Google Analytics is a web analytics service offered by Google that tracks and reports website traffic and activity. This can help you calculate important metrics such as conversion rate for your Etsy store.
In October 2020, Google released the latest version of its analytics suite: Google Analytics 4 (GA4). This is now the default ‘property type’, whilst Etsy tracking still requires Universal Analytics, which has caused confusion (where do you find the UA tracking code now?).
In this tutorial, I’ll be showing you how to connect the “new” Google Analytics to your Etsy shop.
Creating New Account
Sign up for Google Analytics here. You’ll be asked to make a new account.
If you already have Google Analytics, click on ‘Admin’ on the left menu:
Then click ‘create account’.
Enter your Etsy shop name in ‘account name’.
Leave these settings and press ‘next’.
Creating UA Tracking Code (IMPORTANT)
This new version of Google Analytics has made it hard to find the UA tracking code you need for your Etsy shop.
When you reach the ‘property setup’ part of the account creation, type ‘All Website Data’ into ‘Property name’. Choose the correct timezone and currency for your store, then click ‘Show advanced options‘.
In the advanced options, use www.etsy.com as the Website URL.
Keep ‘Create both a Google Analytics 4 (GA4) and a Universal Analytics (UA) Property‘ checked. We’ll be using UA only for this demonstration, but it’s important to have both property types because Google may replace UA with GA4 entirely in the future. I’ll probably update if this happens.
Then they want some info about your business. This isn’t that important and won’t affect your results, just select what applies to you.
Then click ‘Create‘.
Setting Up Site Search Tracking
In the top left of your account you should see this:
Click on ‘All Accounts’. Find your shop name under ‘analytics accounts’ and click on it. Then you should see 2 fields under ‘Properties & Apps’.
This example below is for my website.
The top property is the GA4 property, we’ll be leaving that alone. The second one down is the UA property. Click on that, then click on ‘All Website Data‘ under ‘Views’.
Click the gear icon on the bottom left to access the admin panel.
Click ‘view settings‘.
Check all your info is correct. Then turn ‘Site search Tracking’ on. This lets you track user search queries on your site.
Then turn on ‘Category parameter’ also.
Enter ‘ga_search_query‘ under ‘Query parameter’ and tick ‘Strip query parameters out of URL’.
Enter ‘ga_search_type’ under ‘Category parameter’ and tick ‘Strip category parameters out of URL’.
Then click ‘save’.
Get Account ID
Return here. You should see your UA tracking code in the space shown below. Copy this code entirely.
Go to your Etsy ‘settings’ then ‘options’.
Click on ‘web analytics’ on the top bar.
Copy and paste your UA tracking code in the ‘web property ID‘ box and click ‘save’.
You should see this:
Congrats! Your Etsy shop is now connected to Google Analytics. Go back to your Google Analytics account and click the ‘home’ icon on the left to see your dashboard and data at a glance.
Points to Note
- Google Analytics takes 24 hours to update.
- It includes your own activity on your shop. So the real number of ‘users’ is 1 less than shown.
- See this document for reference. It applies to an older version of GA but most of the info is still accurate.
I’ll go through some important metrics and how to use the data to improve your shop traffic and conversion in a later article.
