If you run an online store, you likely realise that data-driven decision-making is the cornerstone to boosting eCommerce conversions. This is why Shopify Analytics and Google Analytics are powerful tools for online businesses. With Shopify's Google Analytics integration, store owners can gain insight into customer behaviour and optimise their business accordingly.
If you are new to Google Analytics, it has a bit of a learning curve. Whether you choose to take the time to become a Google Analytics master or hire an agency to help you with the setup—it is well worth the investment.
When used correctly, Google Analytics can give you the key to understanding your target customers’ online behaviour, thereby increasing sales. This is crucial in the competitive landscape of eCommerce. This complete guide will give you an overview of the tool and put you on the right path to wield Shopify Google Analytics like a pro.
Can You Use Google Analytics with Shopify?
Yes! Using Google Analytics with Shopify isn’t just possible—it’s relatively simple and very effective. Various Google Analytics features and metrics are specific to eCommerce, making it a powerful free tool for Shopify store owners.
Setting up Shopify Google Analytics is not very complicated, as Shopify has released a native integration for the analytics tool. Integrating your Shopify account with Google Analytics is also something you can do for free.
Some main benefits of a Shopify Google Analytics integration are enhanced tracking and improved insight capabilities. Here are some main features of Shopify Google Analytics reports and their benefits:
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Real-time reports: View online store traffic in real-time, including which channels visitors came from.
Benefit: Monitor immediate effects of marketing campaigns or see traffic “live” during big sales. -
Engagement reports: See how long users spend on your pages and other engagement metrics.
Benefit: Analyse pages needing an improved user experience and better “hooks”. -
Acquisition reports: Discover where your store’s visitors, conversions, and revenue come from over time.
Benefit: Gain insights into which channels drive the most traffic and sales for your business. -
eCommerce purchases reports: Learn which products your visitors buy, as well as product quantity, transactions, and time to purchase.
Benefit: Identify products that sell well and which aren’t because of friction.
How to Connect Google Analytics to Shopify in 2025
Let’s look at how to set up Shopify Google Analytics step by step.
Step 1: Set Up Your Google Analytics Account
Before you can get started with Shopify Google Analytics, you first have to create a Google Analytics account. Go to the Google Analytics homepage, where you’ll be prompted to sign into your account. You can use your regular free Google account to access Gmail. If you don’t have a Google account or want a separate one for the business, you can quickly and easily create one.
After you’re signed in, return to the Analytics homepage and select “Start measuring”. Enter the URL of your online store and choose your eCommerce industry. You’ll also be asked to fill in some other details related to your business. Accept the terms of service, and your account setup is complete.
Now, all you have to do is create a Google Analytics 4 property. Enter the name, currency, and time zone, and select your business's industry category and size. Click Create, and your property is ready. You can then create a data stream in your Admin by clicking Data Streams under Data collection and modification, and then Add stream.
Step 2: Connect Shopify to Google Analytics
To link Shopify to Google Analytics, you’ll need to add your tag and measurement ID (previously called tracking ID) to your website. You can find your measurement ID by going to Admin in your Account home and then selecting your property.
Here are the steps to set up your Google tag in Shopify:
- Enter your Shopify account and download the app “Google & Youtube”.
- Go to your Shopify console and search for “Google and YouTube”.
- Install the app from Shopify App Store.
- Click on Connect Google account and choose the owner of your property.
- Under the banner “Looking only to set up Google Analytics 4, click on Get Started.
- Select your property and click Connect.
If you already had the Google & Youtube app installed, you can go to the app and select “Optimize Your Business with Google Analytics”. Select your property and connect.
Step 3: Start Tracking Conversions
It’s finally time to start tracking your eCommerce data and gain insights. Set up your audiences by linking your Google Analytics property to Google Ads and enabling Personalised Advertising. You can then add audiences to your targeting options.
Conversions are measured through events in GA4, which means that you’ll have to create events and mark them as conversions. To get eCommerce-specific tracking, you’ll want to go to the Online Store in Shopify, select Preferences and enable Enhanced eCommerce. Your Shopify Google Analytics reports will then include the behavioural data that provide relevant insights for your business.
Once you’ve added a data stream, you want to verify that your data collection is actually working. Remember that it can take half an hour for the data to collect. After some time, test and verify that your Shopify Google Analytics data is being collected, for example, by using the real-time report function.
Shopify Analytics vs. Google Analytics: Which Is Better?
Is Google Analytics better than Shopify Analytics? The truth is that both tools have their strengths and complement each other. Understanding their differences and using them for the appropriate purposes can help you reap benefits from both.
Benefits of Shopify Analytics
Shopify Analytics is a great resource tailored to the needs of Shopify store owners. It can provide practical reports on sales, inventory management, and customer behaviour. You can get eCommerce insights about customer preferences and purchase patterns. Shopify Reports can give you information on acquisition, profit margins, marketing, and more.
The real-time insights of Shopify Analytics can be a vital tool for online stores that need to make quick decisions and adjustments to their business strategies. In particular, the tools can facilitate inventory decisions, as inventory is tracked in Shopify.
That said, Shopify analytics has its limitations, and that’s where Google Analytics comes in.
Benefits of Google Analytics
One important factor to take into consideration is that Google Analytics is free. Some of the Shopify reports are only available with more expensive plans. This means that certain Shopify Analytics insights are unavailable to online stores with a smaller analytics budget.
A fantastic feature of Google Analytics is that, unlike Shopify Analytics, it allows for cross-domain tracking. This means that data from multiple websites can be compared. Because of this, Google Analytics is a crucial tool for businesses looking for tracking and insights into data across multiple platforms.
Customisability is another aspect where Google Analytics shines. Each property’s reports can be customised with 50 event-related metrics, 50 custom metrics, and 25 custom user dimensions. However, with Shopify Analytics, customisation has its limitations. What’s more, the customisation actually gets worse when you’ve signed up for upgraded plans, as premium Shopify plans have pre-populated reports.
Other unique metrics that Google Analytics offers are Lifetime Value, eCommerce goals, and referring keywords. In short, while using both Shopify and Google Analytics is the best option, you definitely don’t want to miss out on the comprehensive metrics, deep cross-platform insights, and seamless integrations of Google Analytics.
Why Early Data Gathering is Crucial for Your Shopify Store
Gathering data is vital to enhance the customer experience of visitors to your store. It is key in making sure your eCommerce remains competitive. The earlier you start this data collection, the better. Early data gathering can help you spot and predict trends, guiding your optimisation efforts. Fortunately, Shopify Google Analytics enhances early insights into custom behaviour.
When you collect data from the outset, you can identify room for improvement early on. As one example, let’s imagine that your engagement rate is beginning to decline. If you’ve started collecting data early on, you can adjust your strategies to improve engagement before it leads to real losses.
As another example, imagine that one of your online store’s pages has gotten a sudden and unexpected influx of traffic. Noticing this opportunity because of early data collection allows you to optimise your strategies to capitalise on its popularity.
This also clarifies the need for consistent monitoring. Once you have data collection and analytics running, don’t forget to do regular check-ins to analyse room for optimisation. Good practice can be to do a short and straightforward daily check in case of any notable changes, a more detailed weekly check, and a comprehensive monthly review.
Understanding Shopify Google Analytics Conversion Tracking
How can store owners analyse data through Shopify Google Analytics to increase conversions? Your store might have many visitors, but at the end of the day, what matters is how many of them turn into paying customers.
Fortunately, Google Analytics offers the feature ‘conversion tracking’. Conversion tracking enables you to see how many visitors are making conversions. The eCommerce conversion rate shows you how many sessions convert into completed transactions. What’s more, Shopify Google Analytics can give you insights into what led to the conversion. For example, it could have been a product review, description, or offer.
In GA4, merchants can set up conversion goals for specific pages. In the Conversions tab in Google Analytics, you can create a new goal related to the kind of conversion you are interested in. Then, you can set up conversion tracking by creating a tag to track the goal so that conversions will be recognised.
It is important to keep an eye on the right metrics for monitoring sales, product performance, and user interactions. Some key metrics include average engagement time, events per session, and item views. Using conversion tracking and conversion goals will let you leverage the power of Shopify Google Analytics for your eCommerce.
Analysing Data to Increase Shopify Conversions
There are some other essential eCommerce metrics that you need to understand to boost Shopify conversions.
Average order value (AOV) tracks the amount of money spent on average every time an order is placed. It is considered one of the most important eCommerce metrics, as it provides clear insights into customer behaviour.
If your Shopify Google Analytics data tells you that your AOV is relatively low, this will influence your marketing and product pricing. You could maximise your average order value through upselling, cross-selling, or free shipping thresholds.
Two other vital metrics are conversion rates and bounce rates. A conversion rate is the percentage of users who convert into a completed transaction in their session. A bounce rate is the percentage of visitors that leave a page without taking action.
What if your Shopify Google Analytics data tells you that a page’s bounce rates are high and conversion rates are low for a certain kind of device? This can be interpreted as a shopper experience issue with this device. You can then use tests to identify problems with the customer experience on different devices, for example, iPhone and Android.
Once you’ve identified a problem, it’s time to leverage your Shopify Google Analytics data to optimise your store. A/B testing is a crucial part of this data-driven optimisation process. For example, imagine you’ve discovered that customers find your checkout complicated. With A/B testing, you can test the results of a new simplified checkout (A) with your original checkout (B). If A outperforms B, you can implement the new checkout with confidence.
Creating Custom Shopify Google Analytics Dashboards
Many store owners feel overwhelmed by the sheer amount of data they have access to after a Shopify Google Analytics integration. Customised dashboards can help you focus on the metrics that mean the most to you—zero in on the eCommerce insights that suits your needs with custom reports.
You can set up a custom report in Google Analytics by selecting Customization and then +New Custom Report. Choose the report type and then pick the dimensions and eCommerce metrics that matter to your business. Make sure that your report follows the whole funnel, with acquisition metrics, behaviour metrics, and result metrics.
If you’re unsure how to create a customised report, you can also choose one from the Google Solutions Gallery. It has access to custom reports that others have created.
Types of Data Google Analytics Collects for E-Commerce
What essential types of data are collected through Shopify Google Analytics? Here are some data types that are vital for your eCommerce success:
- User demographics: Behavioral data based on your visitors’ age, gender, language, country, and city.
- Acquisition channels: Where your visitors, conversions, and revenue come from over time.
- Product performance: How often a product was viewed, added to a basket, and purchased.
- Shopping behaviour: How much time visitors spend on pages, how many visitors are new vs. returning, what devices they shop on, etc.
All these data can be analysed to help you optimise your Shopify store’s success.
Boost Performance with Professional Shopify Google Analytics Setup + Support
A Shopify Google Analytics integration can unlock a world of eCommerce benefits for your online store. Real-time reports, cross-domain tracking, customisability, and unique eCommerce metrics are all features that enable you to make powerful data-driven optimisations.
Shopify Analytics and Google Analytics are tools that complement each other beautifully. Many online businesses are seeing the positive results of using both tools simultaneously. The benefits make setting up Google Analytics well worth the long-term investment in your store’s growth. The fact that a Shopify Google Analytics integration is free is just the cherry on top.
If the learning curve of setting up Google Analytics feels overwhelming, don’t hesitate to reach out to a Shopify Google Analytics expert, such as Medito. The agency is an expert in conversion rate optimisation and data-driven marketing. If you need help integrating Shopify Google Analytics or interpreting your data, reach out to our Shopify experts today.
