
• OS Version – Operating system version used by visitors on your website or application.
• OS with Version – Operating system and version used by visitors on your website or
application.
• Platform – Method by which users accessed your website or application. Platforms
include 'Android', 'iOS', and 'Web’.
• Platform / Device Category – Platform for the app or site and type of device.
• Screen Resolution – Width and height (in pixels) of the screen from which user activity
originates. Examples include '1920x1080', '1440x900', and '1366x768'.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 147
 User Section

User Attributes Reports

CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 User Attributes Overview
• Dashboard overview of user traffic to your business from the perspective of user
demographics (e.g., age, city, country, gender, interests, and language).
• Click the “Users” drop-down (in the top left of a card) to quickly switch between Users (all
users), New users, and Returning users – without changing contexts.

1 2 3 4

5 6 7

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 149

User Attributes Overview – Widgets
1. Users by Country - Show the top most common countries active users are visiting from
and the number of active users from each of those countries.

2. Users in Last 30 Minutes – Users in last 30 minutes shows activity as it happens using
data from the Realtime report. The first half of the card shows the total number of users in
the last 30 minutes and the number of users in the last 30 minutes per minute.

3. Users by Town/City – Show the top most common cities active users are visiting from and
the number of active users from each of those cities.

4. Users by Gender – Show the break down of active users by their genders.

5. Users by Interests – Show the break down of active users by their interests.

6. Users by Age – Show the break down of active users by their age brackets. Brackets
include '18-24', '25-34', '35-44', '45-54', '55-64', and '65+’.

7. Users by Language – Show the break down of active users by their languages.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 150

 Demographics Details
• Allow you to examine origin of your app & website traffic in a series of interactive charts.
• Country as the primary dimension. You can click on “Country” to switch to a different
dimension, like Region, Age, or Language.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 151

Demographics Details – Dimensions Options
• Age
• The age of the user by bracket (need to enable Google Signal).
• Brackets include '18-24', '25-34', '35-44', '45-54', '55-64', and '65+’.
• Town/City – Town or City from which user activity originated.
• Country – Country from which user activity originated.
• Gender – The gender of the user (need to enable Google Signal).
• Interests –
• The interests of the user (such as Arts & Entertainment, Games, Sports).
• Users can be counted in multiple interest categories (need to enable Google Signal).
• This is the same concept as affinity segments in Google Ads.
• Language – The name of the language of a user's browser or device (e.g., 'French’,
or 'English’).
• Region
• Geographic region from which activity originated.
• Google Analytics automatically derives location data from users' IP addresses.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 152
 Audiences
• Identify your most engaged and profitable audience – a set of users that share one or more
characteristics or behavioural patterns that you define.
• Audience as the primary dimension. Name of an audience that users belong to during the date range
selected.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 153

 Audiences – Prebuilt & Predictive Audiences
• For every property, GA4 automatically generates 2 audiences:
• All users – Users who have ever launched your app or visited your website.
• Purchasers – Users who have completed a purchase.

• If you are collecting the required types and amounts of data and GA4 is
generating predictive metrics for your property, then GA4 automatically
generates a set of predictive audiences:
• Likely 7-day churning purchasers
• Likely 7-day churning users
• Likely 7-day purchasers
• Likely first-time 7-day purchasers
• Predicted 28-day top spenders

• Users are automatically added to these audiences when they match the
audience definition. You can use these audiences for reporting or advertising
without having to do any audience building yourself.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 154
Enable
Google Signals
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
What is Google Signals
• An advertising reporting feature through which GA4 can collect cross-device data
from those website users who have signed in to one of their Google accounts (e.g.
Gmail, YouTube) and have turned on ad personalization.

• When you activate Google signals, these other Google Analytics features are also
implemented:
• Cross Platform Reporting – Connect data about devices and activities from different
sessions using Google-signals data, so you can get an understanding of user behavior
at each step of the conversion process, from initial contact to conversion and beyond.
• Demographics and Interests – Google Analytics collects additional information about
demographics and interests from Device Advertising IDs and from users who are signed
in to their Google accounts and who have turned on Ads Personalization.

• Note: Google signals is not enabled by default in GA4.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 156

 Step 01. Go to Admin Tab
• Navigate to “Admin” > Select “Property Settings” > Choose “Data Collection & Modification” >
Click “Data Collection”.
• Click on the “Google Advertising Features Policy” link and then go through the policy.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 157

Step 02. Go Through Google Ad Features Policy
• If you've enabled any Google Analytics Advertising features, you are required to
notify your visitors by disclosing the following information in your privacy policy:
• Google Analytics Advertising Features you've implemented.
• How you and third-party vendors use first-party cookies (such as the Google Analytics
cookie) or other first-party identifiers, and third-party cookies (such as Google
advertising cookies) or other third-party identifiers together.
• How visitors can opt-out of the Google Analytics Advertising Features you use, including
through Ads Settings, Ad Settings for mobile apps, or any other available means.
• Google also encourage you to point users to Google Analytics' currently available
opt-outs for the web.
• URL: [Link]/dlpage/gaoptout/
• Warning: If your company can not agree with the Google Advertising features policy,
then you should not activate Google Signals.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 158

Step 03. Enable Google Signals Data Collection
• If you agree with the Google Advertising Feature Policy, then turn on the
switch for enabling Google signals data collection.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 159

Step 04. Disable Include Google Signals in Reporting Identity
• If you've activated Google signals for your property, turn off Include Google Signals in
Reporting Identity to omit specific demographics and interest data from reports—specifically,
data from signed-in, consented users.
• This option is useful if your property uses the Blended or Observed reporting identity, as it
can help reduce the likelihood of data thresholding.
• Google Analytics will still collect Google signals data when this option is turned off, so you
can use the Google signals data in audiences and conversions, and share the data with
linked Google Ads accounts for remarketing and bid optimization.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 160

Step 05. Check it Out After 24 Hours
• After 24 hours have elapsed, navigate to User Attributes Overview report.
• If you can see users data by gender, interest, and age, then it means Google Signals data
has started flowing in your GA4 reports.
• Note: For your reports to include Google-signals data you need a monthly average of 500
users per day per property.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 161

Firebase Report
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
Firebase Overview
• Summarize key metrics about the apps you connect to Firebase, including data about your
app users and their behaviours.
• This report appears in the left navigation when you add the Google Analytics for Firebase
SDK to your application.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 163

User Activity
• User Activity Over Time
• Show the number of people who used your app in the past month (30 days), week (7
days), and day (1 day).
• See changes in activity over a shorter timeframe compared to changes over a broader
timeframe.
• Include only users who engaged with your app in the device foreground, where the
user_engagement event was logged.

• Users in Last 30 Minutes

• Show the number of people
who used your app in the last
30 minutes.
• Include the top 5 countries
from which activity originates in
the last 30 minutes.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 164

App Status
• Latest App Release Overview
• Show the status of the latest release of each version (e.g., Android, iOS) of
your app.
• You can select a version to open the dashboard, where you can see insights
about the app.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 165

App Performance
• App Stability Overview
• Show the percentage of crash-free users on
your app.
• Use data from Firebase Crashlytics.
• Exceptions logged on Android using
Firebase Crash Reporting’s report API are
counted as crashes.

• User Retention
• Measure how many users return to your
app after their first open.
• Show the percentage of users who return
each day in their first 42 days.
• Chart starts with 100% user retention when
all users visit for the first time.
• It decreases from the first day as users
drop off.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 166

Continued Use of App
• User Activity by Cohort
• Show whether users you
acquire on one date return at a
greater rate than users you
acquire on another date.
• Each row represents a cohort.
• Bottom row represents the
most recent cohort, while the
top row represents the earliest
cohort.
• Darker shading indicates that a
higher percentage of users in
the cohort returned.
• Shading becomes lighter as
fewer users return.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 167

User Behaviours
• Views by Page Title and Screen Class
• Shows the number of times users view
each screen by screen class.
• Screen class is the UIViewController or
Activity that is currently in focus.

• Event Count by Event Name

• Show the number of times each event
was triggered in the specified date
range and the percentage change from
the previous date range.

• Key Events by Event Name

• Display the number of times users
trigger each key event.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 168

App Monetization
• Revenue Overview
• Includes the 3 key metrics that summarize revenue from your mobile app.
• Purchase Revenue – Sum of revenue from purchases made on your app (= purchases + in-app
purchases + subscriptions – refund).
• Total Ad Revenue – Sum of the advertising revenue.
• Total Revenue – Total revenue from purchases, in-app purchases, subscriptions, & ad revenue (=
purchases + in-app purchases + subscriptions + ad revenue).

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 169

Key Events
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 What is Key Event
• Conversions are now called “key events” in Google Analytics. The term “conversion” now
aligns with how conversions are defined in Google Ads.
• Previously, important events that were marked as conversions in Google Analytics were
measured differently from how Google Ads conversions are measured, leading to
discrepancies ( 差異 ) between Google Ads and Analytics.
• From now on, events that measure actions that are important to the success of your business
are now called “key events” in GA. You can use the behavioural data from your key events to
improve the user experience across your websites and apps.
• If an event is important to your business's success, you can mark the event as a key event in
Google Analytics. After you mark the event as a key event, you can see how many users
perform the action and evaluate marketing performance across all channels that lead users to
perform the action.
• Example:
• When a user scrolls to 90% of the page, you know that the user has read through the page and
viewed the sign-up form.
• You can identify the 'scroll' event on the Key events page in Admin and then mark the event as a
key event, providing you with more enhanced behavioral reporting.
© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 171
 Enable Key Events
• Navigate to “Admin” > “Property Settings” > “Data Display” > “Events.”
• In the row for the event, turn on the switch in the “Mark as Key Event” column.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 172

 View Key Event
• Once you mark an event as a key event, it appears in “Key Events” table ( Go to
“Property Settings” > “Data Display” > “Key Events”).
• New key event may take up to 24 hours to appear in your reports.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 173

Create Custom Key Events
CERTIFICATE IN DIGITAL MARKETING
 Step 01. Create Custom Event
• GA4 will pick up some events, but it won’t find everything you need to complete your
GA4 configuration.

• E.g., thankyou page from a

contact form or a purchase
was not collected as an event,
so you need to create a
custom event in GA4 to start
collecting this data:
• Head to “Admin” > “Events”
• Click “Create Event” button
on “Existing Events” page.
• Hit “Create” button in
“Customized Events”
window.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 175

 Step 02. Configure Event Conditions
• Decide what your new custom event name will be and configure the conditions for
when to fire this custom event:
• Parameter: This is the referenced event.
• Operator: Define the condition to trigger the custom event.
• Value: The value of the parameter.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 176

 Step 03. Create Thankyou Page Event
• There are 2 ways to track your thankyou page from the available list of parameters in the
dropdown. One being the page title (page_title) and the other being the page URL
(page_location).
• Here I create a new event named “thank_you” with “page_location” parameter that “contains”
the URL of “[Link]/thank-you/”.
• Then, click on “Create” button to complete event creation.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 177

 Step 04. Create New Key Event
• To complete the set up, go to the “Admin” Tab > “Property Settings” > “Data Display”
> “Key Events”.
• Click “New Key Event” button.
• Input the new event name from the previous step and click “Save” button.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 178

 Step 05. Check New Key Event
• It will take 24 hours for new key event to populate in all events report. But, Realtime
Report can render the event hits minutes after testing. So, test your new event and
check “Realtime Overview” to ensure your configuration is correct.

Success! Start seeing new

event in “Key Event by
Event Name” card.

© Copyright 2024 by Larry Leung 179

Goodbye!
You have gained all the
knowledge, skills, and
wisdom you need in digital
life.
From now on, it’s all about
continuous self-
improvement.
Happy farewell!

Source: ShutterStock