Backup Universal Analytics Data?

The deadline to back up your Universal Data is coming up fast. If you do not back up the data by July 1st, 2024 then you will lose it forever.

So should you back it up? If yes then how?

If those are your questions or any other related to Universal Analytics data then this post is for you. Let's tackle these questions one by one.

Should You Back Up UA Data?

That depends on the quality of the data and how you are going to use it.

1. Was data collected properly and were you using it regularly?
2. Have you looked at that data in the past two years?
3. How many years of data do you want to back up?
4. Which data do you want from UA? Pages, Users, Everything, etc.?
5. The granularity of the data? Day, Month, Year, etc.?
6. Where will you store it? Sheets, BigQuery, MS SQL Server, etc,?
7. How do you plan to access it and how often?
8. Do you have any internal resources that will help will you need a third party?

This will help provide clarity.

If you determine that you need then data then the next step is to determine the cost.

There are a few aspects to the cost

1. Labor cost
2. Technology cost
3. Storage cost
4. Query cost

If you have internal resources to help develop a solution then labor costs likely won't matter.

How to Back It Up?

There are a few ways you can back up the data, these are

1. Manual Backup
2. Use GA APIs
3. Use a 3rd Party

Manual Backup

If you have limited data to backup then this will be the cheapest option. Just pull the data by manually copying and pasting it into Google Sheets or Excel. You can also use the download functionality in the reports to download the store that in your folders as CSV, excel, or Google Sheets.

Google Analytics APIs

This process is more involved an requires someone technical. If your organization has developers then you can use their help to use Google Analytics APIs. I won't recommend this option as it is more involved and will cost time and money.

Using a 3rd Party/Agency

There are a few 3rd party tools available that will allow you to back up the data in Google Sheets, Excel, BigQuery, etc. If you have a significant amount of data that needs to be backed up then this is your option.

I recommend backing up the data in BigQuery becuase you can also send GA4 data in BigQuery.  This will allow you to create reports with the data from GA4 and UA in one report.

However using 3rd party also requires setting up your destination i.e. BigQuery with proper permissions, making sure that you pick the right data, know how the data is stored and retrieved, etc. You will also need BigQuery knowledge.  If you have these skills then you can do it on your own. If you don't have these skills then you can contact us at support@optizent.com so that we can help you back up the data and train you on how to use that data.