How to run your first audit? Step by step

Running an audit takes about 2 minutes. A wizard will guide you through 5 steps - from entering your website address to selecting your market. The audit itself runs automatically.

Before you start, make sure that:

•you have a Google account with (at least read) access to the GA4 property you want to audit,

•your website uses Google Analytics 4 - if it doesn't yet, see: I don't have GA4 on my website yet - how do I add it?

Start from the home screen

After signing in, you'll see the home screen with your projects. You can start a new audit in two ways:

•enter your website address in the "Enter a new URL to audit…" field and click Run audit, or

•click the + New project button in the top right corner.

Both open the same wizard.

Tip: if you land on the pricing page instead of the wizard, it means you've used up the project limit on your plan. Re-scanning an existing project is always unlimited - a new project requires a higher plan. More: What's the relationship between a project and an audit?

Step 1 of 5 - Website URL

Enter the address of the website you want to audit, e.g. yourcompany.com or shop.yourcompany.com. You don't need to type https:// - we'll add it automatically.

Make sure it's the same domain your GA4 property measures - in the next steps we'll match the address with a specific property.

Click Continue.

Have multiple domains or subdomains under one property? See: Which URL should I enter if I have multiple domains?

Step 2 of 5 - Connect Google Analytics

Click Connect Google Analytics and sign in with the Google account that has access to your GA4 property. Google will show a consent screen listing the permissions.

We only ask for read-only access:

•View your Google Analytics data - read-only access to reports and configurations,

•List your GA4 properties - to let you select which property to audit,

•Read property settings - tag config, events, conversions, data streams.

We never modify, delete or write any data in your Google Analytics. More on how we handle your data: What permissions does GA4audit need and why?

Once connected, you'll see a confirmation with the email address of the connected account. Connected the wrong account? Click Use a different Google account.

Click Continue.

Step 3 of 5 - Select your GA4 property

You'll see two lists: on the left, the Google Analytics accounts you have access to; on the right, the properties within the selected account.

1.Pick an account from the list on the left - use the search box if you have many.

2.Once an account is selected, its GA4 properties appear on the right. Choose the one that measures the website you entered in step 1.

3.At the bottom you'll see a summary of your selection: account → property. Click Continue.

Can't see your account or property? This usually means you connected a different Google account in step 2 than the one with GA4 access. See: I can't see my Google Analytics account - what should I do?

Domain mismatch warning? If the selected property's data stream points to a different domain than the address from step 1, we'll show a warning. You can continue, but the audit (including the site crawl) will reflect the property's website - make sure you picked the right one.

Step 4 of 5 - Business type

Choose the model that best describes your website:

•E-commerce - you sell products online. The audit will focus on purchase events, cart tracking and revenue attribution.

•Service / Lead gen - you generate leads or sell services. The audit will focus on form submissions, calls and conversion paths.

This choice tailors the audit scope to your business model - some checkpoints (e.g. the purchase funnel) apply only to online stores. More: How does the business type affect my results?

Click Continue.

Step 5 of 5 - Market & currency

Select your primary market (country) and your reporting currency. We use this to validate currency parameters in your events and benchmark conversion rates.

In most cases the defaults suggested from your domain will already be correct - just confirm them.

Click Start audit.

What happens during the scan?

The audit usually takes 1-3 minutes. On screen, you'll see the progress through the stages:

1.connecting to the GA4 Admin API,

2.reading the property configuration,

3.checking data streams & enhanced measurement,

4.auditing key events & conversions,

5.checking attribution settings,

6.analyzing integrations,

7.running data quality checks,

8.compiling results.

In parallel, we live-scan your website to verify that the GA4 tag is implemented correctly.

Done - your first report

When the scan finishes, you'll see a report with your Quality score and the list of checkpoints grouped into thematic categories. Where to go next:

•How is the Quality score calculated?

•What do the statuses mean: Pass, Warning, Error, N/A?

•How does the Action plan work?

Something went wrong?

•My audit failed or got stuck - what should I do?

•"Your GA4 connection session has expired" - how to fix it?

•Still stuck? Write to us: contact@ga4audit.io