Google Analytics 4 recommended events for enhanced tracking

Google has a comprehensive list of recommended events for Google Analytics 4 (GA4) users. This development aims to enhance data collection and reporting capabilities across various business verticals. The new event recommendations cover a wide range of user interactions, from e-commerce transactions to gaming achievements, providing businesses with more granular insights into user behavior.

According to the official GA4 documentation, these recommended events are designed to help website and mobile app owners measure additional features and behaviors, as well as generate more useful reports. Unlike automatically collected events, these recommended events require manual implementation but offer more detailed and contextual data.

The introduction of these recommended events comes as part of Google's ongoing efforts to improve its analytics offerings in response to evolving digital landscapes and user privacy concerns. By providing a standardized set of events, Google aims to create a more unified data collection framework that can benefit businesses across different industries.

One of the key advantages of implementing these recommended events is the automatic update of predefined dimensions and metrics in GA4 reports. This feature allows businesses to analyze data more effectively without the need for extensive custom configurations. Additionally, Google suggests that using these prescribed events will position users to benefit from future features and integrations as they become available.

The recommended events are categorized into several groups, catering to different business needs and verticals. For all properties, regardless of the industry, Google recommends a set of universal events. These include actions such as "ad_impression" for mobile apps, "earn_virtual_currency" for platforms with virtual economies, "generate_lead" for lead generation, "login" for user authentication, and "purchase" for completed transactions.

E-commerce businesses stand to gain significantly from the new recommended events. The list includes detailed tracking options for the entire customer journey, from product views to checkout completion. Events such as "add_to_cart," "begin_checkout," "add_payment_info," and "add_shipping_info" allow online retailers to gain deeper insights into shopping behavior and potential pain points in the conversion funnel.

For businesses focused on lead generation, GA4 now offers a more comprehensive set of events to track the full lead generation funnel, including both online and offline activities. This is particularly valuable for B2B companies, automotive sales, and insurance providers. The recommended events in this category include "generate_lead," "qualify_lead," "disqualify_lead," "working_lead," "close_convert_lead," and "close_unconvert_lead." These events enable businesses to track the entire lifecycle of a lead, from initial interest to final conversion or disqualification.

The gaming industry also receives special attention in the new GA4 event recommendations. Game developers can now track player progress and engagement more effectively with events like "level_start," "level_end," "level_up," "unlock_achievement," and "post_score." These events, when implemented, populate the games reports in GA4, providing developers with valuable insights into player behavior and game performance.

To assist developers and marketers in implementing these recommended events, Google has provided detailed documentation on how to set up events for both websites and mobile apps. The process involves using the Google tag for websites or the Firebase SDK for mobile apps to send these events to GA4. Each event comes with prescribed parameters, which Google strongly recommends using to ensure maximum detail in reports and compatibility with future features.

One of the notable aspects of this update is the emphasis on data quality and standardization. By providing a set of recommended events with specific parameters, Google is encouraging a more uniform approach to data collection across different businesses and industries. This standardization can lead to more meaningful benchmarking and industry-wide insights in the future.

However, it's important to note that while these events are recommended, they are not mandatory. Businesses still have the flexibility to implement custom events that are specific to their unique needs. The recommended events serve as a foundation that can be built upon to create a comprehensive tracking strategy.

To help users verify the correct implementation of these events, Google has included tools within the GA4 interface. The DebugView tool allows for real-time monitoring of events as they are triggered during testing. Additionally, the Realtime report provides immediate visibility into events coming from actual users, enabling quick validation of the event setup.

An interesting feature of the GA4 interface is the intelligent event recommendations system. The Events report now includes personalized suggestions for events to collect, based on the data already being tracked or the app category in the Google Play Store or iOS App Store. This feature demonstrates Google's commitment to making analytics more accessible and user-friendly, especially for those who may not have extensive technical knowledge.

For developers and marketers using older versions of the Google Analytics SDK, the company has issued important considerations regarding updates to Android 17.2.5 (or later) and iOS 16.20.0 (or later). These updates bring significant changes to how item data is structured and accessed within events. Specifically, item data will now only be available within a repeated items array, rather than in standard event parameters as in previous versions.

This change in data structure is aimed at supporting multiple-product analysis, a feature that can provide more detailed insights for businesses dealing with complex product catalogs or multi-item transactions. However, it also means that developers may need to adjust their existing code and queries to accommodate this new data format.

The BigQuery schema, which many advanced GA4 users utilize for in-depth data analysis, will also see changes as a result of this update. The shift to a repeated field for item/product data enables more sophisticated analysis of multiple products within a single event. This change, while beneficial in the long run, may require immediate attention from data analysts and developers to ensure continuity in their reporting and analysis workflows.

The introduction of these recommended events and the accompanying changes to data structures reflect the evolving nature of digital analytics. As user behaviors become more complex and privacy regulations more stringent, analytics platforms like GA4 must adapt to provide valuable insights while respecting user privacy and data protection laws.

One of the driving factors behind these changes is likely the increasing focus on first-party data collection. With the impending deprecation of third-party cookies and growing privacy concerns, businesses are being encouraged to collect more meaningful first-party data. The recommended events in GA4 provide a framework for collecting rich, contextual data directly from user interactions on owned properties.

The impact of these changes extends beyond just data collection. By standardizing event tracking across industries, Google is potentially laying the groundwork for more advanced machine learning and AI-driven insights in the future. Standardized data structures could enable more accurate predictive analytics and cross-industry benchmarking.

For marketers and analysts, these changes present both opportunities and challenges. On one hand, the new recommended events offer the potential for more detailed and actionable insights. On the other hand, implementing these events and adapting to the new data structures may require significant time and resources, especially for larger organizations with complex existing setups.

It's worth noting that while Google is promoting these recommended events, the company is also emphasizing the importance of data minimization and purpose limitation in line with evolving privacy regulations. Users are encouraged to collect only the data they need and to be transparent with their users about data collection practices.

In conclusion, the introduction of recommended events in Google Analytics 4 represents a significant step forward in the evolution of digital analytics. By providing a comprehensive framework for event tracking across various industries, Google is aiming to improve the quality and consistency of data collection while preparing for a future of more advanced analytics capabilities. As businesses adapt to these changes, they stand to gain deeper insights into user behavior, potentially leading to more effective marketing strategies and improved user experiences. However, the full impact of these changes will likely unfold over time as more businesses implement the recommended events and Google continues to develop new features based on this standardized data structure.