The Rise of GA4 and the End of GA3 Data: What Marketers Need to Know

As the digital marketing landscape evolves, so do the tools we use. Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is now leading the way with more user-centric reporting and machine learning features. While the new platform brings a lot to the table, it’s essential not to forget about its predecessor, Google Analytics 3 (GA3). In this blog post, we’ll discuss why GA3 is still relevant and why marketers need to act quickly to safeguard their valuable data.

The Announcement from Google

In case you missed it, Google has announced that GA3 data will be removed by the end of this year. This means that all the historical data you’ve accumulated over the years will disappear, and you won’t be able to retrieve it.

Why This Matters to Marketers

For marketers, GA3 data isn’t just a collection of numbers and graphs; it’s a roadmap to understanding your audience. This data can provide invaluable insights into:

User Behavior: Knowing how users interact with your site helps you refine your content and user experience.

Customer Journeys: GA3 data allows you to see the path that customers take from first clicking on your site to making a purchase, providing a holistic view of the conversion funnel.

Campaign Effectiveness: If you’ve been running ad campaigns, your GA3 data can show you what’s working and what’s not, allowing you to allocate your budget more effectively.

Losing access to this data can be detrimental to your ongoing and future marketing efforts. Without historical data to refer to, you could end up making decisions based on assumptions rather than solid evidence.

The Risks of Not Backing Up

Failing to back up your GA3 data carries significant risks, including: 

Loss of Historical Benchmarks: Marketers often rely on historical data to set future KPIs. Without past data, setting realistic benchmarks becomes a guessing game. 

Inability to Compare Year-over-Year Trends: Seasonal trends, like holiday shopping behavior, can only be accurately gauged by comparing data from previous years. 

Missed Optimization Opportunities: Data from A/B tests, user flow analyses, and other optimization experiments will be lost, making it harder to build on past successes or learn from failures. 

The removal of GA3 data is not just an event; it’s a significant shift that can impact how you strategize and make decisions moving forward. 

As we welcome the advanced features of GA4, it’s crucial not to forget about the valuable data in GA3. Time is of the essence, and the clock is ticking. Make sure to secure your historical GA3 data before it’s too late. 

Adage offers GA3 backup services into BigQuery, as well as GA3 and GA4 data integration for Looker Studio reports, allowing for year-over-year reporting for key data such as page views, goals, and ecommerce data. Contact us today to start your backup plan.