Google Analytics to Data Studio: How to Connect?
The process of capturing and analyzing data is a challenge to every organization. Every untracked piece of data is a lost insight that could have helped an organization be one step ahead of its competitors.
Data Studio is a great tool for understanding and extracting hidden information from data belonging to different sources such as Google Analytics. Google Analytics is a popular comprehensive web data analytics tool.
This article is aimed at providing a step-by-step guide on how to connect Google Analytics to Data Studio.
Table of Contents
Table of Contents
- What is Google Analytics?
- What is Google Data Studio?
- How to Use Google Data Studio?
- Importance of Google Analytics Data Studio Deployment
- Connecting Google Analytics to Data Studio
- Modifying Credential Settings in Google Analytics Data Studio Setup?
- How to Share Data Source in Google Analytics Data Studio Setup?
- How to Generate Reports in Google Analytics Data Studio Setup?
- Limitations of Connecting Google Analytics to Data Studio
- How to Use Google Analytics Data Studio Set Up for Tracking Report?
- Conclusion
What is Google Analytics?
Google Analytics is a web analytics service that provides users with statistical and analytical information. It is highly useful & helps in managing search engine optimization (SEO) and product marketing operations. It is a free-cost service available to every Google user.
It visualizes data using its interactive features such as a dashboard, motion charts, and scorecards to display real-time changes in data. Using Google Analytics, you can generate a custom report that meets your business requirements.
For further information on Google Analytics, you can check the official site here.
What is Google Data Studio?
It is a free visualization tool that can help you build effective and insightful reports with the help of its interactive dashboard. It allows bringing in data from multiple sources and lets you expand reports as per your business needs. You can visualize data using a bar chart, line graphs, etc., and easily share these reports. It supports dynamic reporting and hence can be used to generate reports that get updated in real-time.
For further information on Data Studio, you can check the official site here.
Hevo Data, a Simpler Way to Integrate your Data for Analysis
Hevo Data, a No-code Data Pipeline helps to combine data from Google Analytics along with 100+ sources and visualize it in Google Data Studio for free. Hevo is fully managed and completely automates the process of not only exporting data from your desired source but also enriching the data and transforming it into an analysis-ready form without having to write a single line of code. Its fault-tolerant architecture ensures that the data is handled in a secure, consistent manner with zero data loss.
It provides a consistent & reliable solution to manage data in real-time and always have analysis-ready data in your desired destination. It allows you to focus on key business needs and perform insightful analysis using BI tools such as Google Data Studio and many more.
GET STARTED WITH HEVO FOR FREECheck out what makes Hevo amazing:
- Secure: Hevo has a fault-tolerant architecture that ensures that the data is handled in a secure, consistent manner with zero data loss.
- Simplicity: Using Hevo is easy and intuitive, ensuring that your data is exported in just a few clicks.
- Completely Managed Platform: Hevo is fully managed. You need not invest time and effort to maintain or monitor the infrastructure involved in executing codes.
- Data Transformation: It provides a simple interface to perfect, modify, and enrich the data you want to transfer.
- Schema Management: Hevo takes away the tedious task of schema management & automatically detects the schema of incoming data and maps it to the destination schema.
- Real-Time Data Transfer: Hevo with its strong integration with 100+ sources, allows you to transfer data quickly & efficiently. This ensures efficient utilization of bandwidth on both ends.
Simplify your Data Analysis with Hevo today!
SIGN UP HERE FOR A 14-DAY FREE TRIAL!Prerequisites
- Working knowledge of Google Analytics.
- Working knowledge of Google Data Studio.
- Google Analytics account.
- Google Data Studio account.
How to Use Google Data Studio?
Go to the official Data Studio site and sign in using your Google account. Once you have signed in successfully, you will reach the reports page. This page provides you with a brief overview of reporting in Data Studio with the help of some samples. Go through them and understand the different kinds of reports that can be generated and the various sources from which you can bring data.
To create a new report, click on the blank report option as follows:
You will now be prompted to add a data source to start analyzing your data. Click on the data sources tab (adjacent to the reports tab) to open a list of data sources you have already added.
To add new/more data, click on the create button located at the top right corner. You can check the explorers available for your account by selecting the explorer tab, located just next to data sources.
To check the reports that have been shared with you, navigate to the panel on the left and select the shared with me option. You can also check the reports you’ve created using the owned by me option.
To recover or view the deleted reports, you can use the trash option available on the panel.
This is how you can use Google Data Studio.
Importance of Google Analytics Data Studio Deployment
Using Google Analytics Data Studio setup, you can experience improved Search Engine Optimization and optimize your Content Marketing. Google Analytics, allows you to identify the web pages that are pulling in high traffic for your business. Moreover, this tool provides you with great insights into the changes that your product performance has experienced in recent times.
The analysis offered by Google Analytics Data Studio will allow you to make changes to your content and user-interaction approaches. Since Google Analytics facilitates the tracking of your Content, you can monitor the effects of your changes in real-time. Therefore, by analyzing all aspects of your content strategy, you will be able to develop a functional and stable plan to reproduce the success of your content in future work.
The Google Analytics Data Studio combination also provides you with several features that may even overcome certain limitations of Google Analytics. For instance, Google Analytics has a limit of 12 graphs/charts in one report. However, in Google Analytics Studio, you can include any number of widgets or visualizations. You can also customize these widgets to include the metrics which your teams require.
The ease of use, advanced features, and the ability to customize details are the main reasons why you should use the Google Analytics Data Studio combination.
Connecting Google Analytics to Data Studio
You can connect Google Analytics to Data Studio using the following steps:
- Step 1: Signing in to Google Data Studio
- Step 2: Connecting to a Data Source
- Step 3: Establishing a Connection
Step 1: Signing in to Google Data Studio
Go to the official Data Studio site and sign in using your Google account. Once you have signed in successfully, you will reach the reports page. To create a new report, click on the blank report option as follows:
Step 2: Connecting to a Data Source
A small pop-up with three options namely report, data source, and explorer will now appear. Click on the data source option to bring in your data from a source of your choice. A list of google connectors for various sources will show up, select the desired source from these options. You can even search for a source with the help of the search bar located at the top. Select Google Analytics.
Step 3: Establishing a Connection
Once you have selected the source, you will be asked to authorize it. Click on the authorize button to allow access to the data stored in Google Analytics.
Carefully select the account, property, and view options for the report you will be generating. Click on connect button located at the top right corner.
This is how you can connect Google Analytics to Data Studio.
Modifying Credential Settings in Google Analytics Data Studio Setup
Data source credentials decide which users are authorized to see your valuable data in your Google Analytics Data Studio setup. The default setting is set to Owner’s Credentials. This means anyone who uses that particular data source can also access your data.
You can modify this Google Analytics Data Studio setting to ensure that each user of that data source has to use their credentials if they want to build reports using your data. To enable this, go to the upper-right fields panel and click on “Using Owner’s Credentials”. Next, in the Data source access option, select “Viewer’s Credentials” and finally click on SAVE.
How to Share Your Data Source in Google Analytics Data Studio Setup?
Once your Google Analytics Data Studio setup is in place, you can share a data source and allow other editors to add your data source in future reports. Navigate to the top right and select the “Share” icon. Now, input destination email addresses (of the users with whom you want to share sources). Next, select permissions for each user from the following choices:
- Can view: Users having this permission will be able to only view your data source.
- Can edit: Users having this permission will be able to both view and edit your data source.
How to Generate Reports in Google Analytics Data Studio Setup?
In the final step of setting up your Google Analytics Data Studio, you have to create reports that analyze data stored in your Google Analytics view. On the top right corner, select “CREATE REPORT” and then select “ADD TO REPORT” in the dialogue box.
That’s it! Your Google Analytics Data Studio is all set and working.
Limitations of Connecting Google Analytics to Data Studio
- Connecting Google Analytics to Data Studio can help bring in data from various sources, however, it doesn’t query real-time data. This can be achieved by first exporting real-time data as a Google sheet and then using it in Data Studio.
- Google Data Studio allows fetching the data from only one source at a time. This prevents the blending of data from multiple sources and can affect the analysis.
- Reports created using Data Studio can’t be exported as a separate PDF or a file of any other format.
- Data Studio is not the perfect choice for a BI tool, but it works exceptionally well with Google tools.
How to Use Google Analytics Data Studio Set Up for Tracking Report?
You can use Google Analytics to get insights from your reports. Google Analytics is a free digital analytics service that allows you to measure how your website or mobile app is used. You can use Google Analytics to get a holistic view of your Website/App Usage and build insightful Data Studio reports that answer questions such as:
- Which of my reports gets the most views?
- How do users find my report?
- Where do the readers of the report come from?
You can also get automated insights and use Google Analytics` Flexible Explorations feature to dig deeper into your data.
How to Add the Google Analytics ID to the Report?
You can use Google Analytics 4 (GA4) measurement IDs, Universal Analytics (UA) tracking IDs, or both to measure Data Studio reports. To add an ID to your report:
- Edit the report you want to measure.
- Select File> Report Settings.
- Enter the measurement ID or tracking ID in the Report Settings panel.
Conclusion
This article offers a step-by-step solution to connect Google Analytics to Data Studio. It provides a brief introduction of these tools and their operations to help users understand them better and use them to analyze their data efficiently and in real-time. It also introduces an alternative method to simplify your data analysis, which is Hevo.
VISIT OUR WEBSITE TO EXPLORE HEVOHevo is a No-code Data Pipeline to integrate data from 100+ sources including 30+ Free sources like Google Analytics and various other sources and visualize it in Data Studio. Its fault-tolerant architecture ensures that the data is handled in a secure, consistent manner with zero data loss, without writing a single line of code.
Want to take Hevo for a spin?
SIGN UP and experience the true power of Hevo.
Tell us about your experience of connecting Google Analytics to Data Studio! Share your thoughts in the comments section below.
