Google Analytics 4 for small businesses: measure enquiries, not just visits

Google Analytics 4 (GA4) is Google’s free tool for seeing what people do on your website: where they came from, which pages they read and whether they got in touch. Set it up once, tell it which actions count as enquiries, and check a few reports each month. If you can’t tell whether something worked, you can’t decide what to do next.

Written by Thys du Plooy. If you can’t measure it, don’t do it. This guide is the measuring part.

GA4 and Search Console: what each tells you

They answer different questions, and you’ll want both. They’re free.

Question	Tool
Which Google searches show my site, and which get clicks?	Google Search Console
Can Google read and index my pages?	Google Search Console
Where do all my visitors come from (Google, social, email, ads)?	Google Analytics 4
Which pages do visitors read, and where do they leave?	Google Analytics 4
How many enquiries did the site bring in?	Google Analytics 4, once it’s set up as below

Step 1: Create a property and add the tag

Go to analytics.google.com and sign in with a Google account that you control, not one belonging to a web designer.
Create an account for your business and a property for your website. Set the time zone and currency to your own.
Add a web data stream for your site’s address. Google gives you a measurement ID that starts with “G-“.
Add that ID to your website. On WordPress, the simplest route is a plugin that does this for you. Other website builders usually have a box for it in their settings. Google Tag Manager is another option if you’re comfortable with it.

If someone else built your site, ask them to add you as an administrator, so the data stays yours if you part ways.

Step 2: Cookies and consent

UK rules on cookies changed in February 2026. If you use analytics only to count visits and see how people use your own site, you may not need to ask for consent first. You do have to tell visitors clearly what you’re doing and give them a simple, free way to opt out. If you also use analytics data for advertising, such as remarketing audiences, or you’re not sure, keep a banner that asks first. This is general information, not legal advice.

Step 3: Two settings to change straight away

Data retention. By default GA4 keeps detailed data for a short time. Change it to the longest option, 14 months, so you can compare this year with last.
Exclude your own visits. You and your staff visit your site a lot, which skews the numbers. GA4 lets you define “internal traffic” by your office IP address and filter it out. The filter starts in a testing state, so remember to switch it to active.

Step 4: Mark your key events

GA4 calls the actions that matter to your business key events (it used to call them conversions). Set up the ones that mean an enquiry:

Action	How it’s usually tracked
Form sent	An event when your thank-you message or page appears
Phone tap	An event when someone taps your phone number
Email tap	An event when someone taps your email address
Booking made	Your booking tool’s own integration, if it has one

GA4’s enhanced measurement records some actions automatically: page views, scrolls (when someone reaches 90% of the way down a page), outbound clicks, site search, YouTube video plays, file downloads and form interactions. Form tracking can be unreliable with some WordPress form plugins, so test it. Phone and email taps usually need a small set-up in your plugin or Tag Manager. Once an event is recording, mark it as a key event.

Then test it: send yourself a form and tap your phone number on your own phone. GA4’s real-time report should show the event within a few minutes.

Step 5: Link Search Console

In GA4’s admin settings, link your Search Console property. You can then see search data and visitor behaviour side by side. If you haven’t set up Search Console yet, start with our Google Search Console guide.

The three reports that matter

GA4 has a lot of reports. For a small business, these three cover most of what you need:

Report	What it tells you	What to look for
Traffic acquisition	Where visitors came from: Google search, maps, social, email, other sites	Which sources bring visitors who then enquire
Pages and screens / landing pages	Which pages people read, and which they arrive on first	Your busiest pages: are they the ones you’d want?
Key events	How many enquiries happened, and from where	The trend month by month

Treat the numbers as a guide, not an exact count (see “What it can’t tell you”).

A 15-minute monthly routine

Open Key events. How many enquiries this month, compared with last month and the same month last year?
Open Traffic acquisition. Which sources brought the enquiries?
Open your landing pages. Which pages bring visitors who enquire, and which bring visitors who leave?
Pick one page to improve this month. Our conversion rate optimisation guide helps with that.
Write down the three numbers and what you changed, so next month means something.

If you run ads or post on social media, add a line for each: what it cost and how many enquiries it brought. Our pages on PPC and social media explain how we think about both.

What it can’t tell you

People who decline cookies or opt out aren’t counted in the usual way, so your figures will be lower than reality.
Phone calls from your Google Business Profile or from a printed flyer don’t touch your website. Keep a simple log of calls, and ask every new customer how they found you.
Why people did something. Analytics shows what happened. Talking to customers tells you why.

DIY or get help?

You can set all of this up yourself, and once it’s running the monthly check takes minutes. Getting help makes sense when you’d rather not touch tracking settings, or when you want someone to read the numbers with you and turn them into next month’s to-do list. Reporting on enquiries, clicks and rankings is part of our SEO service.

FAQs

Is Google Analytics free?

Yes, the standard version is free and is plenty for a small business.

Do I need Google Analytics if I have Search Console?

They do different jobs. Search Console covers Google search. Analytics covers every visitor, from every source, and what they did on your site.

Next steps

Google Search Console guide: the search side of your data
Digital marketing for small businesses: what to track, and what to ignore
Conversion rate optimisation guide: turn more visits into enquiries

Not sure your tracking is counting the right things? Book a free discovery call and, within 48 hours of the call, you’ll get a free audit of your site, so you know what’s working before you spend more. Prefer to have the reporting done for you? Every package includes a monthly report built around your enquiries.

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