Google Analytics 4 was announced as an event-based analytics tool during its launch, showing that events play an important role in Google Analytics 4. But what exactly are ‘events’? In this blog post, you’ll learn what Google events are, tips for good event tracking, and finally, how to set up events in Google Analytics 4.
What Are Google Analytics 4 Events
Events are users’ interactions with web page elements embedded in a website or mobile app. Google Analytics 4 tracks some events automatically, while there are others you must manually set to be tracked.
The good thing about GA4 is that most events are tracked automatically. Using Google’s Enhanced Measurement, GA4 automatically tracks basic user interactions, e.g., clicks, scrolls, site searches, and even file downloads when you create a new GA4 property.
The automatic or built-in event tracking in Enhanced Measurement doesn’t cover everything you need to track on your website, and that’s why you need to learn how to create and track events.
Google Analytics 4 has four categories of events. They are:
Automatically Collected Events
These events are automatically started and recorded when a user does a predefined activity. For example, when a user clicks an ad or visits a website for the first time, etc. You can set the actions that would trigger the automatically collected events.
Enhanced Measuring
Like the automatically collected events, the enhanced measuring events are automatically triggered and recorded when a user does a predefined activity; however, the events are only recorded when you have enabled enhanced measurement.
Some examples of enhanced measuring include the scroll event that’s triggered the first time a user scrolls 90% of the website.
Recommended Events
These are events recommended by Google, and you must implement them manually to record them. Google recommends events and parameters based on the business type. For example, Retail/ecommerce, Travel/Hotel, and Gaming.
Some recommended events include the add_to_cart event triggered when a user adds an item to the cart.
Custom Events
Custom events are the events that you create. It’s advisable to check and confirm that the enhanced measuring and recommended events don’t provide what you require before creating your custom event.
Tips for Good Event Tracking
Before creating and tracking events, you need to have a purpose for tracking. The following tips will help you have a clear idea of what you want to do with the data you collect.
Have a Clear Motive for the Events You Create
You should ensure that you have a good reason for the collection of every piece of data. This helps you minimize the accumulation of useless data. Remember, the more information you have, the more likely you will be overwhelmed and distracted by the amount of data.
When you have a clear motive for the events you create, you’re more likely to derive useful insights from the data.
Personalize Your Tracking
You should ensure that all your tracking is tailored to your site. There’s no need to track events that are popular on social media, yet they aren’t relevant to your site.
Have a Readable Setup
The final tip has to do with readability. Remember to create well-planned and reusable event names and parameters.
You can do this by creating a thought-out measurement framework that covers all user actions on the site and what actions are useful to track. These will help you when naming your events, and you’ll have an easy time understanding your data.
Once you’ve internalized the tips above, review your tracking setup and correct any errors you might have made.
If you havent started tracking events, read the following section about how you can easily start creating and tracking events with Google Analytics 4.
How to Create Events in GA 4
Sign in to your Google Analytics as an administrator and move your cursor to the upper left side of the Google Analytics page, navigate to EVENTS and click All events.
GA4 will show you all events that are running. You might not see any event if it’s your first time opening GA4. But dont worry; to create a new event, click on Create event.
Then click Create.
Afterward, give your custom event a name (that conforms to Event naming rules) and add conditions that will trigger the event, then click Create.
That’s it; you have created a new event.
Create Events and Get More Insights
In this blog post, you’ve learned about the events in Google Analytics 4. You can use them to track metrics and later use the data to get valuable insights for your website.
We hope you learnt something from this blog. You can now create events easily. Remember to check whether Google Analytics 4 automatically collects your desired data before creating a custom event.
Sagar T
Sagar, Vice President of Digital Analyst Team (DAT), brings over 15 years of digital media expertise, including 12 years dedicated to DAT's growth. Certified in Google Ads, Microsoft Ads, Google Analytics, and Marin, he excels in managing an annual budget of over $80 million. Sagar is renowned for his strategic acumen in digital marketing, exceptional budget management, and his ability to drive significant industry results.