As a advertising and marketing specialist who has gone by means of the transition from Common Analytics to Google Analytics 4 on numerous tasks, I can confidently say that no platform migration has divided the advertising and marketing neighborhood fairly like GA4.
5 years after the preliminary launch of GA4 in October 2020, and greater than a 12 months for the reason that full Common Analytics shutdown, it’s time for an trustworthy evaluation of the place we stand with Google’s flagship analytics platform.
The Nice Migration: A Bumpy Highway To The Future
When Google introduced in March 2022 that Common Analytics would cease processing information by July 2023, the advertising and marketing world was in shock. The brief window between the announcement and the sundown date caught many entrepreneurs off guard, inflicting delicate panic amongst corporations and web site homeowners.
What adopted was some of the contentious platform migrations in digital advertising and marketing historical past.
Beginning July 1, 2023, normal Common Analytics properties stopped processing hits, with Common Analytics 360 properties receiving a one-time processing extension ending on July 1, 2024.
For many people who had spent over a decade mastering Common Analytics, this wasn’t only a platform change; it was the top of an period.
The elemental shift from UA’s session-based mannequin to GA4’s event-based structure represented greater than a technical improve. It was a whole reimagining of how we measure and perceive consumer conduct.
Whereas Google positioned this as future-proofing for a privacy-first, cross-device world, the truth on the bottom was far tougher.
The Promise Vs. The Actuality
Google’s advertising and marketing pitch for GA4 was compelling: enhanced consumer journey monitoring, privacy-compliant measurement, superior machine studying, and extra intuitive reporting.
As somebody who eagerly adopted GA4 early, I used to be enthusiastic about these prospects. Nevertheless, the execution has been a blended bag at greatest.
The Person Expertise Disaster
Maybe an important criticism of GA4 has been its consumer interface, with widespread damaging suggestions from the advertising and marketing neighborhood.
The interface complaints aren’t nearly aesthetics; they’re about productiveness. Duties that took two clicks in Common Analytics now require six or extra steps in GA4. Filtering for a single web page, one thing entrepreneurs do dozens of occasions each day, has grow to be an train in frustration.
Knowledge Reliability Issues
Past usability points, GA4 has struggled with information reliability issues that strike on the coronary heart of promoting decision-making.
In line with Piwik PRO’s evaluation, conversion monitoring discrepancies, inaccurate site visitors stories, integration issues with Google Adverts, and discrepancies between GA4 information and BigQuery exports have been persistent points since launch.
These aren’t minor technical glitches; they’re basic issues that have an effect on how we measure marketing campaign efficiency and allocate advertising and marketing budgets.
The shift from UA’s goal-based conversion monitoring to GA4’s event-based system has created confusion round what we’re truly measuring, notably when evaluating year-over-year efficiency.
Indicators Of Progress: Current Enhancements
To Google’s credit score, it hasn’t ignored the criticism. The previous 12 months has seen a number of significant updates that handle a number of the most urgent considerations.
Google Analytics has launched a Generated Insights characteristic that summarizes developments and adjustments in information, serving to customers make faster choices. These insights are displayed on the prime of element stories and embrace motion buttons for report modifications. This AI-powered evaluation is genuinely useful for figuring out patterns which may in any other case be missed.
The addition of Anomaly Detection intimately stories routinely flags any sudden spikes or dips in your information, represented as circles in your charts. For busy entrepreneurs juggling a number of campaigns, this proactive method to information monitoring is a welcome enchancment.
Maybe most importantly for businesses and enterprises, as of March 2025, GA4 lastly helps the flexibility to copy stories and explorations from one property to a different. For those who’ve ever needed to manually rebuild the identical customized stories throughout a number of shopper accounts, you’ll recognize how a lot time this protects.
The Broader Influence On Advertising Analytics
The GA4 transition has compelled your complete advertising and marketing analytics panorama to evolve. Present information exhibits that over 15 million web sites use GA4, making it the de facto normal for net analytics no matter particular person opinions in regards to the platform.
Screenshot from developments.builtwith.com, August 2025Wanting into historic Common adoption, greater than 21 million web sites used Common Analytics, which leaves a spot to be crammed. So, regardless of GA4 main the analytics trade, it nonetheless has an extended method to attain the previous adoption charge, which creates some kind of vacuum.
This shift has had a number of unintended penalties. Many organizations have diversified their analytics stack, supplementing GA4 with specialised instruments that fill particular gaps. There may be an elevated curiosity in options like Matomo for privacy-focused measurement and extra subtle attribution modeling platforms for enterprise customers.
The emphasis on first-party information assortment has additionally intensified. With the top of third-party cookies and stricter consent guidelines, web site information protection will lower, limiting your leverage.
First-party information will grow to be much more essential than ever. This has pushed advertising and marketing groups to grow to be extra strategic about information assortment and buyer relationship constructing.
Sensible Suggestions For Advertising Groups
After 5 years of working with GA4, right here’s my recommendation for advertising and marketing groups scuffling with the transition:
Make investments In Schooling
The educational curve has been steep, however unavoidable.
As former Google Analytics group member Krista Seiden correctly famous:
“The one method to be taught a brand new software is to dive in and truly get your ft moist.” Funds time and sources for correct coaching.
Focus On Developments, Not Absolutes
When evaluating year-over-year efficiency, give attention to developments and seasonality moderately than absolute numbers. GA4’s totally different measurement methodology means precise numerical comparisons with UA information are largely meaningless.
Complement Strategically
Don’t attempt to make GA4 do every part. Determine particular gaps in your analytics wants and fill them with specialised instruments.
Many profitable advertising and marketing groups now use GA4 as their basis whereas leveraging extra platforms for detailed attribution, buyer journey mapping, or real-time optimization.
Embrace The Occasion-Primarily based Mannequin
Fairly than combating GA4’s event-based construction, lean into it. Google recommends implementing new logic that is sensible within the event-based context moderately than merely copying over current occasion logic from UA. This method will yield higher insights in the long term.
Wanting Ahead
Cookie deprecation and enhanced privateness laws imply that options like enhanced conversions, consent mode V2, and offline conversion monitoring are actually vital moderately than nice-to-haves. GA4, regardless of its flaws, is best positioned for this privacy-first future than Common Analytics ever was.
The platform will undoubtedly proceed enhancing. Google has proven responsiveness to consumer suggestions, and the current updates reveal a dedication to addressing essentially the most urgent usability considerations. Nevertheless, entrepreneurs ought to anticipate GA4 to stay extra complicated and technical than its predecessor.
The Backside Line
5 years after its launch, GA4 represents each the promise and peril of contemporary advertising and marketing analytics. It gives capabilities that Common Analytics couldn’t match: cross-platform monitoring, privateness compliance, and AI-powered insights. But, it additionally calls for a stage of technical sophistication that many advertising and marketing groups battle to attain.
The compelled migration was undoubtedly painful, and the criticism of GA4’s usability is essentially justified. Nevertheless, the platform is right here to remain, and combating that actuality serves nobody. The organizations that may thrive are those who put money into correct GA4 implementation, complement it strategically with different instruments, and adapt their processes to work with moderately than in opposition to its event-based philosophy.
As entrepreneurs, we’ve weathered platform adjustments earlier than, and we’ll climate this one, too. The hot button is approaching GA4 not as a alternative for Common Analytics, however as a basically totally different software for a basically totally different digital panorama. As soon as we make that psychological shift, GA4 turns into much less irritating and extra highly effective.
The way forward for advertising and marketing analytics is privacy-first, cross-platform, and AI-enhanced. GA4, for all its present limitations, is our greatest free gateway to that future. It’s time to cease mourning Common Analytics and begin mastering what comes subsequent.
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