24 Jun 7 Smart Strategies for Reporting on Ad Campaign Results
When it comes to reporting on ad campaign results, the proper data reporting tools and the right tactics make all the difference.
It’s a challenge — and an opportunity — that we see every day at The Threadgill Agency. That’s why we recently attended a webinar to stay agile and up-to-date about Google Analytics 4 (GA4) best practices — from setup and conversion tracking to automation and data-driven attribution.
Whether you’re a seasoned marketer or just diving into GA4, these key takeaways for reporting on ad campaign results, including some of our own hard-won lessons from the field, will help you master the reporting process.
You’ll learn ways to be more efficient, avoid common missteps, and confidently understand how your advertising campaigns are performing to reach your marketing goals and business outcomes.
1. Start with the Right Setup in GA4
Before you can even pass “go” in GA4, it’s essential that you have the right setup in place. That means properly configuring your events, conversions, and account structure so the data you collect reflects actual performance — not just static and noise.
“Understanding user behavior starts with a solid GA4 setup,” said Emma Miller, VP of Operations and Account Management at The Threadgill Agency.
Pro tip: Focus on key events for your GA4 reports — not just standard events that track any user action on your site. Key events are actions you identify that are important to the success of your business — ones that directly impact your bottom line, like purchases, form fills, or bookings. By measuring key events, you can better evaluate marketing performance across all channels that lead users to perform the desired action.
2. Get Granular with Regex
If you’ve ever learned to drive a stick shift, it can be challenging at first, but once you master it, you benefit from more control (and even better fuel efficiency). That’s kind of how regular expressions (regex) work in GA4, according to Chelsey Graham, Senior Digital Account Manager at The Threadgill Agency.
While GA4’s default channel grouping helps categorize your traffic, regex allows for smarter refinement and more flexible definitions for things like data filters, key events, segments, audiences, content groups, and custom channel groups.
Pro tip: Regex can help you clean up hard-to-read, inaccurate, or splintered GA4 reports from multiple (or messy) UTMs.
“It’s worth reviewing your UTM tagging conventions regularly,” Graham said.
By taking some time on the front end to fine-tune your UTMs, you’ll avoid traffic slipping into the dreaded unassigned category and ensure every click is counted correctly.
3. Track Engagement Rate
Engagement rate is in — and bounce rate is officially out (or, at least, it’s far less meaningful).
Instead of tracking how quickly someone leaves your site, GA4 focuses on how deeply they interact.
“It tells a fuller story,” said Graham, adding that even small actions — like scrolling or spending 10 seconds on a page — count as meaningful engagement.
Pro tip: Shift your focus to engagement metrics to truly understand your user behavior and campaign performance.
4. Activate Data-Driven Attribution (But Know Its Limits)
GA4’s data-driven attribution model offers a more nuanced view of what’s actually impacting and influencing conversions.
“It’s not just last-click anymore,” said Miller. Instead, this model looks at multiple touchpoints that could have contributed to a result.
However, data-driven attribution does have its limits, especially with view-through conversions. A view-through conversion is when a user sees, but doesn’t click on an ad. For deeper insights, consider adding in third-party data reporting tools.
Pro tip: Use GA4 for baseline attribution, but supplement with other platforms when needed.
5. Take Advantage of Automated Insights
While you can’t totally “set it and forget it,” GA4 automated insights and alerts can absolutely help. This type of automation helps you stay informed if something changes in your website’s performance by notifying you if a specific condition or anomaly is detected.
“Custom insights and alerts in GA4 can flag tracking issues early,” said Graham. Automated alerts can help identify data issues before they escalate, catching both minor and major hiccups early in the process.
Pro tip: Set up alerts for key events, spikes, or drop-offs to stay ahead of potential problems.
6. Know When to Use Reports vs. Explorations
While both GA4 standard reports and explorations provide actionable insights, they offer different views of the data. In particular, explorations allow for deeper analysis.
“Think of reports as the dashboard and explorations as the lab,” said Miller.
Pro tip: Build a library of reports that are tailored to your KPIs using Looker (a cloud-based business intelligence platform that helps visualize data insights) or GA4’s built-in data reporting tools.
7. Monitor Like a Pro
Ongoing reporting is more than just one monthly check-in. “You need a rhythm,” said Miller.
Weekly metrics should include traffic spikes, unassigned traffic, and key events. Then monthly, you can zoom out to evaluate engagement trends and attribution quality.
Graham also offered some advanced tips, including the following:
- Hover over metrics to understand how they’re calculated.
- Skip pie charts with under three segments.
- Use BigQuery when you need richer attribution data.
Pro tip: Consistent, insightful reporting helps you optimize your ad campaign strategy and increase your bottom line while allowing you to identify issues before they spiral.
Reporting Is a Conversation — Not a Conclusion
“Reporting isn’t just a deliverable. It’s a living, breathing conversation,” said Miller. When your data reporting tools, insights, and strategies are aligned, your campaigns tell a clearer, more actionable story.
It’s time to stop fighting — or ignoring — your dashboards and start making reports work for you.
Need Help with Reporting on Ad Campaign Results?
The Threadgill Agency is here to help you untangle all that GA4 data and turn analytics into action. It’s often a numbers game, so we make sure to know every last one of them–right down to the decimal point.
From GA4 setup to campaign reporting strategy, our team can ensure you have clarity and confidence about your ad campaign performance and beyond. Let’s talk.