Google Analytics 4 (GA4) implementation

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is the new generation of Google's analytics platform, which replaced Universal Analytics in July 2023. The key difference is the event-based model instead of sessions and pageviews. Every user interaction — a click, a scroll, a form submission, an add-to-cart — is recorded as an event with parameters. This enables precise measurement of the purchase path, user segmentation and remarketing lists built on actual behavior, not just visits.

Installing the GA4 code is only the starting point. The default configuration collects basic automatic events such as pageviews and first visits. Without a well-designed measurement plan, custom event configuration and conversion marking, you don't know which parts of your website actually drive sales or inquiries — or what your advertising campaigns should focus on.

The GA4 event model and the measurement plan

The foundation of a proper GA4 implementation is a measurement plan — a document describing which events and parameters are collected, what counts as a conversion and which custom dimensions are needed for reporting. We translate the measurement plan into tag and trigger configuration in Google Tag Manager (GTM), which lets us deploy or update events without touching the website's source code. We verify every implementation in GTM preview mode and GA4 DebugView before publishing.

• Automatic events — page_view, session_start, first_visit, scroll (90%), outbound_click collected without configuration.
• Enhanced Measurement events — outbound clicks, file downloads, site search, form engagement.
• Custom events — any interactions tailored to your business: form submissions, phone number clicks, video views, checkout steps.
• E-commerce events — full purchase path tracking: view_item, add_to_cart, begin_checkout, purchase with revenue parameters.
• Conversions — marking key events as conversions imported into Google Ads for smart bidding.
• Custom dimensions and metrics — e.g. order value, product category, customer type — for more precise reporting.

Google Tag Manager (GTM) — tag management without a developer

Google Tag Manager is a platform for managing analytics and marketing tags without directly editing your website code. After a one-time GTM container installation, we can add and modify GA4, Google Ads, Meta Pixel and other tags without involving developers for every change. GTM also gives full control over triggers — we define precisely when a given tag should fire: after a specific button click, after a form submission, after a scroll-depth percentage is reached. We test every change in preview mode before publishing. If you're about to adopt server-side tagging, GTM is the essential first step toward full control over your data.

Consent Mode v2 — GDPR compliance and complete conversion data

Consent Mode v2 is a Google mechanism required since March 2024 in the European Economic Area. It adjusts the behavior of Google tags (GA4, Google Ads Conversion) to the user's decision in the cookie banner. Without Consent Mode v2, Google Ads campaigns cannot factor in conversion data from users who declined consent — which directly limits smart bidding and remarketing capabilities. We implement Consent Mode v2 in Basic and Advanced modes, integrating it with popular CMP platforms (Cookiebot, OneTrust, CookieYes and others). A correct configuration can recover as much as 15–30% of conversion data modeled by Google. For clients focused on campaign optimization, we recommend adding a conversion optimization audit — combining reliable GA4 data with CRO testing delivers the best results.

GA4 export to BigQuery — raw data without limits

GA4 offers a native, free export of raw event data to Google BigQuery. This is especially important for high-traffic websites and e-commerce stores that want to analyze data without sampling limits, keep history longer than 14 months (the standard GA4 limit) and join analytics data with other sources — CRM, sales data, advertising systems. In BigQuery you can build advanced attribution models, cohort analyses and SQL reports tailored to your business. We configure the export, set the right permissions and help you understand the structure of GA4 tables in BigQuery.

GA4 integration with Google Ads

Linking GA4 with Google Ads lets you import analytics conversions into the ad account, build remarketing lists based on GA4 events and gain fuller insight into the conversion path in attribution reports. Correct integration is essential for smart bidding strategies: tCPA and tROAS only optimize the campaign when they have access to complete, correctly marked conversions. A useful complement is call tracking — tracking phone calls as conversions in GA4 and Google Ads, which meaningfully rounds out the picture of campaign performance, especially for service industries.