Google Universal Analytics Y2K

Did the site run out of visitors?
Run out of conversions?
Did conversions reach record levels in July?
Did strange things happen in ADS advertising?

I'm sure these are questions many people are asking now that the holidays are over. The strange and confusing events can be explained by the fact that the old version of Google Analytics (=Universal Analytics) officially stopped collecting data at the beginning of July. Not everyone stopped using Analytics at the same time, and some people may still be seeing visitor data from July. However, the cessation of data collection is inevitable in the near future and already most of the old Analytics has stopped collecting data.

New analytics are created automatically

Google automatically created a new version of the old Analytics, GA4, unless it was explicitly forbidden. During the design process, it has also tried to bring in conversions to the best of its ability. From the wording alone, you can tell that it hasn't necessarily worked very well...especially if the old Analytics had conversion points that were actually good for business. Google may also have created its own conversion scores.

It may not even help if you have installed the GA4 account yourself. Google "plays it safe" and suggests combining accounts. I don't even know what all happens in the merge process :). Personally, I have tried to block all mergers, because experience has shown that they have not been helpful, rather the opposite. Once that is blocked, you know for sure what data is collected and how to interpret it.

Wrong data causes money to be spent

With those conversions, which Google guesses, you can waste a lot of money in the worst case.
e.g. ADS advertising can use pricing strategies based on conversion data from Analycs. If the AI receives signals about wrong conversions, it can start weighting ad impressions for completely wrong reasons.

Social media advertising relies entirely on artificial intelligence and the information it receives from the site's results. If the measurement is wrong, there's a good chance that ads will be displayed a bit randomly.
Other forms of advertising that receive signals from analytics can also draw "wrong conclusions" and considerable money can be spent on unnecessary media.

These are direct costs. It is also worth taking into account any lost sales by not reaching a potential target group. Other possible indirect costs (money or time) are the costs for you/your partner to find out what is going on in the measurement and why.

The installation of Google Analytics 4 alone is often not enough to measure a website, whether you have created an account yourself or have it automated by Google. Without proper measurement, designed specifically for your needs, only a small part of the analytics can be used. I have already written about this several times before.

I recommend everyone to go through their Analycs account and correct any errors. If you or your potential analytics partner don't know how to do that, please contact us and we'll look into it. You could save a pretty penny.