Which Google Analytics 4 events should you track based on your business (e-commerce, lead gen, SaaS)?

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) lets you measure many interactions on your website: page views, clicks, downloads, video plays, purchases, form submissions, etc. But not all Google Analytics events carry the same weight. The data you should collect depends above all on your business and the goals you want to track.

What is a GA4 event?

In Google Analytics 4, an event corresponds to an action performed by a visitor on your website or app. Each interaction generates data that is then used in Google Analytics reports.

A page view, a click on a link, a video play, a document download or a purchase are all examples of events in Google Analytics 4.

Unlike Universal Analytics, which worked mainly around sessions and pages, Google Analytics 4 relies on a much more flexible approach. Each event has a name and can be enriched with various parameters to provide more information.

For example:

• A download event.
• An internal site search.
• A click on a contact button.
• A video play.
• A newsletter signup.
• A purchase made on the site.

This logic gives you much more precise tracking of user behavior!

Why aren’t all Google Analytics events equal?

Before creating dozens of events in Google Analytics, it’s important to understand that they aren’t all equally useful. The goal isn’t to measure as much data as possible, but to track the interactions that have real value for your business.

The different types of events in Google Analytics 4

Google Analytics 4 distinguishes several types of events:

• Automatically collected events created by default.
• Events from enhanced measurement.
• Events recommended by Google.
• Custom events created according to your needs.

Automatic events cover certain basic interactions such as first visits or page views. Recommended events, meanwhile, follow the conventions defined by Google Analytics 4 to make reports easier to work with. Finally, custom events offer more freedom when tracking needs are specific.

Why align your tracking with your business goals?

An event is only useful if it helps answer a business question.

Indeed, an e-commerce business will want to measure the steps of the purchase funnel, a lead generation company will be more interested in submitted forms, and a SaaS will rather track the actions that reflect user activation and engagement.

In other words, the number of events tracked matters less than their relevance. We’ll explain all of this in the next part of this article!

Which Google Analytics events should you track based on your business?

The important events aren’t the same from one activity to another. Your tracking plan should therefore be built around the conversions that truly create value.

For an e-commerce site

In e-commerce, Google Analytics events are mainly used to analyze the purchase funnel and understand where visitors abandon their journey. The goal isn’t only to measure final sales, but also all the steps leading up to them.

The most common recommended events include:

• Viewing a product page.
• Adding to cart.
• Starting the checkout funnel.
• Adding payment information.
• The final purchase.
• Applying a promo code.
• Internal site search.

This data then lets you identify friction points. For example, if many visitors add products to their cart but leave the site before paying, it may reveal an issue with shipping costs, trust signals or user experience.

Beyond purchases, some online retailers also choose to track clicks on certain product pages, interactions with videos or the use of the internal search engine. All this information provides a better understanding of visitor behavior and makes conversion rate optimization easier.

For a lead generation site

The logic is different for a lead generation site. Here, the conversion isn’t necessarily an immediate sale, but rather acquiring a qualified prospect.

Depending on your activity, several actions can carry strong value: submitting a contact form is obviously a classic, but it’s not the only meaningful indicator. Booking an appointment, clicking on a phone number, downloading a guide or signing up for a newsletter can also be important goals.

In some industries, these micro-conversions even represent the first step of a sales cycle that can last several weeks, or even several months. That’s why it’s essential to build a tracking plan tailored to the way you sell.

Take the example of a B2B company: a visitor who downloads a white paper or requests a demo isn’t a customer yet, but they’re already showing interest in your services. These Google Analytics events then let you assess the quality of the traffic generated by your Google Ads campaigns or your SEO efforts.

For a SaaS

Event tracking in a SaaS follows yet another logic. Unlike an e-commerce site, success doesn’t come down to a single transaction: what really matters is users’ ability to adopt the product and use it over time.

Take the example of a project management software: someone can create a free account without ever returning to the platform. Conversely, a user who creates their first project, invites collaborators and uses several key features is much more likely to become a customer.

That’s why SaaS companies generally track events related to user activation and engagement. Signing up is often a starting point, but it’s only one step among others.

In practice, some events are watched particularly closely:

• Account creation.
• Email address verification.
• Creating the first project.
• Using an important feature.
• Inviting other users.
• Upgrading to a paid plan.

This data helps you better understand user behavior and identify the steps that drive retention.

So each business model has its own measurement logic. That’s precisely why there’s no universal list of Google Analytics events to set up. Good tracking is above all tracking tailored to your business goals.

How to create and customize your events in Google Analytics 4?

Once your tracking plan is defined, all that’s left is to translate these needs into Google Analytics 4. Good news: some events can be created directly from the GA4 interface, while more advanced needs will require Google Tag Manager!

The steps to create an event in Google Analytics 4

Google Analytics 4 lets you create new events without having to modify your website’s code. This feature is especially useful when you want to create an event from an interaction already measured by GA4. Google also specifies that an event created in the interface is always based on an existing event. (Source: Google, Analytics Help, “Rename and generate new events”)

To create an event, you generally need to:

1. Go to your Google Analytics 4 property.
2. Open the Admin section.
3. Go to Data display, then Events.
4. Click Create event, then Create.
5. Choose the existing event that will serve as the basis (for example page_view).
6. Define the conditions that must be met.
7. Give the new event a name.
8. Save the configuration.

For example, you can create a specific event when a user lands on a confirmation page after submitting a contact form. This event can then be marked as a conversion so it appears more easily in reports.

A quick clarification: this doesn’t mean you have to wait for a user to perform an action before you can measure it. However, Google Analytics 4 can’t invent a new interaction that isn’t already sent to it. For example, you can create an event from an existing page view, but tracking a click on a specific button will generally require additional configuration, often via Google Tag Manager.

How to customize your events in Google Analytics 4?

Not all businesses have the same needs, as we saw in the previous section. That’s why Google Analytics 4 lets you enrich events with various parameters to collect more information.

For example, an event can be associated with a value, a content type, a product ID or other information specific to your activity. These parameters then let you get more detailed reports and refine your performance analysis.

You can also turn certain events into conversions (now called “key events” by Google) to put more emphasis on the actions that really matter for your company.

The goal isn’t to create as many events as possible, but to build tracking that is consistent with your business goals.

Using Google Tag Manager to create custom events

When needs become more advanced, Google Tag Manager brings a lot more flexibility. The tool lets you create custom events that aren’t necessarily supported natively by Google Analytics 4.

It then becomes possible to measure more specific interactions such as:

• Clicks on certain buttons.
• Downloads of particular documents.
• Interactions with a form.
• Watching a video.
• The use of a specific feature on your site.

Google also recommends prioritizing recommended events when they already exist. Custom events should mainly be used when no standard event meets your need!

If you’re just getting started, you can read our article on the difference between Google Tag Manager and Google Analytics 4 to better understand the role of each tool.

Conclusion

Google Analytics 4 offers great flexibility for measuring visitor interactions on your website. But good tracking isn’t about tracking as many events as possible: the key is mainly to collect the data that has real value for your business.

An e-commerce site, a lead generation company or a SaaS don’t pursue the same goals and therefore don’t need the same tracking plan. By taking the time to identify the Google Analytics events that matter most for your business, you’ll get more reliable reports and more usable data to guide your marketing decisions.

GA4 events FAQ