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• 10 Key Google Analytics Limitations You Should Be Aware Of

  9 mai 2022, par Erin

  Google Analytics (GA) is the biggest player in the web analytics space. But is it as “universal” as its brand name suggests ?
  

  Over the years users have pointed out a number of major Google Analytics limitations. Many of these are even more visible in Google Analytics 4. 

  Introduced in 2020, Google Analytics 4 (GA4) has been sceptically received. As the sunset date of 1st, July 2023 for the current version, Google Universal Analytics (UA), approaches, the dismay grows stronger.

  To the point where people are pleading with others to intervene : 

  

  Main limitations of Google Analytics

  Google Analytics 4 is advertised as a more privacy-centred, comprehensive and “intelligent” web analytics platform. 

  According to Google, the newest version touts : 

  • Machine learning at its core provides better segmentation and fast-track access to granular insights 
  • Privacy-by-design controls, addressing restrictions on cookies and new regulatory demands 
  • More complete understanding of customer journeys across channels and devices 

  Some of these claims hold true. Others crumble upon a deeper investigation. Newly advertised Google Analytics capabilities such as ‘custom events’, ‘predictive insights’ and ‘privacy consent mode’ only have marginal improvements. 

  Complex setup, poor UI and lack of support with migration also leave many other users frustrated with GA4. 

  

  Let’s unpack all the current (and legacy) limitations of Google Analytics you should account for. 

  1. No Historical Data Imports 

  Google rushed users to migrate from Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4. But they overlooked one important precondition — backwards compatibility. 

  You have no way to import data from Google Universal Analytics to Google Analytics 4. 

  Historical records are essential for analysing growth trends and creating benchmarks for new marketing campaigns. Effectively, you are cut short from past insights — and forced to start strategising from scratch. 

  At present, Google offers two feeble solutions : 

  • Run data collection in parallel and have separate reporting for GA4 and UA until the latter is shut down. Then your UA records are gone. 
  • For Ecommerce data, manually duplicate events from UA at a new GA4 property while trying to figure out the new event names and parameters. 

  Google’s new data collection model is the reason for migration difficulties. 

  In Google Analytics 4, all analytics hits types — page hits, social hits, app/screen view, etc. — are recorded as events. Respectively, the “‘event’ parameter in GA4 is different from one in Google Universal Analytics as the company explains : 

  

  This change makes migration tedious — and Google offers little assistance with proper events and custom dimensions set up. 

  2. Data Collection Limits 

  If you’ve wrapped your head around new GA4 events, congrats ! You did a great job, but the hassle isn’t over. 

  You still need to pay attention to new Google Analytics limits on data collection for event parameters and user properties. 

  

  These apply to :

  • Automatically collected events
  • Enhanced measurement events
  • Recommended events 
  • Custom events 

  When it comes to custom events, GA4 also has a limit of 25 custom parameters per event. Even though it seems a lot, it may not be enough for bigger websites. 

  You can get higher limits by upgrading to Google Analytics 360, but the costs are steep. 

  3. Limited GDPR Compliance 

  Google Analytics has a complex history with European GDPR compliance. 

  A 2020 ruling by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU) invalidated the Privacy Shield framework Google leaned upon. This framework allowed the company to regulate EU-US data transfers of sensitive user data. 

  But after this loophole was closed, Google faced a heavy series of privacy-related fines :

  • French data protection authority, CNIL, ruled that  “the transfers to the US of personal data collected through Google Analytics are illegal” — and proceeded to fine Google for a record-setting €150 million at the beginning of 2022. 
  • Austrian regulators also deemed Google in breach of GDPR requirements and also branded the analytics as illegal. 

  Other EU-member states might soon proceed with similar rulings. These, in turn, can directly affect Google Analytics users, whose businesses could face brand damage and regulatory fines for non-compliance. In fact, companies cannot select where the collected analytics data will be stored — on European servers or abroad — nor can they obtain this information from Google.

  Getting a web analytics platform that allows you to keep data on your own servers or select specific Cloud locations is a great alternative. 

  Google also has been lax with its cookie consent policy and doesn’t properly inform consumers about data collection, storage or subsequent usage. Google Analytics 4 addresses this issue to an extent. 

  By default, GA4 relies on first-party cookies, instead of third-party ones — which is a step forward. But the user privacy controls are hard to configure without losing most of the GA4 functionality. Implementing user consent mode to different types of data collection also requires a heavy setup. 

  4. Strong Reliance on Sampled Data 

  To compensate for ditching third-party cookies, GA4 more heavily leans on sampled data and machine learning to fill the gaps in reporting. 

  In GA4 sampling automatically applies when you :

  • Perform advanced analysis such as cohort analysis, exploration, segment overlap or funnel analysis with not enough data 
  • Have over 10,000,000 data rows and generate any type of non-default report 

  Google also notes that data sampling can occur at lower thresholds when you are trying to get granular insights. If there’s not enough data or because Google thinks it’s too complex to retrieve. 

  In their words :

  

  Data sampling adds “guesswork” to your reports, meaning you can’t be 100% sure of data accuracy. The divergence from actual data depends on the size and quality of sampled data. Again, this isn’t something you can control. 

  Unlike Google Analytics 4, Matomo applies no data sampling. Your reports are always accurate and fully representative of actual user behaviours. 

  5. No Proper Data Anonymization 

  Data anonymization allows you to collect basic analytics about users — visits, clicks, page views — but without personally identifiable information (or PII) such as geo-location, assigns tracking ID or other cookie-based data. 

  This reduced your ability to :

  • Remarket 
  • Identify repeating visitors
  • Do advanced conversion attribution 

  But you still get basic data from users who ignored or declined consent to data collection. 

  By default, Google Analytics 4 anonymizes all user IP addresses — an upgrade from UA. However, it still assigned a unique user ID to each user. These count as personal data under GDPR. 

  For comparison, Matomo provides more advanced privacy controls. You can anonymize :

  • Previously tracked raw data 
  • Visitor IP addresses
  • Geo-location information
  • User IDs 

  This can ensure compliance, especially if you operate in a sensitive industry — and delight privacy-mindful users ! 

  6. No Roll-Up Reporting

  Getting a bird’s-eye view of all your data is helpful when you need hotkey access to main sites — global traffic volume, user count or percentage of returning visitors.

  With Roll-Up Reporting, you can see global-performance metrics for multiple localised properties (.co.nz, .co.uk, .com, etc,) in one screen. Then zoom in on specific localised sites when you need to. 

  

  7. Report Processing Latency 

  The average data processing latency is 24-48 hours with Google Analytics. 

  Accounts with over 200,000 daily sessions get data refreshes only once a day. So you won’t be seeing the latest data on core metrics. This can be a bummer during one-day promo events like Black Friday or Cyber Monday when real-time information can prove to be game-changing ! 

  Matomo processes data with lower latency even for high-traffic websites. Currently, we have 6-24 hour latency for cloud deployments. On-premises web analytics can be refreshed even faster — within an hour or instantly, depending on the traffic volumes. 

  8. No Native Conversion Optimisation Features

  Google Analytics users have to use third-party tools to get deeper insights like how people are interacting with your webpage or call-to-action.

  You can use the free Google Optimize tool, but it comes with limits : 

  • No segmentation is available 
  • Only 10 simultaneous running experiments allowed 

  There isn’t a native integration between Google Optimize and Google Analytics 4. Instead, you have to manually link an Optimize Container to an analytics account. Also, you can’t select experiment dimensions in Google Analytics reports.

  What’s more, Google Optimize is a basic CRO tool, best suited for split testing (A/B testing) of copy, visuals, URLs and page layouts. If you want to get more advanced data, you need to pay for extra tools. 

  Matomo comes with a native set of built-in conversion optimization features : 

  • Heatmaps 
  • User session recording 
  • Sales funnel analysis 
  • A/B testing 
  • Form submission analytics 

  

  9. Deprecated Annotations

  Annotations come in handy when you need to provide extra context to other team members. For example, point out unusual traffic spikes or highlight a leak in the sales funnel. 

  This feature was available in Universal Analytics but is now gone in Google Analytics 4. But you can still quickly capture, comment and share knowledge with your team in Matomo. 

  You can add annotations to any graph that shows statistics over time including visitor reports, funnel analysis charts or running A/B tests. 

  10. No White Label Option 

  This might be a minor limitation of Google Analytics, but a tangible one for agency owners. 

  Offering an on-brand, embedded web analytics platform can elevate your customer experience. But white label analytics were never a thing with Google Analytics, unlike Matomo. 

  Wrap Up 

  Google set a high bar for web analytics. But Google Analytics inherent limitations around privacy, reporting and deployment options prompt more users to consider Google Analytics alternatives, like Matomo. 

  With Matomo, you can easily migrate your historical data records and store customer data locally or in a designated cloud location. We operate by a 100% unsampled data principle and provide an array of privacy controls for advanced compliance. 

  Start your 21-day free trial (no credit card required) to see how Matomo compares to Google Analytics ! 

  21 day free trial. No credit card required.

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  I hereby accept the terms and conditions and the data processing agreeement (DPA).

  
  Your information will be used to create an account on our cloud service. For more information please consult our privacy policy.
  
  

  » Start improving your websites now

  

• 9 Ways to Customise Your Matomo Like a Pro

  5 octobre 2022, par Erin

  Matomo is a feature-rich web analytics platform. As such, it has many layers of depth — core features, extra plug-ins, custom dimensions, reports, extensions and integrations. 

  Most of the product elements you see can be personalised and customised to your needs with minimal restrictions. However, this breadth of choice can be overlooked by new users. 

  In this post, we explain how to get the most out of Matomo with custom reports, dashboards, dimensions and even app design. 

  How to customise your Matomo web analytics

  To make major changes to Matomo (e.g., create custom dashboards or install new plugins), you’ll have to be a Matomo Super User (a.k.a. The Admin). Super Users can also grant administrator permissions to others so that more people could customise your Matomo deployment. 

  Most feature-related customisations (e.g. configuring a custom report, adding custom goal tracking, etc.) can be done by all users. 

  With the above in mind, here’s how you can tweak Matomo to better serve your website analytics needs : 

  1. Custom dashboards

  

  Dashboards provide a panorama view of all the collected website statistics. We display different categories of stats and KPIs as separate widgets — a standalone module you can also customise. 

  On your dashboard, you can change the type, position and number of widgets on display. This is an easy way to create separate dashboard views for different projects, clients or team members. Rather than a one-size-fits-all dashboard, a custom dashboard designed for a specific role or business unit will increase data-driven decision-making and efficiency across the business.

  You can create a new dashboard view in a few clicks. Then select a preferred layout — a split-page view or multi columns. Next, populate the new dashboard area with preferred widgets showing :

  • SEO website rankings 
  • Visits, conversions and revenue 
  • Custom reports 

  Or code a custom widget area to pull specific website stats or other reporting data you need. Once you are done, arrange everything with our drag-and-drop functionality. 

  

  Popular feature use cases

  • Personalised website statistics layout for convenient viewing 
  • Simplified analytics dashboards for the line of business leaders/stakeholders 
  • Project- or client-specific dashboards for easy report sharing 

  Read more about customising Matomo dashboards and widget areas. 

  2. Custom reports

  

  As the name implies, Custom Reports widget allows you to mesh any of the dimensions and metrics collected by Matomo into a custom website traffic analysis. Custom reports save users time by providing specific data needed in one view so there is no need to jump back and forth between multiple reports or toggle through a report to find data.

  For each custom report, you can select up to three dimensions and then apply additional quantitative measurements (metrics) to drill down into the data.

  For example, if you want to closely observe mobile conversion rates in one market, you can create the following custom report :

  • Dimensions : User Type (registered), Device type (mobile), Location (France)
  • Metrics : Visits, Conversion Rate, Revenue, Avg. Generation Time.

  Custom Report widget is available within Matomo Cloud and as a plugin for Matomo On-Premise.

  &lt;script type=&quot;text/javascript&quot;&gt;<br />
       if ('function' === typeof window.playMatomoVideo){<br />
       window.playMatomoVideo(&quot;custom_reports&quot;, &quot;#custom_reports&quot;)<br />
       } else {<br />
       document.addEventListener(&quot;DOMContentLoaded&quot;, function() { window.playMatomoVideo(&quot;custom_reports&quot;, &quot;#custom_reports&quot;); });<br />
       }<br />
  &lt;/script&gt;

  Popular feature use cases

  • Campaign-specific reporting to better understand the impact of different promo strategies 
  • Advanced event tracking for conversion optimization 
  • Market segmentation reports to analyse different audience cohorts 

  Read more about creating and analysing Custom Reports.

  3. Custom widgets

  

  We realise that our users have different degrees of analytics knowledge. Some love in-depth reporting dimensions and multi-row reporting tables. Others just want to see essential stats. 

  To delight both the pros and the novice users, we’ve created widgets — reporting sub-modules you can add, delete or rearrange in a few clicks. Essentially, a widget is a slice of a dashboard area you can populate with extra information. 

  You can add pre-made custom widgets to Matomo or develop your own widget to display custom reports or even external data (e.g., offline sales volume). At the same time, you can also embed Matomo widgets into other applications (e.g., a website CMS or corporate portal).

  Popular feature use cases

  • Display main goals (e.g., new trial sign-ups) on the main dashboard for greater visibility 
  • Highlight cost-per-conversion reporting by combining goals and conversion data to keep your budgets in check 
  • Run omnichannel eCommerce analytics (with embedded offline sales data) to get a 360-degree view into your operations 

  Read more about creating widgets in Matomo (beginner’s guide). 

  4. Custom dimensions 

  

  Dimensions describe the characteristics of reported data. Think of them as “filters” — a means to organise website analytics data by a certain parameter such as “Browser”, “Country”, “Device Type”, “User Type” and many more. 

  Custom Dimensions come in handy for all sorts of segmentation reports. For example, comparing conversion rates between registered and guest users. Or tracking revenue by device type and location. 

  For convenience, we’ve grouped Custom Dimensions in two categories :

  Visit dimensions. These associate metadata about a user with Visitor profiles — a summary of different knowledge you have about your audience. Reports for Visit scoped custom dimensions are available in the Visitors section of your dashboard. 

  Action dimensions. These segment users by specific actions tracked by Matomo such as pageviews, events completion, downloads, form clicks, etc. When configuring Custom Dimensions, you can select among pre-defined action types or code extra action dimensions. Action scoped custom dimensions are available in the Behaviours section of Matomo. 

  Depending on your Matomo version, you can apply 5 – 15 custom dimensions to reports. 

  Important : Since you can’t delete dimensions (only deactivate them), think about your use case first. Custom Dimensions each have their own dedicated reports page on your Matomo dashboard. 

  Popular custom dimension use cases among users :

  • Segmenting reports by users’ screen resolution size to understand how your website performs on different devices
  • Monitor conversion rates for different page types to determine your best-performing assets 

  Read more about creating, tracking and managing Custom Dimensions. 

  5. Custom scheduled reports

  Manually sending reports can be time consuming, especially if you have multiple clients or provide reports to numerous stakeholders. Custom scheduled reports remove this manual process to improve efficiency and ensure timely distribution of data to relevant users.

  Any report in Matomo (default or custom) can be shared with others by email as a PDF file, HTML content or as an attached CSV document. 

  You can customise which data you want to send to different people — your colleagues, upper management, clients or other company divisions. Then set up the frequency of email dispatches and Matomo will do the rest. 

  Auto-scheduling an email report is easy. Name your report, select a Segment (aka custom or standard report), pick time, file format and sender. 

  

  You can also share links to Matomo reports as text messages, if you are using ASPSMS or Clockwork SMS. 

  Popular feature use cases

  • Convenient stakeholder reporting on key website KPIs 
  • Automated client updates to keep clients informed and reduce workload 
  • Easy data downloads for doing custom analysis with business intelligence tools 

  Read more about email reporting features in Matomo. 

  6. Custom alerts

  

  Custom Alerts is a Matomo plugin for keeping you updated on the most important analytics events. Unlike Custom Reports, which provide a complete or segmented analytics snapshot, alerts are better suited for tracking individual events. For example, significant traffic increases from a specific channel, new 404 pages or major goal achievement (e.g., hitting 1,000 sales in a week). 

  Custom Alerts are a convenient way to keep your finger on the pulse of your site so you can quickly remedy an issue or get updated on reaching a crucial KPI promptly. You can receive custom alerts via email or text message in a matter of minutes.

  To avoid flooding your inbox with alerts, we recommend reserving Custom Alerts for a select few use cases (3 to 5) and schedule custom Email Reports to receive general web page analytics. 

  Popular custom alerts use cases among users :

  • Monitor sudden drops in revenue to investigate the cause behind them and solve any issues promptly 
  • Get notified of traffic spikes or sudden dips to better manage your website’s technical performance 

  Read more about creating and managing Custom Alerts. 

  7. Goals

  

  Goals feature helps you better understand how your website performs on certain business objectives such as lead generation, online sales or content discovery. A goal is a quantifiable action you want to measure (e.g., a specific page visit, form submission or a file download). 

  When combined together, Goals make up your sales funnel — a series of specific actions you expect users to complete in order to convert. 

  Goals-setting and Funnel Analytics are a powerful, customisable combo for understanding how people navigate your website ; what makes them take action or, on the contrary, lose interest and bounce off. 

  On Matomo, you can simultaneously track multiple goals, monitor multiple conversions per one visit (e.g., when one user requests two content downloads) and assign revenue targets to specific goals.

  &lt;script type=&quot;text/javascript&quot;&gt;<br />
       if ('function' === typeof window.playMatomoVideo){<br />
       window.playMatomoVideo(&quot;goals&quot;, &quot;#goals&quot;)<br />
       } else {<br />
       document.addEventListener(&quot;DOMContentLoaded&quot;, function() { window.playMatomoVideo(&quot;goals&quot;, &quot;#goals&quot;); });<br />
       }<br />
  &lt;/script&gt;

  Separately, Matomo Cloud users also get access to a premium Funnels feature and Multi Channel Conversion Attribution. On-Premises Matomo users can get both as paid plugins via our Marketplace.

  Popular goal tracking use cases among users :

  • Tracking newsletter subscription to maximise subscriber growth 
  • Conversion tracking for gated content (e.g., eBooks) to understand how each asset performs 
  • Analysing the volume of job applications per post to better interpret your HR marketing performance 

  Read more about creating and managing Goals in Matomo.

  8. Themes

  

  Want to give your Matomo app a distinctive visual flair ? Pick a new free theme for your On-Premises installation. Minimalistic, dark or classic — our community created six different looks that other Matomo users can download and install in a few clicks. 

  If you have some HTML/CSS/JS knowledge, you can also design your own Matomo theme. Since Matomo is an open-source project, we don’t restrict interface customisation and always welcome creativity from our users.

  Read more about designing your own Matomo theme (developer documentation).

  9. White labelling

  

  Matomo is one of the few website analytics tools to support white labelling. White labelling means that you can distribute our product to others under your brand. 

  For example, as a web design agency, you can delight customers with pre-installed GDPR-friendly website analytics. Marketing services providers, in turn, can present their clients with embedded reporting widgets, robust funnel analytics and 100% unsampled data. 

  Apart from selecting a custom theme, you can also align Matomo with your brand by :

  • Customising product name
  • Using custom header/font colours 
  • Change your tracking endpoint
  • Remove links to Matomo.org

  To streamline Matomo customisation and set-up, we developed a White Label plug-in. It provides a convenient set of controls for changing your Matomo deployment and distributing access rights to other users or sharing embedded Matomo widgets). 

  Read more about white labelling Matomo. 

  Learning more about Matomo 

  Matomo has an ever-growing list of features, ranging from standard website tracking controls to unique conversion rate optimisation tools (heatmaps, media analytics, user cohorts and more).

  To learn more about Matomo features you can check our free video web analytics training series where we cover the basics. For feature-specific tips, tricks and configurations, browse our video content or written guides. 

  21 day free trial. No credit card required.

• Revision 32594 : plugins en minuscules, et alias pour les noms de sites

  1er novembre 2009, par fil@… — Log

  plugins en minuscules, et alias pour les noms de sites