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timcavey
timcavey
Helper ⭐️⭐️
June 23, 2023
Solved

Google Analytics 4 - content drilldown not available by default?

  • June 23, 2023
  • 6 replies
  • 556 views

For anyone that uses Google Analytics (GA), you may remember that the pre-GA4 ‘Behaviour’ menu had a ‘Site content’ sub menu and a ‘Content drilldown’ sub sub menu. e.g

 

 

This was a helpful way to see page view volumes and more at a forum category level.

 

It seems that GA4 doesn’t have this by default. Chat GPT is suggesting I need to set up a custom dimension for this and then implement tracking of this event via my GTM script. Is this really necessary to get something I see as pretty basic. 

 

Any recommendations, other then move to Mixpanel? 

    Best answer by Alistair FIeld

    Morning @timcavey 

    Nice spot. 

    TBH, I do not use much of the GA analytics reporting. I instead have had the GA linked to Google Looker Studio.

    I have done the same with GA4, and connected the two. I also know our PM team are working on a Looker connector for the Data Lake.

    To get over not having Page Level 1, I can create a new field with a regex expression to capture that part of the url.

    REGEXP_EXTRACT( Full page URL , '\/([a-zA-Z0-9-]+)\/')

     

     

    I do not have a better solution. I think it beats putting in custom events etc.

     

    6 replies

    Alistair FIeld
    Alistair FIeldAnswer
    Expert ⭐️
    June 26, 2023

    Morning @timcavey 

    Nice spot. 

    TBH, I do not use much of the GA analytics reporting. I instead have had the GA linked to Google Looker Studio.

    I have done the same with GA4, and connected the two. I also know our PM team are working on a Looker connector for the Data Lake.

    To get over not having Page Level 1, I can create a new field with a regex expression to capture that part of the url.

    REGEXP_EXTRACT( Full page URL , '\/([a-zA-Z0-9-]+)\/')

     

     

    I do not have a better solution. I think it beats putting in custom events etc.

     

    The needs of the many, outweigh the needs of the few. 🖖
      timcavey
      timcaveyAuthor
      Helper ⭐️⭐️
      June 26, 2023

      This is great, thanks @Alistair FIeld.

       

      A quick follow up, this regex config would be done on Google Looker Studio would it? 
       

      Also am I correct in saying I would edit the regex so that it searches for the specific file path that I want? x8

       

      learning, sharing and repeat
      Alistair FIeld
      Alistair FIeld
      Expert ⭐️
      June 27, 2023

      @timcavey 

      This Regex expression finds the first part of the string that matches the expression. In this case it returns the first part of the url between the first two forward slashes. Here are a couple of examples.

       

      https://community.insided.com/got-a-question-38/as-an-admin-may-i-merge-two-registered-user-accounts-into-one-3449

      https://community.insided.com/analytics-and-reporting-156/google-analytics-4-content-drilldown-not-available-by-default-5942

       

      This how this regular expression breaks down:

      • \/ matches the forward slash ("/") character.
      • ([a-zA-Z0-9-]+) captures one or more alphanumeric characters or hyphens.
      • \/ matches the closing forward slash ("/") character.

       

      Looker requires the double backslash to escape regular expression metacharacters. 

      The field is created within the the data resource in Looker, yes.

       

      The needs of the many, outweigh the needs of the few. 🖖
        Suvi Lehtovaara
        Suvi Lehtovaara
        Helper ⭐️⭐️
        June 28, 2023

        Thanks @Alistair FIeld for the instructions, was able to build this in our Looker studio 😊

        And thanks @timcavey for asking this, had actually never thought of using the content drilldown. I guess it’s better late than never 🤣

        https://yhteiso.elisa.fi/
          timcavey
          timcaveyAuthor
          Helper ⭐️⭐️
          July 13, 2023

          Such great support, thanks @Alistair FIeld 

           

          I’ve been able to set that up very easily. I’m in the process of setting up the ‘report’ using this page level 1 data field. Where would I find and add user metrics such as page views, sessions etc?

           

          Is it a ‘dimension’ or a ‘metric’ - I can’t find either in either currently...

          learning, sharing and repeat
          timcavey
          timcaveyAuthor
          Helper ⭐️⭐️
          July 13, 2023

          Update: it is indeed in the ‘Metrics’ drop down. :)

          learning, sharing and repeat
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