Google Analytics adds Google Business Profile data


Google published documentation for a native link between Google Business Profile and Google Analytics, integrating local metrics like calls and directions requests into Analytics reports. The link may not yet appear in all Analytics accounts.

What appears in Analytics

Once a profile is linked, a Google Business Profile section appears in your reports. It includes seven metrics: interactions, website clicks, calls, directions, messages, reservations and menus. You create the link in the Analytics admin panel, under Product Links.

What the link doesn’t do

If you link multiple profiles, Analytics combines the metrics from each of them. You cannot segment or filter by individual location. Metrics also cannot be used in explorations, comparisons, or filters, and integration does not work for subproperties.

Analytics retains business profile data for six months. Reports won’t show anything older, even if your Analytics date range goes back further.

Analytics also differs from the Business Profile dashboard in one way. It shows all business profile statistics, regardless of your business type, while the dashboard hides statistics that don’t apply to you.

Why it matters

Until now, Analytics could only view business profile traffic through UTM tags on links in your profile, which primarily capture website clicks. Calls, directions, and reservations happen on the profile itself, and a native link integrates these local actions into Analytics alongside web data. For a single-site business, this consolidation comes into a tool they already use. Multi-location brands and agencies benefit less than a single-location business.

Looking to the future

Google’s help document doesn’t specify whether the link is available for all Analytics accounts or whether location-based reporting will follow. Analytics contains six months of business profile data. It therefore shows recent local trends rather than a long-term record. For now, the Business Profile Dashboard, Exports, and Performance API still provide more location-level detail than the Analytics integration.


Featured Image: Skorzewiak/Shutterstock



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