Matthew Widdop
Matty is a Digital SEO Executive at Intelligency, helping our clients to improve their digital performance. Matty is currently studying for his Level 3 Multi-Channel Marketer apprenticeship and has completed a Sport Journalism Degree at the University of Huddersfield.
Google Analytics 4 is the most dominant analytics platform for website users, with over 32 million live websites currently using the platform and over 78% of websites that report using traffic analysis tools. Over the years, as cookie restrictions and privacy consent have become more stringent, GA4 has faced serious issues with data collection, namely from data being withheld due to a lack of user consent. Having access to accurate data is crucial for website users to be able to make informed decisions on how to improve their site. In this article, we’ll discuss how GA4 have tried to combat incomplete data to improve user data and alternative platforms you can use.
How have GA4 Handled Missing Data?
Google has started to use AI to model how users likely behave on your site with data such as user counts, conversions, and more, all being projected based on similar data from users who have given cookie consent. Estimates suggest this can recover a significant portion of lost data, but there is no way to know how accurate current datasets are. When reporting on conversions, user counts and sessions to clients, data needs to be accurate.
For large data sets, GA4 also uses data sampling. This is where GA4 takes only a small sample of the data before extrapolating it to gain results. This is problematic because even though it makes data more scalable, once again, precision is being lost in data reporting.
Why is Precision so Important in Data Reporting
While it may not seem completely detrimental for GA4 ot be estimating data, if the data still gives you a fairly accurate picture of how your business is performing, there are still limitations to how you can improve performance with estimated as opposed to accurate data.
- Small Margins. If you’re working with tight margins and your data only changes incrementally, estimates may wipe out these margins altogether, or you may not feel you can rely on them enough as solid data to make decisions that can positively impact your business.
- Budget Allocation. There are different ways in which to spend the budget to maximise performance. If you’re relying on imprecise data to determine which channels are your strongest performing, then you could be allocating budget to the wrong areas of your site.
- Forecasting Implication: In understanding how your site is going to perform in the future, you can often use your historical data as a benchmark, for example, understanding peak times of the year when your site is busy and not. If the data is projected, then these forecasts can often be misguided, leading to disappointment.
What alternatives are available?
Here at Intelligency, we have been using Matomo as an alternative to GA4 to report on client data. Matomo describes itself as “a web & app analytics for teams who demand accuracy.” Matomo is still GDPR compliant, but puts data ownership in your hands as opposed to giving it to Google. Matomo allows for increased accuracy in data reporting by only reporting on data that it directly observes and using minimal modelling compared to Google’s model-heavy product, leading to better insights and outcomes.
