How to set up Events and Conversions in Google Analytics 4 ( Part II)?

6 min readJul 18, 2021

To continue from the last article about how to set up Events and custom dimensions in GA 4, in this article, I’ll talk you through the Conversions ( what we used to refer to as Goals in UA).

The conversions and their functionality have been completely rebuilt with the preregistered and newly conversions, e.g. Firebase, E-commerce, apps purchases, etc. Note that in GA 4, users can get up to 30 goals per property, where previously, there is only 20 per view in UA.

Conversions: Create from an Event Name

In addition, the new conversion features are way more flexible that allows users to turn the conversion on and off at any time. If the user no longer uses reserved slots as they did in UA, they can simply archive as needed ( stop collecting data ), which free up the brand new slots. And it is the same thing that users can achieve in their events report with the same toggle function.

How to set up Events and Conversions in Google Analytics 4 ( Part II). Image taken from CXL.

One of the things about conversions in GA4 is that each unique conversion requires a unique event_name. This means users don’t have the option to create anything more defined for those conversions than the event name level.

This is also where a new feature in GA 4 comes in — a big departure from how things worked in UA — that allow users to modify and create events directly in UI. Often, you will want to create conversions from a value in an event parameter. For example, you want a Blog View conversion to record your page_view event fires anytime, and the page_title or page_location parameters contain a blog.

To do this, you need to use the Create Events feature. Step 1: Click on the create event to create a custom conversion for the blog view.

Step 2: Pick the most relevant stream if you have multiple websites configured.

Step 3: Click on create, and it leads you to an event window.

Step 4: Give a custom event name. In this example, I’ll put blog_view. Then, you will need to define when you want this event to fire. In the matching conditions, you can put “event name” on parameter, “equals” on operator, “page_view” on value.

In the next row, put down “page_location” on the parameter, “contains” on operator, “blog” on value.

If you want to track other events, e.g. scroll tracking by 90%. You can do the exact same steps by giving the custom event name scroll_conversion, having this condition on the first row

> “event_name” on parameter, “equals” on operator, “scroll” on value

Second row with:

> “percent_scroll” on parameter, “equals” on operator, “90” on value.

There are some advanced settings for carrying or not carrying all parameters from the source event or modifying the parameters. But at the moment, you can leave it as default here. Click Create and done!

Now you will be able to view the event in the real-time report, and bear in mind that it could take up to 5 mins to get the data to show up. To track the event more accurately, you can go to Debug View and see all interactions in real-time.

To back this up, you could set your blog_view as a new conversion, and by doing so, go to your conversion and registered as the same name. Then you see your new conversion name show up.

In a nutshell, if you have other events and wanted to create a conversion when someone views a thank-you or blog page, you need to create a unique event name such as form_fill or blog_view. You can do this using the create or modify events feature (create/modify an event from an event). This is where you set up all the ad hoc user conversions. Alternatively, it is to add another unique event_name in GTM that fires on the conversion action. There are a set of predefined conversions (can’t disable and don’t count against your limits).

Conversions: Modify Events Feature

Now, one last component to cover is the event modification, and it is basically mean how users adjust what’s being tracked in the current events from GA 4. So, as an example, you may make a mistake when you added the wrong event name.

Now you can simply go to Modify event and remedy the changes. So click on Modify event > select your stream > now you land on the modify event window. The following diagram shows you the exact step where you can follow. Take the scroll tracking as an example, here we give the “Fix Scroll” as the modification name. In the matching condition, you would need to name parameter as “event_name”, operator as “equals” and value as “scroll”. For the modify parameter, this is where you need to pay attention with.

Initially, you have an event name called scroll and you want this to actually modify the parameter for percent_scroll (wrong parameter) to make the modification. Make sure you toggle to the question marks and read through the instruction as to use another parameter’s value, you need to input the parameter’s name between double- brackets [[source_param_name]]. And, to remove a parameter, add the parameter name and leave the “New value” field blank.

Now after placing new parameter “percent_scrolled, you put [[prcent_scroll], which mean you are creating new parameter called percent scrolled, and wanted to pass the value from the incorrect parameter ( percent_scroll) into the correct one. And, to remove the old parameter, add the old parameter name to the next row and leave the “New value” filed blank.

And TADA, you are done.

Conclusion

To recap, the key takeaway of the new events models make GA4 so different from UA., where automatic measurement will often need to be customised. Furthermore, custom dimensions and metrics are more important than ever since event parameters aren’t auto-registered by default (except in BQ). The Create/Modify Events feature one new way to create customised conversions and filter/modify/clean up existing events/parameters.

How to set up Events and Conversions in Google Analytics 4 ( Part II)?

Conversions: Create from an Event Name

Conversions: Modify Events Feature

Conclusion

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Written by janet wong