When UA was introduced in 2012, it had only been five years since the unveiling of the iPhone. Because e-commerce shopping and advertising were not yet the multi-platform experiences they are today, UA’s tracking was based on user sessions (most often via web browser) and used third-party cookie data to measure key data points such as conversion and attribution.
GA4 is the most recent version of Google Analytics. Today, as customers move between email, web, and social media apps on their phones as well as browsing and communicating on computers, all with an expectation of privacy, it’s important that tracking captures each event in a customer’s journey. GA4 collects event-based data across platforms, assigning different categories to these events to better understand and analyze a customer’s activities and interactions with your brand. GA4 was designed with built-in compliance to GDPR, CCPA, and other regulatory developments, including the requirement that IP addresses must no longer be tracked.
GA4 is an analytics tool built for the cookieless future that allows you to monitor web, mobile, and app analytics on a single dashboard. With a more in-depth integration system and audience list, users are afforded a robust understanding of the customer journey as well as more informed ads targeting. GA4 uses advanced machine learning for customer tracking across platforms and devices, with conversion modeling offering knowledge where the loss of third-party cookie tracking leaves holes. GA4 automates certain customer behavior insights, such as showing how changes in new customers’ activity connects to a rise in demand for a certain category.