What is the New Upgrade All About?

Google Analytics 4 introduces a line of robust new features. Google Analytics 4 is created to give you vital insights in order to be prepared for what might be coming next, which allows you to build a comprehensive customer journey, in order to maximise profit. So, what else is GA4 promising you?

Artificial Intelligence-powered Predictions and Insights

Insights powered by machine learning have been in analytics for some time, however, GA4 is now equipped to highlight data trends such as growing demand for a service or product.

The brand-new technology can be used to predict outcomes, such as potential profit a business can earn from a specific customer segment. Those insights can then assist you in expecting the actions your customer may take in the future. Therefore, it will let you focus on audiences with higher values.

New Data Model

GA4 has an entirely different data model than the older version. GA4 is solely based on Users and Events. Each session is an event, a page view is an event, every communication inside the browser is tracked immediately as an event.

Deeper Audience Integration with Google Ads

Creating and maintaining audience lists is improved. Here’s how: if a user has qualified for your Google Ads audience list due to an action they took while browsing an app or webpage, they can be automatically eliminated from that list once they have reached the established goal for that specific campaign. This basically indicates that you spend less on ads.

Customer Lifecycle-framed Reporting

Report organisation is different this time—GA4 aims to present a complete view of how customers are engaging with your business across channels and devices. You can also allocate users with an ID or allow Google alerts to deduplicate users over devices for enhanced reporting and ad targeting.

Analytics in a Future Free of Cookies

Third-party cookies are slowly phasing out, so Google anticipates that scattered data will become the new normal. Therefore, GA4 will depend on machine learning to fill in the blanks, which will help to ensure accuracy when reporting and improve insights.

Should You Move to GA4 Now?

The short answer to this question is yes. Universal Analytics probably isn’t going anywhere anytime soon—Google hasn’t explicitly stated when they are completely retiring AU— but it is highly recommended that you add GA4 property to your running Google Analytics account.

GA4 doesn’t migrate your data over when you shift, which means you don’t have any old data available when you move to the new version. If you move over to Google Analytics 4 now, you can run both your new and old accounts alongside each other and start collecting data in GA4 before the old version is phased out. This way, you get the best of both worlds and conduct experiments with GA4 as it develops. You will be able to migrate your data over time.

What If You Don’t Upgrade? Can You Still Use Your Existing Setup for GA4?

The change won’t be radical. Google Analytics 4 won’t just show up one day and make Universal Analytics null and void. Your present Google Analytics will work as it is. However, it is highly recommended that you upgrade to GA4 because, as mentioned above, GA4 will provide a much better data model than UA.

You don’t need to use GA4 right away for analysis and reporting but it will provide you with the option to try out new things. While you can keep using the same Google Tag Manager account, you will need to set up GA4 from the ground up. GA4 tracking is very different from Universal Analytics tracking. Your current event tracking will cease to work.

In the end, if you’re trying to target users that perform an event on your website, then you need to decide which is significant. Are you leveraging for all sessions or only the people who perform the event? Data is similar in both GA3 and GA4, so if you’re just tracking events and need to ensure whether the event is triggered, it all depends on individual preference.

What is Performance Marketing?

Performance marketing is the term used to describe online marketing campaigns where advertisers pay advertising platforms or marketing companies for results attained, such as conversions or clicks.

Unlike organic and conventional marketing, performance marketing is particularly used to drive actions, monitor, and measure those actions.

While larger enterprises can spend millions of dollars on branding, most businesses need to concentrate on the bottom line to remain profitable. Performance marketing for B2B puts the power back into the hands of the advertiser. You select the action, then pay when that action is fulfilled—whether that’s a lead, click or sale.

Types of Performance Marketing

In the world of marketing, there are four types of performance marketing that work best for B2B.

Social Media Advertising

This includes content put up on any social networking site that’s used for advertisements, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Snapchat.

Native Advertising

Ads created to match the platform or site on which they appear is what native advertising is all about. These ads are appealing because they are written and designed to feel as if they are a routine part of the page you’re on.

Branded Content

To tell your company and brand’s story, you need branded content. Such content is usually compelling, visually appealing and entertaining. It helps you compete by making more than just an ad. It applies storytelling to build an experience where your brand—and the solutions you can give to a customer—is cast in a positive light.

Branded content can be more than just blog posts.

Podcasting might seem terrifying in the beginning but like blogs, podcasts follow similar fundamentals of inbound marketing. They are also the perfect way to include branded content in your marketing strategy.

For example, an ad you hear during your favourite podcast can sound like a usual radio ad that fits into the episode like a commercial break. It can also be a scripted ad read by the host, who can also offer complimentary discounts to listeners. Other times, it can sound like a friend telling you what they did over the weekend: engaging, personal and casual. The end goal, no matter the method, should be about telling a story about the service or product.

Including video into your B2B marketing strategy is another way to tell your brand’s story through striking visuals. Video can take all the intricate information you provide in a case study or white paper and compress it into an easy and consumable format.

Similar to podcasting, videos are becoming increasingly popular for business because they work. It’s both a marketing tool and a way to get positive ROI.

Performance Partnerships

When you team up with an influential person online to promote your business, it’s called a performance partnership. This individual can be a social media influencer with a huge following, affiliate bloggers or business development partners.

These campaigns can be extremely beneficial in that they provide you with the perception of being applied by a selected group of people with an amazing online reach. Tapping into this individual’s already existing following can help you improve your outreach exponentially.

The Main Advantages of Performance Marketing

It’s Low-risk

In performance marketing, there’s less risk involved as compared to conventional advertising. You can access results in real-time with performance marketing and adjust your campaign elements accordingly. Are your ads not converting? You have the means to fix your budget or even stop the ad to prevent overpaying.

Better Reach

You only pay the website or platform when your ad reaches a specific outcome. Therefore, the chances of your brand reaching the right people for conversion is more plausible.

It’s Measurable

You can monitor and measure your efforts down to the click. On most platforms, you can access campaign metrics and reports that help in determining which tactics are working and which you should change.

When it comes to digital advertising, you want to ensure you get the most bang for your buck. You only pay when you get some sort of value in the form of a click or an impression. It’s the optimal way of leveraging your marketing budget in a way that allows you to prevent funding ad campaigns that don’t generate engagement.