Customer Journey Mapping: Google Analytics + Google Ads
What do customers do before they call or book? askotter reads Google Analytics and Google Ads together and answers it for your business, by text.
How does customer journey mapping with Google Analytics and Google Ads work for a small business?
askotter reads Google Analytics and Google Ads side by side so it can map the path customers take across your accounts. The whole path in one view, with every visit and decision point on it.
Read the full answerShow less
The owner asks follow-up questions by text.
- From Google Analytics
- Sessions and pageviews, User demographics and geography, Traffic source and medium.
- From Google Ads
- Campaign performance, Keyword data and quality scores, Ad group and creative performance.
- Status
- Both connect today.
- Not for
- Replacing Google Analytics or Google Ads. Both keep working exactly as they do now.
What do customers do before they call or book?
On paper the path is simple: someone sees an ad, visits the site and books. In real life they search twice, read reviews and come back days later on a different phone. Each tool sees only its own piece.
How askotter handles it
askotter reads Google Analytics and Google Ads side by side, so it can map the path customers take across your accounts.
A person checks the result before it reaches you. This is part of our GA4 setup work.
How Google Analytics and Google Ads records line up
Google Analytics and Google Ads can both hold the Google click ID that Google Ads adds to the landing page URL when auto-tagging is on. That ties one paid click to what the same visitor did afterwards.
Google Analytics and Google Ads both report by page. URLs are normalised first (protocol, trailing slash and tracking parameters removed) and then joined page by page.
Shared between the two: the Google click ID (gclid), the page URL and the UTM campaign tags.
What customer journey mapping uses from each
Customer journey mapping needs the order of events for one person.
From Google Analytics that means the sequence of pages and events in each session. From Google Ads it means the search term and click time for each visitor.
What each tool sees on its ownShow less
Google Analytics on its own
GA4 sees what people do on the site. It does not see refunds, repeat purchases made offline, or the deal a lead turned into later.
Timing. GA4 collects events in near real time, and Google says standard reports can take 24 to 48 hours to finish processing.
Access. The GA4 Data API with read access to the property.
Google Ads on its own
Google Ads counts the conversions it can see through its own tag. It cannot tell a refunded sale from a kept one, or a junk lead from a good one.
Timing. Google Ads credits a conversion back to the date of the click, so yesterday's conversion count can still rise for days.
Access. The Google Ads API with read access to the account.
Related guides
- How to Track AI Traffic in Google Analytics. It is already in your analytics. It is just filed under Referral with everything else.
- SEO Forecasting: What the Models Get Wrong. Every SEO forecast is a chain of estimates multiplied together. Understanding which link is weakest tells you how much to trust the number.
Services that use these connections
Other analyses: Google Analytics + Google Ads
Questions about Google Analytics + Google Ads
Do I need a developer to connect Google Analytics and Google Ads?
How is askotter's Customer Journey Mapping different from what Google Analytics shows on its own?
Connect Google Analytics + Google Ads. Five minutes.
Plans are on the digital marketing pricing page.
Self-managed is $99/mo and scales with the compute you use. Our team runs it from $600/mo.