Transitioning Into Google Analytics 4 for Law Firms
- David Davis
In 2023, having a strong digital presence is crucial for all businesses, this is especially true for law firms. Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is a powerful tool you can leverage to track website performance and make data-driven decisions about your law firm. Google announced that Universal Analytics will no longer process data come July 1st, 2023, making it critical to start investing time into learning about GA4. I’ve spent the past several months learning all there is to know about GA4 for law firms and recently had the opportunity to lead a webinar covering the transition from Universal Analytics to GA4. The great thing about GA4 is that it can be customized to your law firm and you can use this to leverage your digital presence. My collegaue and CMO of Cardinal Concepts, Brent Harkins, and I went over the basic settings, events, conversions, and audiences that must be generated in order to have GA4 set up properly for divorce and family law firms.Â
Google Analytics 4 vs Universal AnalyticsÂ
GA4, is the latest version of Google’s analytics platform. GA4 uses machine learning to provide more accurate and useful insights into user behavior on a website. This platform uses event-based tracking instead of the session-based tracking Universal Analytics used. This allows law firms to be more accurate when it comes to making data-driven decisions helping them to monitor events and conversions that matter the mos; form submissions and phone calls. This information can help law firms better understand their clients and tailor their online presence to meet their needs.
Create Custom Events and Event Based Conversions
GA4 will come with preloaded data metrics the same as we have seen prior in UA such as page_view, first_visit, session_start, scroll, and many more. Although these are key metrics you can leverage, it is recommended to create custom events that will track unique engagements on your site such as form submissions and phone calls. From there, you can tell Google to use these events-based conversions and focus on specific key metrics.Â
Leverage Event-Based Conversions for AudiencesÂ
This is a great opportunity to build out custom audiences from the different channels such as paid search, organic, and social by leveraging new custom event-based conversions and making actionable audiences moving forward. Google provides some pre-built options to use but I would suggest creating a custom audience catered to the goals and results you are looking to drive. The audience builder allows you to build simple or complex audiences. If you have multiple offices or practice verticals, you can create audiences directly catered to your business needs while excluding non-relevant traffic at the same time.Â
Monitoring Key Performance MetricsÂ
While Google provides an ample amount of data metrics, two metrics I would focus on for your law firm would be Engagement Rate and Engaged Sessions. Starting with Engagement Rate, Google is essentially measuring how actively visitors or potential new clients (PNCs) are engaging with your website. This metric is important because it can help you understand how effective your website is in regards to engagement and generating leads. You want the highest engagement rate possible. Engaged sessions measure the number of sessions where PNCs were actively engaged with your site. An engaged session is one where visitors interact with your website for 10 seconds or more, by scrolling, watching a video, or filling out a form.Â
Making the Transition Into GA4
By tracking user behavior and event-based conversions, law firms can identify marketing opportunities that they may have otherwise missed. When leveraging the insights provided by GA4, law firms can make more informed decisions about their marketing efforts, website design, and overall client experience. Whether you’re a solo practitioner or a large law firm, switching to GA4 is a must. If you would like to see a live demo of GA4 presented by Cardinal Concepts and Colorado Legal Group, please click here. If you have concerns about your current setup, contact Cardinal Concepts today to schedule a consultation.
