Meta GA4 Integration Explained: Benefits, Access and Data Quality Impacts

Meta launched a beta version of their new Google Analytics 4 (GA4) integration earlier this year to a limited number of users, and continues to expand access to the integration. 

In Meta’s official announcement about this development, they explain that giving businesses the power to integrate their analytics tools and share their aggregated campaign data will ultimately “allow us to better understand what conversions an advertiser may value across their marketing mix.” 

Meta reports that this integration, which connects through a simple API setup, can contribute to a conversion increase of up to 22% based on user data, and that users can see a performance improvement within two weeks of setting up the integration.

This article provides additional information on Meta’s new integration with GA4:

• Benefits of the Meta GA4 Integration
• Limitations of the Meta GA4 Integration
• Locating the GA4 Integration in Meta
• Improving Data Quality for Meta Ads and GA4

Benefits of Integrating Meta with GA4

In addition to the potential for a 22% conversion increase, Meta’s new GA4 integration offers potential advantages for merchants who implement it:å

• Unified Data Tracking: Users can get a more holistic view of their marketing efforts by integrating Meta’s advertising data with GA4’s analytics capabilities.
• Comprehensive Analytics: Meta’s ad performance metrics combined with GA4’s analytics features deliver a more comprehensive view of user behavior. This can help merchants make more informed decisions about their advertising campaigns.
• Enhanced Audience Segmentation: GA4’s audience-building capabilities combined with Meta’s advertising data enable more precise audience segmentation, helping merchants target their ads more effectively.
• Better Reporting: GA4 provides advanced reporting features and customizable dashboards. Integrating Meta with GA4 allows merchants to leverage these features to create more insightful reports about their ad campaigns.
  
• Cross-Platform Insights: By integrating Meta with GA4, merchants can gain insights into how users interact with their brand across different touchpoints, giving merchants a better view of the customer journey.
  

Challenges and Limitations

Despite its list of benefits, the Meta GA4 integration does have some limitations: 

• No Consideration for Ad Impressions: Merchants running top-of-funnel or upper-funnel campaigns will have limited ability to see the reach of their campaigns because GA4 doesn’t collect ad impressions.
• Constraints Due to Privacy Regulations: GA4 cannot track individual users because of privacy regulations, which creates an impediment to attributing sales data.
  

How to Access Meta’s GA4 Integration

Because Meta’s GA4 integration is still in a beta testing phase, not all merchants have access to it yet. 

Merchants who do have access will see a pop-up appear that gives them the option to connect Google Analytics data when logging in to their Meta advertiser account.

Merchants with access to the integration can also find it in Meta by opening Event Manager and selecting Google Analytics under Partner Integrations.

Improving Data Quality for Meta Ads and GA4

Meta’s rollout of their GA4 integration increases the importance of having high-quality data in GA4 because of the direct impact this data can have on Meta ad campaign performance.

Merchants with low-quality data or high direct/none source traffic risk hindering their Meta ad campaign performance since Meta can now gain visibility into GA4 data through this integration.

The Elevar integration with GA4 guarantees 99%+ purchase data accuracy, giving merchants a solution for ensuring their GA4 data is reliable.

Questions About Your Meta Ads Performance?

Elevar has answers! Schedule a call with us to learn how we can help you improve the performance of your Meta ad campaigns and optimize the quality of your conversion tracking data.