Google Analytics Premium & BigQuery: Access Raw Data In Seconds

May 16, 2013 | Dorcas Alexander

One of the advantages of Google Analytics Premium is that you can get unsampled data, but it’s still processed data. Have you dreamed of getting access to your raw GA data?

Those dreams are about to come true. Announced today at Google I/O: later this year BigQuery will be available to users of Google Analytics Premium.

Query hit-level data at interactive speed

BigQuery is a web service that lets you query billions of rows, a.k.a. Big Data, with a response time in seconds. Without Google Analytics Premium, you upload some data first and then run your queries.

With Google Analytics Premium, your hit-level GA data will be available for the same type of interactive ad hoc queries. Pose a question, get an answer. Does that lead to another question? Rinse and repeat! You can batch queries, too.

Build complex queries and join data sets

Direct granular access to your GA data opens the door for all kinds of complex queries. You’ll also be able to combine data sets from other sources for powerful business insights.

Imagine having data at your fingertips to solve problems like these:

  • Narrow segments of large data sets with no sampling: For the past two years, how many purchases came from a social referral and what designer drove the most referrals and conversions per product category?
  • Offline purchases for visitors with loyalty cards who also log in to your site: Are visitors who click on display ads more likely to come into the store and buy? What pages do they view before coming to the store and what do they eventually purchase?
  • Language processing with regex across massive data sets: Which groups of organic keywords brought the best-qualified visitors? Which visitors converted the most (consumed content, became a sales lead, or bought something), and how does what they read, submitted, or bought relate to what they searched for?

If you’re a Google Analytics Premium customer, or thinking about becoming one, consider all the data sets you could combine with GA and BigQuery: from customer data, to inventory, to content management, taxonomies, and more.

LunaMetrics is an Authorized Reseller of Google Analytics Premium, and we’ll be happy to help.

All the benefits of BigQuery

The integration of BigQuery with Google Analytics Premium connects all the benefits of the BigQuery service to your GA data:

  • Google’s computing power delivers insights in seconds rather than hours.
  • No up-front investments, either in hardware or software licensing.
  • Collaborate quickly and securely using Access Control Lists.
  • Protect your data with multiple layers of security from Google.
  • Store as much as you want. Pay only for what you use.

Not familiar with BigQuery and want to learn more? Get the details or watch the video for a good overview of how it works.

If you’ve been on the fence about Google Analytics Premium, does this new feature move you? What’s your reaction? Please share in the comments.