GA4: Advertising Performance Report

Finally, the section dedicated to advertising in GA4 has also received an important improvement in terms of analysis!

In fact, the Performance Report has been introduced. This is the place where you can find the analysis of ROAS and spending in Google Analytics 4!

Advertising Performance Report

To access the report dedicated to advertising performance, just click on the Advertising menu and then select Performance > All Channels.

The report is active if:

• The GA4 property receives data
• At least one conversion event must be set
• There must be an active link with at least Google Ads, Search Ads 360 or Display & Video 360
• You have imported cost data via data import

Advertising Report Detail

The advertising performance report can therefore be divided into 3 macro categories, as shown in the screenshot below.

1. Conversion events and filters: in this section it is possible to select one or more conversion events as well as set a filter to analyze the report data in detail
2. Report metrics: at the moment they are in fixed mode, i.e. not customizable as in other reports, but among these are:
   • Conversions: The number of times a conversion event was triggered
   • Ads Costs: The total cost amount of the campaigns. This metric shows the cost data of Google Ads and those imported (e.g. Facebook Ads)
   • Cost per conversion: represents the cost per conversion, calculated as the total cost over the number of (selected) conversions
   • Total Revenue: total total revenue calculated as Purchase Revenue + Subscription Revenue + Ad revenue
   • Return on Ad Spend (ROAS): Revenue for selected conversions divided by the total cost of the related ad
3. Selectable sizes: by default the initial size is the Default Channel Group but you can select Source Platform, Source, Medium and Campaign. Obviously it is possible to cross this dimension with a secondary one.

Important Notes:

• The conversions appear “fractionated” as in this case the Data Driven Attribution Model is applied (from the Admin interface)
• When a filter is used, the report shows only conversions and campaigns that match the selected criteria. The cost displayed in the “Ad Costs” metric and used in “Cost per Conversion” and “ROAS” represents the full cost of the campaign and not the one generated by the filter
• Google Analytics 4 and Google Ads use a different attribution system and the data may be different

Advertising Performance Report Considerations

The introduction of this report certainly allows for better data analysis in terms of Advertising and ROAS, above all thanks to the possibility of importing cost data from other campaigns not directly linked to the Google ecosystem.

Furthermore, thanks to this new report, you can start using GA4 as an overall hub for analyzing campaigns‘ data using a single attribution model rather than mixing multiple tools together.

At the moment it is a small step forward for Google Analytics 4 and there will certainly be further improvements in this section but we need to start using it now and get as many insights as possible.