How to Use Shopify Google Analytics

Key takeaways

• To use the Shopify Google Analytics integration, create a Google Analytics account and Google Analytics 4 property through which you can use a web data stream to add your Shopify store.

• By adding Google Analytics to Shopify, you’ll be able to learn more about your store’s performance and track events like page visits, product searches, and when customers view or add products to their carts.

• It’s also important to consider potential challenges, such as discrepancies between the data you get from your Shopify analytics and Google Analytics, which you can overcome by adding scripts to the checkout settings.

Explore how to set up Google Analytics with your Shopify store and learn more about why it can be beneficial. To develop your digital marketing skills, enroll in the Google Digital Marketing & E-commerce Professional Certificate. In as few as six months, you’ll earn a credential you can add to your resume and professional profile while having an opportunity to build skills such as search engine optimization (SEO), online advertising, and social media marketing and strategy.

Benefits of adding Google Analytics to Shopify

In addition to the data provided by Shopify analytics, you can connect your Shopify store to Google Analytics to track events and learn more about the performance of your store. Analytics allow you to learn more about your customers and your sales to help you improve your business. 

With Google Analytics, you can automatically track specific events in your store when a customer:

• Visits a page in your store (page_view)

• Searches for a product in your store (search)

• Views a product in your store (view_item)

• Adds an item to a cart (add_to_cart)

• Begins a checkout process (begin_checkout)

• Enters payment information (add_payment_info)

• Completes their checkout (purchase)

How to set up Google Analytics for your Shopify store

Prior to connecting your Shopify store to Google Analytics, you first need to create a Google Analytics account. Then you can create a Google Analytics 4 property from which you can add to your Shopify store through a web data stream. When completing this process, you will receive a Tag ID for later use. Google provides a guide with the information you need for creating a Google Analytics account, property, and data stream. Once this is complete, follow these steps to add Google Analytics to your Shopify store:

1. Access store preferences.

2. Connect your Google account.

3. Connect your Google Analytics 4 property.

4. Link Google Analytics to your Google Ads account.

Let's go through each step in detail:

1. Access store preferences.

You can access your store preferences from your Shopify admin by selecting Online store > Preferences.

2. Connect your Google account.

To connect your Google account, go to the Google Analytics section and select Manage pixel here, then click Connect your Google account.

3. Connect your Google Analytics 4 property.

Select the Tag ID you received earlier when setting up your Google Analytics 4 property, then click Connect your Google Analytics 4 property to connect Google Analytics to your Shopify store. 

Make sure you remove password protection from your Shopify store to allow Google Analytics to begin tracking events. You can do this from your Shopify admin by going to Online Store > Themes > Remove password. If you do not see "Your online store is password protected," password protection has already been removed or was not set.

4. Link Google Analytics to your Google Ads account.

You can access more customer activity information by linking your Google Analytics and Google Ads accounts.

Things to consider when using Shopify Google Analytics

It’s possible to have discrepancies between the data provided by your Shopify analytics and Google Analytics. This can happen for a number of reasons, such as customers using browser extensions to block Google Analytics tracking, as well as whether or not customers have certain cookies enabled or their internet connections. If you have knowledge of web design languages such as HTML, JavaScript, CSS, or Liquid, you can add scripts to the checkout settings in your Shopify admin to track additional events in Google Analytics 4.

Read more: Most Popular Programming Languages

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