Measuring Your University’s Website Performance with GA4

Companies measure online leads and sales. News sites measure article engagement. Nonprofits measure online donations.

But higher education institutions—who must continually recruit new students, drive campus visits, and collect donations while supporting existing students—have to track website performance differently.

If you find it difficult to determine how well your digital presence is actually supporting your institution’s goals, you aren’t alone.

This step-by-step guide walks you through how to use Google Analytics 4 (GA4) and other essential tools to evaluate whether your website is actually supporting your university’s goals.

By using this guide, you’ll be able to:

• Set up Google Analytics 4, GTM, and third-party integrations correctly.
• Measure student applications, RFIs, campus visits, and donations.
• Evaluate custom GA4 events, email campaigns, and site search tools.
• Identify exactly where visitors come from, including organic search, social media, and email.
• Track and measure trends from AI search tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude.