Google Analytics offers a set of APIs that allow ecommerce platform providers to integrate with Google Analytics and offers users a rich set of analytics and tools to optimize and improve their ecommerce businesses.
Ecommerce implementation overview
The end-to-end solution to enable Google Analytics for ecommerce platform providers is organized into 4 main implementation components:
Each component adds additional value for the user. It’s up to the service provider to determine which components to implement for users and which scenarios to support.
1. The Google tag (gtag.js)
If you are starting a new implementation it is recommended that you use gtag.js for Google Analytics web and ecommerce tracking. You can also continue to use analytics.js if you have an existing implementation and want to enable ecommerce tracking.
Resources:
2. Enhanced Ecommerce
Once you are using the Google tag (gtag.js), you can begin to implement Enhanced Ecommerce. To do so, follow the Developer Guide for implementing enhanced ecommerce with gtag.js.
We recommend implementing enhanced ecommerce in full, which includes measurement of:
- Product list impressions and clicks (for example, measuring the impression of a product in a list of search results)
- Internal promotion impressions and clicks (such as banners displayed to promote a sale on another section of a website)
- Product detail views
- Add/remove from cart
- All checkout steps and checkout options where relevant
- Transactions
- Refunds
3. Reporting
Data Studio can be used to create reports and dashboards using the Google Analytics connector. To provide insights for your customers the reports can be shared or embedded as a dashboard from within your product.
For a fully customized dashboard solution, you can use the Google Analytics Reporting API to query a user's reporting data and then visualize as desired.
Resources:
- Data Studio to easily create shareable and embeddable reports for your customers
- Reporting API
- Multi-Channel Funnels Reporting API
- Real Time Reporting API
4. Automated Onboarding
Google Analytics offers APIs that allow the Ecommerce Platform to create a new Property, or View on behalf of the user. It is also possible to turn on the Enhanced Ecommerce reports programmatically. This allows for a simplified new user signup flow that the user can complete entirely on your site.
Additionally, the Management API can be used to automate other configuration tasks, such as creating new filters or goals, listing property IDs for the tracking code, and configuring user access.
Resources:
- Management API to create new Properties, Views, Filters, and Goals
- Turn on Enhanced Ecommerce by setting the Ecommerce and Enhanced Ecommerce properties of a View (see example code to update a View)
- The Management API can also be used to retrieve and configure Google Analytics entities
Non-automated Onboarding
If the Management API is not used to create or retrieve the Google Analytics Property/Tracking ID and to enable the Enhanced Ecommerce reports, then include the following information in your help center or FAQ pages:
- How to find the Google Analytics Property/Tracking ID (example: UA-XXXX-Y), and how to sign up for a new Google Analytics account if the user is new to Google Analytics
- How to turn on Enhanced Ecommerce in the view settings, in order to view the Enhanced Ecommerce data in Google Analytics
- How to label each step in the checkout funnel (optional)