Another metric is average engagement time, showing the average amount of time spent on the site either by session (visit level) or by user (individual level), depending on the report you are viewing.
Finally, you can view new vs. returning users to get an idea of which channels will most likely drive people to the site for the first time vs. those who have previously interacted with it.
Of course, note that these metrics aren’t perfect (with cross-device users and privacy settings complicating accuracy), but they can at least give you a rough idea.
Additionally, be mindful that channels, where you’ve focused more heavily on retargeting, will naturally drive more returning users.
Ad Platform Integrated Metrics
If you have a Google Ads account, you should link it to your GA4 account in order to automatically pass through metrics from your campaigns. This will offer more robust data than just relying on UTM parameters.
To ensure Google Ads data is flowing correctly, make sure you have admin access to the account, turn on auto-tagging, and link the proper Ads account ID to the correct GA4 property.
Screenshot from Google Analytics, November 2024
You can see this data correlated with GA4 key events under Advertising > Planning > Google Ads.
If desired, you can import cost data from non-Google ad platforms and view corresponding metrics in the Planning > All Channels report.
Screenshot from Google Analytics, November 2024
Additionally, the Advertising > Conversion Performance report allows you to select a Google Ads account and Ads-based conversions to view counts by various breakdowns. This lets you compare totals for these conversions from Ads vs. other channels.
As an added bonus, you can also see a few GA4 metrics directly within the Ads interface if you select the option to “Import app and web metrics” when setting up your link.
The % engaged sessions (the percentage of total sessions qualifying as “engaged”), events/sessions, and average engagement duration are the three available as of the time of publishing.
These can be useful to get a quick view of which campaigns, ads, etc., will most likely attract users willing to spend time on your site.
As a side note, you should not be overly concerned about matching up sessions and click totals perfectly. These can vary for a number of reasons:
A session is only counted when a page is viewed, and any previous sessions have timed out. By default, if a user goes back to the site within 30 minutes, they will still be within the same session.
A user could click and leave the site before the GA4 code has time to fire, in which case the click would be counted, and a session would not register.
Some types of Google Ads campaigns count clicks for actions that may not entail visiting a website. For instance, Demand Gen campaigns include clicks to open Gmail ads.
Start Analyzing Your Paid Traffic
Now that we’ve reviewed several important GA4 metrics, think about how you can apply this data when managing your PPC campaigns.
Understanding the metrics available to you is one important step in mastering GA4, but being able to segment data and understand context is the other crucial step.
Be sure to review these metrics both at the channel and source level, as well as for individual landing pages you’re pushing traffic to.
Wherever possible, incorporate takeaways from GA4 into your PPC reporting as well to show insight beyond the ad platform data.
More resources:
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