GA4: Brilliant and Broken – Doug Hall’s Honest Take 

At the Digital Analytics Summit 2025, Doug brings a talk that’s part critical assessment, part troubleshooting guide — and part rallying cry to digital analysts: stop complaining and start building. 

Pragmatic optimism, not platform loyalty 

For Doug, GA4 isn’t about love or loyalty, it’s about what works. 

“Don’t drop a tool or platform because of religious arguments,” he says. “Be an engineer. Be a scientist. Don’t let brand loyalty  colour a technical decision.” 

Yes, GA4 has issues. But it also has genuine improvements. Doug lists annotations, configurable menus, and data transfer capabilities as big wins over the old Universal Analytics setup. 

Still, there are some gaps that sting. “Property-level filters are increasingly being missed,” he says. “I want to be able to filter based on a GTM container ID, for example. Protecting against bots, spam, and misconfigured data collection is fundamental to data quality. You can do this to a degree in Server-Side GTM — but it’s better done in the property config.” 

Don’t complain, contribute 

Doug has a sharp take on the typical “GA4 rant” you might see on social media. 

“Don’t just bitch and moan that GA doesn’t do X, Y or Z and damnit, the lousy GA team better do this one feature for me or I’ll say bad things on LinkedIn,” he says with a grin. 

Instead, his advice – especially for newer analysts – is to give feedback that matters. 

“Explain what you’re doing. Give rich context. Show how your clients need to do something with GA data. Explain the business value. Explain how you solve it, and what business function it enables. Always explain the value — ideally at scale — for agencies, clients and Google.” 

That, he argues, is how you help shape the product. 

The future: AI, privacy… and measuring what matters 

Doug doesn’t shy away from the broader shifts reshaping analytics: AI and privacy-first marketing. 

“Privacy is a thing and it’s here to stay,” he says. “But currently, it’s sub-par. The only group of stakeholders to get value out of GDPR so far is lawyers.” 

His verdict? “It’s well founded on the right principles, but the execution is rubbish.” 

So what’s the better direction? “Privacy settings at a user level that are transparently applied without friction,” he says. 

When it comes to AI, Doug sees real promise – especially in agentic AI: systems that act on behalf of users, not just answer questions. “AI as a companion is the right direction,” he says. “It won’t replace humans. Human input is mandatory for high-end functions.” 

He even suggests we might need a shift in what we measure. 

“We have web and app streams in GA,” he notes. “But what happens when your Shopify store is selling to an AI agent via an MCP server? You need to be able to measure the agentic performance.” 

And here comes the punchline: “Marketers need to stop measuring users — PLEASE stop it already! You invest in campaigns, not users. So measure the effectiveness of the investment. Better for business, better for privacy.” 

Want the honest story on GA4? 

If you’re tired of rants but still frustrated with GA4, Doug’s session offers something rare: clarity without complaint. He’ll show what’s working, what’s broken, and how to move forward. Not just as a user, but as a contributor to the evolution of digital analytics. 

Catch Doug Hall live at the Digital Analytics Summit 2025 on October 9 in B. Amsterdam. Get your ticket now. 

Anouk Erens

Interim digital data analist / CRO specialist