Google Analytics 4 (GA4) helps local SEO by showing where your visitors are, which channels bring them, which landing pages they arrive on and whether they take actions such as calling or sending a form. Set it up with key events, link it to Search Console, tag your Google Business Profile website link with UTM parameters, and review a short list of reports each month.
Universal Analytics stopped processing data in 2023, so GA4 is the only Google Analytics you can use now. If your old guide mentions Behavior Flow or goals, those belong to the older version. This post uses GA4 terms as Google’s help pages use them today.
What GA4 can and cannot tell you about local SEO
GA4 measures what happens on your website. It does not show how many people saw your Google Business Profile or tapped “Call” on the profile itself. That data lives in the Business Profile performance view and in Search Console. Treat the three as a set:
- Google Business Profile shows views, calls, direction requests and website clicks from the listing.
- Search Console shows the queries and pages that appeared in Google Search, with impressions, clicks and positions.
- GA4 shows what visitors do after they arrive, and which of them become enquiries.
Used together, they answer the question local businesses care about: did the work we did in search bring in real customers from the places we serve?
Step 1: Check the GA4 setup
Before you read any report, confirm the basics are right. Bad setup produces confident but wrong numbers.
- Install the tag once. Put the Google tag on every page through your CMS, a tag manager or a plugin. Two copies of the tag double-count page views. Our guide to WordPress plugins for Google Analytics lists options if you use WordPress.
- Keep enhanced measurement on in the web data stream settings. It records page views, scrolls, outbound clicks, site search, file downloads and similar interactions without extra code.
- Exclude your own traffic. If you or your staff visit the site daily, set up an internal traffic filter in the admin area, following Google’s guidance on internal traffic.
- Link Search Console. In GA4 admin, open product links and connect the Search Console property for your site. You can then see search queries and landing page data inside GA4 once the Search Console reports are added to your report navigation. Google explains the steps in its Search Console integration help page.
- Check the time zone and currency in the property settings so reports line up with your business day.
Step 2: Record the actions that matter to a local business
Visits are interesting, but enquiries pay the bills. In GA4, any event can be marked as a key event, which is the term Google now uses where older guides said conversions. Choose the actions that tell you someone is ready to deal with you.
Actions worth tracking
- A contact or quote form submitted
- A tap on the phone number (a link that starts with tel:)
- A click on an email link (mailto:)
- A click on a “Get directions” or map link
- A booking or appointment request, if you use an online booking tool
- A click on a WhatsApp or chat button
How to record them
Form submissions are often recorded by a thank-you page or by a form plugin that sends an event. Taps on phone and email links are not part of the automatic outbound click event, which covers links to other domains, so most sites record them using Google Tag Manager with a link click trigger, then send a named event to GA4. Give events clear names, such as phone_click or form_submit. Then, in the GA4 admin area under events, mark the ones that matter as key events.
Test every event in the DebugView or the Realtime report before you rely on it. Click the button yourself and confirm the event appears. If you cannot see it, the report in a month will be empty.
Step 3: Tag your Google Business Profile website link
Visits from your Business Profile can blend into ordinary organic traffic unless you tag the link. Add UTM parameters to the website URL in your profile so GA4 can tell them apart. Example URL to adapt:
https://www.example.com/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=gbpUse one tag for the profile and a different one if you have several locations, for example a campaign value per branch. Use lower case and keep the naming the same each time, because GA4 treats “GBP” and “gbp” as different values. Do not tag links from your own pages that point to other pages on your site, as that overwrites the original traffic source.
After a few days, open the Traffic acquisition report, switch the dimension to session source and medium, and look for the tagged traffic. If it does not appear, check that the URL in the profile saved correctly and that your site does not strip parameters in a redirect.
Step 4: The reports worth checking each month
Traffic acquisition: how people found you
Open the Traffic acquisition report under Acquisition. It groups sessions by default channel group, such as Organic Search, Direct, Referral, Organic Social and Paid Search. For local SEO, watch Organic Search. Add a comparison or secondary dimension to see source and medium. Notice how your tagged profile traffic compares with ordinary search visits.
A rise in Organic Search for a few months after a round of work is the kind of trend to look for. A single week tells you very little, so compare month to month.
Landing pages: where visitors arrive
The Landing page report sits under Engagement. It lists the first page of each session. Filter it to organic search traffic with a comparison, and check whether your service pages and area pages are among the top entries. If the page that should win for “boiler repair Ranelagh” is not receiving visits, look at that page first.
For each important landing page, look at engaged sessions, engagement rate and key events. A page that gets visits but no enquiries needs a clearer call to action, a visible phone number or better proof.
Location: where visitors are
The demographic details report in the User section of Reports breaks visitors down by country, region and city. For local SEO, it helps answer whether your visitors come from the places you serve. If a Dublin plumber finds most of their traffic coming from another country, the content or the search terms are off. Remember that the data is based on IP addresses and is approximate, particularly for mobile networks, so use it for patterns and not for exact locations.
For a more tailored view, build an exploration. Choose landing page as a row, add city or region as a second dimension, and add sessions and key events as values. This is the closest GA4 comes to “which area pages bring which visitors”.
Device: phone versus desktop
Add device category as a comparison in your reports. Many local searches happen on phones, so check whether phone visitors engage and enquire at a similar rate to desktop visitors. If phone visitors leave faster or never tap a key event, look at load speed, button size and whether the phone number is a tap-to-call link. Our mobile optimisation guide shows what to check.
Paths: how visitors move through the site
The old Behavior Flow report no longer exists. In GA4, use a path exploration, built in the Explorations area, to see the pages visitors view after a landing page, or before they reach your contact page. It helps you spot dead ends, such as a service page that never links to the contact form.
Step 5: Combine GA4 with Search Console
With the two linked, you can see which queries led to which pages in Search Console, then look at what happened next in GA4. Use Search Console to find queries that include your place names or “near me” variants, check that the matching pages exist, and look at pages with plenty of impressions but few clicks. A weak title or description often explains the gap. For more on this, read our guide to tracking local SEO performance.
A simple monthly routine
- Compare Organic Search sessions with the previous month and with the same month last year if you have data.
- Check the tagged Business Profile traffic and its key events.
- Review the top landing pages and look for any that lost visits.
- Check key events by city or region to see which areas produce enquiries.
- Look at the phone versus desktop split for each main page.
- Write down one change to make before next month, and record what you did so you can judge it later.
Keep the notes in a simple log. It is the only way to tie a result to the change that caused it.
Common mistakes
- Treating GA4 as the whole picture. Calls from the profile itself never touch your website, so they will not appear in GA4.
- Counting every event as a conversion. Mark only the actions that suggest a real enquiry as key events.
- Not tagging the profile link. Without it, profile visits are mixed with ordinary organic traffic.
- Reading tiny numbers as trends. A small business with a few hundred sessions a month will see noise. Look at longer periods.
- Ignoring consent rules. Depending on where your visitors are, you may need a cookie consent setup before the tag runs. Check the requirements for your region.
Frequently asked questions
Can GA4 show me my Google Business Profile calls?
No, not on its own. Calls and direction requests made from the profile are shown in the Business Profile performance view. GA4 only sees visits that reach your website, plus any events you record there.
What happened to conversions in GA4?
Google renamed them key events. You mark an event as a key event in GA4 admin, and the reports then show how often it happens and where it came from. The idea is the same as before.
Where do I see traffic by city?
Use the demographic details report in the User section of Reports and choose city as the dimension. You can also add city as a secondary dimension in an exploration or a comparison. The data is approximate because it is based on IP address.
Do I need Google Tag Manager?
You do not need it for page views, but it makes tracking phone taps, email clicks and button clicks much easier without editing the site code. Many local sites use it for exactly that.
Why does my Business Profile traffic show as organic search?
Without UTM tags, visits from the profile often arrive as Google organic traffic. Adding utm_source, utm_medium and utm_campaign to the website link separates them. Keep the values consistent so reports stay clean.
Is GA4 enough for local SEO, or do I need other tools?
GA4 plus Search Console and the Business Profile view cover most small business needs. Rank tracking tools can add position data for specific searches, but they are optional.
How long before the data is useful?
You will see basic traffic on day one, but trends need weeks or months of data. Build the setup first, then compare month on month. Key events only count from the day you create them, so set them up early.
Where to go next
Pair this setup with a list of the measures that matter in our post on key metrics for local SEO success. If you serve several areas, see how local SEO for multiple locations structures pages so that GA4 reports are easy to read. For a general overview of the platform, a beginner’s guide to Google Analytics 4 covers the interface.