IP Address Collection in GA4 

To align with the most up-to-date data privacy laws, IP addresses are not stored in GA4. IP anonymization is automatically turned on in Google Analytics 4 and can’t be changed.  

However, despite the IP anonymization features of GA4, you can still block specific IP addresses from internal traffic. Blocking an IP address will not allow any website actions from a user to show up in GA4. 

The Steps 

There are several ways you can exclude an IP address. The method below details how to block an IP address using the settings within GA4. 

Part 1: Define Internal Traffic 

1. Admin > Data streams > Click on the data stream for your website

2. Configure tag settings > Show more > Define internal traffic 

3. Create >  Fill out all the fields in the Configuration window > Create

Fields to complete include the following: 

Rule Name: [any unique name you want to use to define the IP address you are excluding] 

• traffic_type value: internal 

• Match type: IP address equals 
  • Use IP address matches regex if filtering multiple IP addresses 
• Value: [the IP address number] 
  • You can use a site like What is my IP address to find your IP address number. 
  • You can string multiple IP addresses together in the value box by creating a regular expression. If you are not a regex expert, you can ask ChatGPT to combine multiple IP addresses together as a regular expression. 

Part 2: Create a Data Filter 

Now that you have defined what internal traffic should be excluded, you want to follow the steps below to create a data filter so this internal traffic is actually blocked. 

1.Admin > Data filters > Create filter 

2. Internal Traffic > Fill out the Filter details > Create 

Fields to Complete include the following: 

1. Data filter name: [any unique name to define the filter] 
2. Filter Operation: Exclude 
3. Parameter Value: [whatever value you put for traffic_type value in Part 1] 
4. Filter State: Active 

Conclusion 

After following the above steps, you should notice a drop in the number of users in GA4, which indicates that you correctly blocked the IP addresses. Excluding IP addresses gives you the freedom to open and click on websites all you want without worrying about messing up data integrity. 

How to Exclude IP Addresses in Google Analytics 4 is an original blog post first published on Go Fish Digital.

This post will explore the four categories of CRO tools, the step-by-step process for implementing a CRO program, and an analysis of the popular CRO tools. Applying the recommendations in this post can help you effectively use the capabilities of CRO tools.

Understanding CRO and Its Importance

Conversion Rate Optimization refers to increasing the number of website visitors who complete an action on your site. Whether that action might be making a purchase, submitting a form, or signing up for a newsletter, implementing CRO gives you the competitive edge. CRO allows you to understand the user experience on your site and identify reasons why users might not be converting. 

The key to success in CRO is leveraging the power of Conversion Rate Optimization tools. CRO tools collect data about your website and its users, enabling you to identify and test opportunities to increase conversion rates. Using CRO tools effectively can turn your website visitors into loyal customers. 

The Four Pillars of CRO Tools

CRO tools fall into four categories: 

• Web analytics tools
• Behavior analytics tools
• CRO testing tools
• Lead capture tools

Web Analytics Tools: 

Web analytics tools collect information, such as user demographics, traffic sources, webpage performance, and key engagement metrics like conversion rate. The data from these website analytics tools assist in the Conversion Rate Optimization process.

They allow a CRO specialist to identify the web pages experiencing low conversion rates. The tools also provide insight into your target audience’s interests, which can help guide the CRO strategies you create.

Trending website analytics tools include Google Analytics 4, Semrush, and Adobe Analytics. 

Behavior Analytics Tools:

Behavior analytics tools focus on user behavior and engagements on a site. They can help you identify common user patterns on your site, such as places where users encounter difficulties. Heatmap tools are a great way to understand the user journey on your site.

Using a heatmap tool like Hotjar, Crazy Egg, or Microsoft Clarity, you can learn where the most popular and least popular clicks occur, see how far users are scrolling on your website, and identify where dead clicks happen. 

All of this information can be instrumental in the CRO process as you can identify the best places to put calls to action and fix the roadblocks stopping users from converting. 

CRO Testing Tools: 

CRO testing tools allow you to discover the versions of your site that will lead to the most conversions. You can run an A/B test to compare the performance of two web pages. 

Webpage A is the original webpage, and webpage B is the new version of the page that is tested and evaluated to see if it performs better or worse.

A/B testing tools like VWO, Crazy Egg, and AB Tasty can help you identify conversion obstacles and determine the site setup that will convert the most.

Lead Capture Tools: 

Lead capture tools help you collect information about potential customers interested in your services. These tools use methods such as pop-up forms to gather leads and information about customers. You can use lead capture tools to determine which interested customers are most likely to convert and who you should focus on targeting. Popular lead capture tools include OptinMonster, Hello Bar, and Leadpages.

Step-by-Step Guide to Implementing a CRO Program

Here at Go Fish Digital, we developed a step-by-step process for implementing a CRO program. 

Step 1: Identify Factors Driving Visitors

The first step in finding the best CRO program for your business is to identify why users visit your site. Ask yourself: are there certain pages or sections of your site that users are drawn to?

Understanding user intent for your website can help facilitate CRO. Using the tools mentioned in the four pillars section, you can make website changes, such as strategically placing CTAs or optimizing a popular landing page, that will ultimately lead to conversions.

Step 2: Pinpoint Conversion Hindrances

You can use CRO tools such as heatmap and session recording tools to see the places during a user’s site journey where a user faces a hurdle in converting and decides to leave the site. 

You will likely start to see similar patterns where users are getting stuck, and you can develop improvements based on these patterns to increase conversions. 

Step 3: Discovering Persuasive Factors 

Since CRO tools allow you to understand users’ interests and behaviors on your site, you can use this information to discover the most effective ways to increase conversions. Website analytics tools like GA4 can show you the places that receive the most and the fewest conversions. 

From there, you can compare the differences between the places getting the most and least conversions. With the help of tools like heatmaps and session recordings, you can further identify why certain places receive higher conversion rates. Based on these discoveries, you can implement strategies to compel users to convert in areas that previously received lower conversion rates.

Step 4:  Implementing and Testing Changes 

Now that you have identified the changes needed to increase conversions, you are ready to complete the final step of testing and implementing these adjustments. 

You can use A/B testing tools to experiment with these changes and determine if they will lead to improvements. If you find the changes are successful, you can implement and monitor these changes using the tools that fall under the four pillars.

Comparing the Popular CRO Tools

While the CRO industry includes a variety of CRO tool options, here are some of the most popular CRO tools available. 

Adobe Analytics 

Adobe Analytics is a multi-dimensional website analysis tool that tracks real-time data for your site. The conversion tracking features of Adobe Analytics allow you to monitor users’ journeys from when they first click to when they complete a conversion. Its attribution features can help you to identify where conversions are coming from. Adobe Analytics also conducts predictive analytics. By using machine learning to find patterns in user data, Adobe Analytics predicts future user behavior, such as the likelihood of completing a conversion. 

Hotjar

Hotjar is a user behavior analysis tool. Its session recording and heatmap features can identify website design changes to improve user site experience. The tool also offers conversion tracking features like funnels and dashboards to help you identify low conversion rate areas on your site. 

Crazy Egg

Crazy Egg is another helpful user behavior analysis tool that can improve your understanding of site engagement. Its heatmap features can help you identify the most and least popular places users engage with on your site. It also offers an A/B testing tool to help you determine the version of your site that will lead to the optimal conversion rate. 

FullStory

FullStory is a digital intelligence platform with tools to understand user interactions on a website. Its auto-capture technology allows you to gain a detailed analysis of how users interact with your site. FullStory can help you identify and solve usability issues on your site that will improve your optimization efforts.

Go Fish Digital’s Contribution to CRO

Go Fish Digital is here to help you in your CRO journey. Our agency offers CRO services that will turn your website visitors into loyal customers. Using the tools across all four pillars, we develop a personalized CRO strategy for your business. We identify the obstacles that prevent users from completing site conversions. 

We also optimize key landing pages by establishing credibility with your site visitors. After discovering possible changes to improve CRO, we use comprehensive A/B testing to ensure we make the most effective changes. Our CRO services can increase your customer base and give you a competitive advantage. You can request a custom CRO proposal with us today for more information.

Conclusion 

Conversion Rate Optimization tools allow you to unlock strategies for improving user experience and ultimately increasing the conversion rate on your website. 

To implement an effective CRO program, you can follow our 4-step process of identifying factors driving visitors to your site, pinpointing conversion hindrances, discovering persuasive factors leading to conversions, and implementing and testing these changes. 

Our CRO team’s expertise here at Go Fish Digital can help you navigate this CRO process and enhance your website to achieve optimal performance. 

The Best Conversion Rate Optimization Tools is an original blog post first published on Go Fish Digital.

Step 1: Enable Enhanced Measurement 

The first step is to make sure you have enhanced measurement turned on. This setting will likely already be on; however, you can check this by going to Admin > Data collection and modification > Data streams > Click on the data stream for your website. 

You should then see a window called Web stream details. There, you can confirm that the enhanced measurement field is on. 

Step 2: Turn on Site Search and Add Search Term Parameters 

While you are in the Enhanced measurement panel, click on the gear icon. 

A pop-up window labeled Enhanced measurement will appear, and you will see a section called Site search. Ensure Site search is enabled and then click on Show advanced settings.

You will see a section called Search Term Query Parameter. Filling out this field will allow you to identify when a site search has occurred. GA4 already includes the default parameters of q, s, search, query, and keyword in this field. However, you will want to add the specific parameter that comes before a search term in your site’s URL.  

To find out what this letter or sequence of letters is, go to the search box within your site and enter a word. Next, check the URL at the top of the page to see what comes before the word you searched. For example, the sequence of _sf_s appears before a search term on this particular webpage. 

So, I added _sf_s to the Search Term Query Parameter box. If one of the 5 default parameters appears before a search term on your site, there is no need to add that parameter again. 

Remember to hit Save after you make any updates to the Site search section!

Step 3: Create a Custom Dimension

Like you often do with other event parameters you create, the next step is to register an event parameter for site search as a custom dimension. Adding a site search parameter as a custom dimension is essential if you want to see specific search terms show up in your reports. 

To create this custom dimension, go to Admin > Custom definitions > Create custom dimension. 

In the custom dimension box, fill out the dimension name, set the scope to Event, add a description, and label the event parameter as search_term. 

You can choose any dimension name and description you want, but I recommend using names that clearly relate to the topic of site search. Make sure to hit Save when you finish filling out all the fields.

This custom dimension search_term is a recommended dimension according to GA4’s guidelines.

Step 4 (Optional but Helpful): Create an Exploration for Search Terms 

After ~24 hours, your site search term data should populate in GA4. An easy and effective way to view this data is to create a search term exploration. To do this, go to the Explore section of GA4. Then, click on the blank exploration template. 

Under the variables tab, click the ‘+’ button next to Dimensions. Next, import the Event Name and the Site Search Term dimension you created in Step 3 by checking the box next to these dimensions and clicking Import. Your dimensions should now appear in the Variables tab. 

Now, you will repeat those same steps, but this time for metrics. Go to the Metrics section of the Variables panel and click on the ‘+.’ Check the Event count metric in the pop-up window that appears, and then click Import.

At this point, you should have all the necessary dimensions and metrics to build your exploration. 

Navigate to the Settings panel in your exploration dashboard and set your visualization type to Table. 

Next, go to the Rows section and drag and drop the Site Search Term dimension into that section. I recommend changing the Show Rows value from the default 10 to a higher number like 100. That way, you can see more of your search term data grouped together. 

Now, go to the Values section in the Settings panel. Drag and drop the Event count metric you added in the Variables panel. To add some visual interest to your exploration, you can change the Cell Type to Bar chart.

After making these changes, you might notice a (not set) value appearing as your top result. To get rid of this value, you can set a filter. At the bottom of the Settings panel, click on the ‘+’ button below Filters and then click Event name. Under conditions, select exactly matches and then type in the event name of  view_search_results. Make sure to click Apply after you complete all the filter fields. 

The (not set) item should now be gone from your list, and you should see a finalized exploration for your site search terms. 

Conclusion 

Analyzing your site’s internal search term data allows you to understand better your audience and the topics users are interested in learning more about on your site. You can use this information to identify new content to add to your site that aligns with user’s popular searches. 

How To See Search Terms in Google Analytics 4 is an original blog post first published on Go Fish Digital.

You might find exporting data from GA4 into spreadsheets beneficial for…

• Using data visualization tools like Tableau
• Conducting more in-depth data analysis using programming languages like R
• Data integration with other data sources 
• Data archives and backing up data 
• Data sharing  

With GA4, transferring data from reports and explorations to a spreadsheet is easy. In order to export data, you must have admin or editor access to a GA4 account. 

How To Export Data from Google Analytics 4 Reports

At some point, while using GA4, you will likely want to export data from a Google Analytics 4 report to Excel. In this example, I will explain how to export data using the built-in features of GA4. 

However, this is not the only way to export your data. You can also export data through tools like an API connector or BigQuery. If you are interested in using the free export features of GA4, then you can follow the steps below. 

1. Select the Google Analytics 4 report you want to export data from 

    For this demo, I chose the Landing page report. 

2. Select a date range 

    I chose the month of July. 

3. Click on the Share this report button located in the top right              corner

4. Next, click on Download File and choose Download CSV 

5. Now you have a CSV export of your Google Analytics 4 report data 

    You can then import the CSV file into Excel, Google Sheets, or another spreadsheet tool. 

Limitations

There are some limitations when it comes to exporting data from reports in GA4. 

Limitations: 

• You can’t download data from multiple reports into the same file. You have to download the data in separate files. 
• You can’t export your data directly into Google Sheets. Your only options are a CSV file or a PDF download. 
• GA4 has an export limit of 5,000 rows. 
• You have to select a specific date range for the data you export.  

Exporting Data from Explorations 

In addition to exporting data from reports, GA4 also provides features for transporting data from an exploration. 

1. Open the exploration you want to export data from

You can refer to our GA4 for SEOs: 4 GA4 Explorations all SEOs Need blog post to get some ideas for possible explorations to export. 

2. Select the correct date range

3. Select the Export data button located in the top right corner 

4. Choose the format you would like to export your data into 

Google Sheets users will be happy to know that in an exploration, there is an option to transport data right into a Google Sheet and avoid the extra step of downloading a CSV file. However, non-Google Sheets users can still download the data as a CSV file.

Conclusion 

Despite sometimes being a pain to look at, spreadsheets can be helpful for storing GA4 data and connecting GA4 data to other sources. Whether you are Team Excel, Team Google Sheets, or Team Other, transferring data from GA4 to your desired spreadsheet platform is easy.

How To Export Google Analytics 4 Data To Excel is an original blog post first published on Go Fish Digital.

Custom audiences allow you to categorize users by dimensions, metrics, and events. With many ways to create subsets of users, you can track audiences relevant to your business and goals. 

Helpful Articles:

• Website Analytics Agency
• Google Analytics 4 Agency
• Conversion Rate Optimization Services

Adding a New Audience

The setup of custom audiences occurs in the Audiences section located in the Admin settings. GA4 allows you to create up to 100 custom audiences in one property. Audiences you create in GA4 can also be used when setting up campaigns in Google Ads, but that’s not all they’re for.

1. New audience → Create a custom audience

If you don’t want to start completely from scratch, you can also create audiences from GA4’s premade templates.

2. Name and briefly describe your audience  

If you are unsure what type of audience you want to create, you can return to this step after exploring the filter options. 

3. Establish the scope 

When setting up your custom audience, you can choose from three different scopes:

 Across all sessions, Within the same session, and Within the same event. 

The Across all sessions scope is the most inclusive scope and will account for user data across multiple sessions.

The Within the same session scope only collects user data for one session. And finally, the narrowest scope, Within the same event, only looks at user data from a single event. 

4. Select Add new condition, explore the events/dimensions/metrics you can filter your audience by, and then select the relevant condition. 

5. Add any parameters or additional conditions 

With one condition, your custom audience will likely be too broad. To narrow down your audience even more you can add parameters and additional conditions. 

 To add additional conditions, you can use the OR/AND functions. 

As you add additional parameters and conditions, be sure to monitor the summary box on the right side of the screen to see how much you are narrowing down your audience. 

6. Edit additional audience settings (optional) 

The audience builder defaults the time frame users stay in the audience to 30 days. A user will be removed from the                    audience if they do not meet the audience criteria again in the span of 30 days. The maximum membership duration allowed is 540 days. 

You can also add audience triggers. This feature allows you to trigger an event when users match the criteria of an audience.          For example, if your audience criteria is set to spend at least 5 minutes on a page, you can create a trigger that will record an event name of your choice every time a user spends 5 minutes or more on a page. 

The event is then available for you to access in all GA4 reports. 

7. Save your new audience

Another possible way to build an audience is through a sequence. This feature can be helpful if you want to analyze audiences that complete a specific order of actions. 

Setting up a sequence: 

1. Add sequence to include 

2. Add a condition/parameter 

3. Add step 

4. Decide if you want the step to directly or indirectly follow the previous step 

5. Continue adding the number of steps you want 

6. Save new audience 

Examples of Custom Google Analytics 4 Audiences 

Returning Users 

A key audience you likely want to track is returning users to your site. Understanding who comes back to your site can help you distinguish users with high interest in your company and discover which pages users often come back to. 

Steps for this audience: 

1. New audience → Create a custom audience

2. Name/describe the audience

3. Add new condition → session_start 

4. Add parameter → Event count

     a. Condition = greater than (>)

     b. Value =  1 

     c. Apply 

5. Add additional conditions/parameters 

If you want to get more detailed, you could add the name of a specific page you want to monitor returning users on. 

AND → Add new condition → page_view → page_title → Condition → exactly matches → (enter your page title name). 

6. Save your new audience  

High Page Views No Conversions 

An audience you might want to track is users who view multiple product pages on your website but do not complete a conversion. Analyzing this target audience can help you uncover common places where no conversions happen and allow you to discover new strategies for driving more conversions. 

Steps for this example:  

1. New audience → Create a custom audience 

2. Name/describe the audience 

 3. Add new condition → page_view 

 4. Add parameter → page_location → contains → ‘product’ 

5. Select AND 

6. Add new condition → page_view  

7. Add parameter → Event count  

                 a. Condition = greater than (>) 

                 b. Value = 3 

                 c. Apply 

8. Add a group to exclude 

a. Once you have your condition set up, you want to make sure you are excluding all user actions that are considered                              conversions. To do this you first select Add group to exclude.  

b. Then, you select Add new condition and search for the name of your conversion event

c. Next, select OR 

d. Repeat adding new conditions until all your conversion names are added to the exclude box. 

9. Save your new audience 

Cart Abandonments 

If your site is for an ecommerce business, cart abandonments is a key audience you will likely want to track.

1. New audience → Create a custom audience 

2. Name/describe the audience 

3. Add new condition → add_to_cart 

4. Add group to exclude 

5. Add new condition → Event name

6. Add parameter → Condition → exactly matches → ‘purchase’ 

7. Save new audience 

Audience Explorations 

Exploration reports are another great way to analyze the performance of audiences. Using an exploration such as Path exploration allows you to learn more about the user journey of your target audiences. 

Steps for adding audiences to your explorations: 

1. Explorations → Choose an exploration type 

                     I chose Path exploration.

2. Segments → ‘+’ button  

Segments are only available to use in explorations. If you want your audience to also be available to use in the standard report types, you can select Build an audience.

3. Create a custom segment → User segment 

4. Complete the steps for adding a new audience (as outlined above) 

5. Save and apply 

6. Add your segment in the Segment column to filter your exploration by your custom audience 

Audiences Report

At the beginning of August 2023, GA4 unveiled the Audiences report which can be found under User Attributes in the Reports section. 

This report is the hub for all your custom audiences. The Audiences report allows you to easily compare and evaluate the performance of your different audiences. 

You can also filter other standard report types by custom audience. For example, I could filter a Landing page report to just show landing pages of my custom audience. 

To do this, first open the Customize report tool (the pencil icon in the top right corner). Then, click Add filter → Dimension →  Audience Name →  exactly matches → (choose the name of a custom audience from the drop-down menu) → Apply. 

Conclusion

Using Google Analytics 4 audiences is an easy way to elevate your reporting. Based on audience analysis in GA4, you can develop audience-focused marketing strategies, improve the customer experience on your site, and personalize your content for your target audiences.  

A Guide To Google Analytics 4 Audiences is an original blog post first published on Go Fish Digital.

However, you will likely find the default dashboards in GA4 to be broad, cluttered, and lacking the relevant information you want to track. Setting up custom dashboards in GA4 can save you time and allow you to display your desired business insights.

Related Articles:

• Website Analytics Agency
• Google Analytics 4 Agency
• Conversion Rate Optimization Services

Getting Started

To make these custom dashboards, you can use the Customize report feature. This feature allows you to pick specific information you want to display and monitor in a dashboard by building filters. You can then save these filtered dashboards and add them to the navigation panel to make it easy for your team members to also view your customizations. In order to utilize the Customize report feature, you must have admin or editor access to GA4.  

Creating a Customized Dashboard 

To start, pick the dashboard you want to customize. For the following examples, I choose the Pages and screens dashboard. Then, click the Customize report button in the top right corner. 

Next, select the Add filter button. This button will direct you to the Build filter tool. In this tool, you can create up to 5 filters for your dashboard. As of August 2023, the Build filter tool now uses match types when filtering dimensions.

Longtime UA users will recognize the match types as they are finally brought over to GA4:

• Exactly matches
• Contains
• Begins with
• Ends with
• Matches regex
• Matches partial regex
• Does not exactly match
• Does not contain
• Does not begin with
• Does not end with
• Does not match regex
• Does not match partial regex

The following three examples demonstrate how to use the Build filter tool to make a dashboard that is right for you. 

Example 1: Filter by Subfolder

If your site includes a blog, a helpful custom dashboard to create would specifically display blog post performance. To set up this custom dashboard, I selected the filter dimension of Page path and screen class, set the match type to contains, and then entered ‘blog’ in the value box. 

After applying this filter, my dashboard was updated to display just the performance of blog pages. 

A possible circumstance you might come across when filtering by subfolder is filtering for multiple values. For example, I might want to filter for both blog and services pages. 

To achieve this, I first went back into the Build filter tool and chose the Page path and screen class dimension. I then selected the match type of matches regex. To look for blog or services pages, I used the regex of ^.*(blog|services).*$.  

In addition to adding filters, you can also remove or add metrics and dimensions. 

In the list of already added metrics, you will notice one of the metrics listed has an arrow. This metric is the primary metric. 

The default primary metric for my dashboard is Views. For my blog post report, Sessions makes more sense as the primary metric. To change the primary metric, I searched for my new metric Sessions in the drop-down menu called Add metric. 

Then, I dragged my new metric to the top of the list and clicked on the metric. You will know you completed this step correctly if the chart titles on your dashboard start with the name of your primary metric. In this case, my chart titles start with “Sessions by.” 

In this example, I also want to remove a metric. It does not make sense to include the Total revenue metric in my dashboard as the blog posts make no revenue. To remove this metric, I simply clicked the x next to Total revenue and applied the change to my dashboard. 

Saving Your Customized Dashboard

After making all your customizations, remember to save your work. You can either save all changes to the existing report or save them as a new report. The better option in most cases is to save your customized dashboard as a new report. This way you still have access to the original dashboard. All new reports can be found in the Library tab under Reports. 

Each report created can be added to a collection. GA4 automatically creates the Life cycle and User collections. To add your customized reports to an existing collection, first find the collection in the Library panel and click Edit collection. Then, you find the report you just customized by searching in the right-side menu. Once you find your report, you drag the report and add it to the collection panel. Remember to hit Save so your customized report will appear under the collection in the left sidebar navigation panel every time you open GA4. 

You can also add your customized reports to a new collection. After creating a new collection, make sure to publish the collection so your new collection and customized dashboards will appear in the navigation panel. 

Example 2: Audiences   

A likely dashboard you will want to create is one customized for a specific audience. If you already have created specific audiences in GA4, you can make audience-specific dashboards with the Customize report tool. If not, you can first create a custom audience under the Audiences section in Admin. 

Similar to the blog post example, you again use the Build filter option. For the filter dimension, I chose Audience name, for the match type I selected exactly matches, and for the value, I selected the premade audience my team created of people who viewed five or more pages in one site session. 

You might find that one or multiple of the default dashboard charts are not necessary and make your dashboard cluttered. For this example, I hid the line and bar chart visuals from the board in the Charts section of Customize report. 

Remember to follow the steps for saving your dashboard as listed above!

Example 3: Subdomains (AKA Views)

Another beneficial custom dashboard to create is one for a specific subdomain. Universal Analytics veterans remember the Views for separating subdomains. That, unfortunately, is not available in GA4 for non-360 users.

Websites often have subdomains for various sections, from blogs to careers. A possible first step for you would be getting a list of all your subdomains and analyzing which of your subdomains perform the best. 

You can do this by going to the Customize report tool, selecting Dimensions, and then searching for the Hostname dimension in the Add dimension box. Once you add Hostname to your dimensions list, click on the three dots next to Hostname and select Set as default. Your dashboard will then update to show a list of all your subdomains. 

After evaluating the overall performance of your subdomains, you might be curious to see more information about a specific subdomain. In this example, I want to know which pages perform best on the careers subdomain. 

To do this, I first set the default dimension to Page title and screen class. I then went to the Build filter tool and selected the Hostname dimension. Next, I chose a match type of exactly matches, selected the careers subdomain from the drop-down values menu, and hit Apply. I now have a dashboard specific to pages from the careers subdomain. 

Conclusion 

Creating custom dashboards in GA4 allows you to view the information most relevant to your interests and goals. By setting up custom dashboards, you no longer have to spend unnecessary time searching for specific insights every time you use GA4. 

With so many possibilities for filters, it may take time to find the best filters that work for your dashboard. Next time you open GA4, explore the custom dashboard options and find the setup that works best for you and your team. 

How to Customize a Google Analytics 4 Dashboard is an original blog post first published on Go Fish Digital.

Related Articles:

• Website Analytics Agency
• Google Analytics 4 Agency
• Conversion Rate Optimization Services

Setting Up Subdomain Tracking In Google Analytics 4

If you wanted to filter traffic by subdomain in UA, creating a View was the best way to do so. Google Analytics 4’s new way of tracking subdomains requires far fewer steps.

The essential step for collecting subdomain data in Google Analytics 4 is installing the tracking code of your GA4 property to all subdomains. There are a couple of ways to do this; either hardcoding it on your site or installing it with Google Tag Manager. Typically, you will use the same process you did to set it up on your primary domain.

For subdomain tracking to work properly, make sure you use the same GA4 property and data stream when connecting all your subdomains. 

If your subdomains have different Google Tag Manager (GTM) container codes, you can still track them in one GA4 account. You just have to ensure you connect all the GTM containers to the same GA4 Measurement ID. 

To verify that GA4 is tracking activity on your subdomains, you can use GA4’s debug view. 

Verification Steps: 

1. Open the preview mode of your site in GTM
2. Navigate to a subdomain while in preview mode 
3. Look for a page_view event to appear in debug view 

Finding Subdomain Data in Google Analytics 4 

After connecting GA4 to your subdomains, you are ready to find your subdomain data.

The dimension to remember when tracking subdomains in GA4 is Hostname. Any domain or subdomain with a GA4 tracking code is considered a Hostname. There is no need to add the Hostname dimension to GA4, as it is already available in all reports. 

To see data from your different subdomains, pick a report category first. 

Useful report categories for tracking subdomain data include Pages and screens, Traffic acquisition, and Landing page. For this example, I choose the Landing page report. 

After choosing your desired report, the next step is to click on the + found in the first column of your report’s table.

A pop-up window will appear where you can search for and apply that all-important Hostname dimension. 

I now see an updated dashboard showing me the different landing pages for both my primary domain and subdomains. 

Creating Google Analytics 4 Subdomain Reports

If you have multiple subdomains, creating filtered reports will make it easier to analyze data for each specific subdomain. You can choose to filter any of the standard report types found in the Reports section. For my filtered subdomain report, I will continue using the Landing page report I created in the previous section. 

The first step for creating a subdomain-specific report is clicking on the Add filter button at the top of your chosen report type.

Selecting the Add filter button brings you to the Build filter tool. In this tool, click the Select dimension drop-down menu and then search for Hostname. Next, click the Select match type drop-down menu and choose exactly matches. A Select dimension value drop-down menu should appear and you can select the specific subdomain you want to analyze (I choose the info. subdomain on my site). 

After clicking Apply, you will see an updated dashboard specific to your chosen subdomain. 

For future reference, make sure to save your report. By using the library feature, you can save and publish your reports to make them readily available. 

You can follow the saving instructions in our GA4 custom dashboards blog post. 

Conclusion 

Don’t let subdomain tracking become a daunting task. With the help of Google Analytics 4, you can efficiently set up subdomain tracking and create custom subdomain reports all in the same GA4 account. 

How To Track Subdomains In Google Analytics 4 is an original blog post first published on Go Fish Digital.