Black Friday and Cyber Monday are just around the corner. And what better way to get into the Christmas spirit than by shopping for some great gifts?  That's why we've put together Littledata’s Holiday Shopping Guide, with some of our favorite merchants from all over the world. These direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands reach thousands of happy customers — some even offer subscriptions for the gift that keeps on giving! Whether you're looking for the perfect present for your significant other, family member or you're just trying to find a work colleague's Secret Santa, we've got you covered. So take a look at our guide and find the perfect gifts for everyone on your holiday shopping list.  Happy holidays, and happy shopping! Grind As a remote-first company, it’s no surprise that Grind is at the top of our list! Over the past two years, Grind has quickly grown from a handful of London-based cafes to an international DTC brand, shipping their famous house blends across the globe. This holiday season, learn how Grind skyrocketed its online sales from $10k to $500k monthly in just three months. And be sure to check out our top gift picks from Grind below. Treat your coffee lover to Grind’s Nespresso-compatible Coffee Pods. If they’re looking for a new favorite blend, they can explore up to three different flavors and find their new favorite to sample before purchasing in bulk.  If you’re looking for something a little more luxurious, opt for Grind’s French Press Gift Set. The set includes Grind’s classic tin in silver or pink, the Grind house blend ground coffee, and a limited-edition tote bag, featuring a Shoreditch Grind illustration. For the aspiring mixologist, be sure to pick up the Espresso Martini Gift Set. A cocktail kit that comes with everything a person needs to make their favorite caffeinated cocktail at home this holiday season.  Last but not least, we have the ultimate gift for the coffee lover in your life: a subscription to their favorite coffee shop. Give your friends and loved ones the gift of their favorite house blends from the comfort of their homes all year long! Abbott Lyon If you’re looking for an indulgent & unique gift, then look no further than Abbott Lyon. Their beautiful personalized jewelry is the perfect way to add a little sparkle to your recipient's life this holiday season. Not only are their products highly personalized, but their site experience is too! By utilizing server-side tracking to capture complete first-party data, Abbott Lyon unlocked opportunities for personalization and identified key areas for improvement in their website to optimize the user journey. Gifting someone who loves to travel? The Mini Raffia Pearl Resort Bag is the perfect accessory for them. This lavish little bag will add a touch of class to any outfit and can be customized with their initials.  The Sphere Chain Anklet is a great gift for someone special and is different from the usual gifts you see. The spheres create a delicate and eye-catching design and are available in silver and gold. This charming and budget-friendly anklet is a great way to show your loved ones how much you care.  Johnnie-O For all the fashionable guys in your life, Johnnie-O captures the perfect mix of style, function, and high-quality materials. Shoppers can receive unique offers, including personalized product recommendations, discounts, and loyalty perks by enrolling in Johnnie-o’s SMS and email newsletter. By seamlessly sending Shopify data to Segment with Littledata’s plug-and-play connection, Johnnie-O opened up endless opportunities for omnichannel engagement and messaging with their customers. Ready for the ugly Christmas sweater parties? You can’t go wrong with Johnnie-O's festive collection! Their use of color and patterns is spot-on, and the quality of their pieces is second to none.  Christmas sweaters are perfect for those who want to show their holiday spirit but sometimes it’s a little too much for your recipient and they would be happy with a baseball cap instead. A red baseball cap is a more subtle way to show your holiday spirit and it’s also a lot more practical. You can wear it all year round and it won’t take up as much space in your closet.  Joshua Tree Coffee Gifting subscriptions are on the rise this holiday season, and we can understand why — it’s the gift that keeps on giving! Joshua Tree Coffee offers personalized subscription gifts, in which recipients can choose their favorite roasts, frequency, and quantity. Joshua Tree Coffee isn’t alone — subscriptions are the fastest-growing area in ecommerce. Whether you’re selling coffee, snacks, or skincare products, you name it, now is the time to launch your subscription service! And with the subscription ecommerce market set to be worth over $478 billion by 2025, what time is better than now to learn the ins and outs of selling by subscription? The sooner you start, the sooner you will perfect your subscription model. [tip]Discover the keys to building data-backed subscriptions with The DTC Guide to Subscription Analytics[/tip] Among our top picks from Joshua Tree Coffee are the Variety Sample Pack and Mug Bundle. Including four different kinds of coffee beans, the coffee lover you're shopping for will be able to sample a quality mixture of light, medium, and dark roasts and discover their new favorite while drinking from their new mug. Robert Goddard If you’re not keen on shopping around multiple stores this BFCM, Robert Goddard is your one-stop shop for all your designer fashion needs! With up to 50% off, their Black Friday sale has already begun! Offering a variety of products, SKUs, and brands, Littledata’s Shopify source for Google Analytics plays a crucial role in helping the Robert Goddard team understand which products are their top performers, identify which campaigns lead to the most conversions, and get a complete view of the customer journey. As winter sets in, many of us are looking for ways to stay warm, one great option is to gift the Barbour Mallory Beanie Hat and Scarf Gift Set. This delicate cream colorway is an excellent choice for any winter wardrobe. Not only will it keep you cozy and warm, but it will also make a great fashion statement.  When it comes to giving a practical and cozy gift to the fashionable men in your life this winter, why not try a pair of Barbour Navy Porterfield Slippers? Made from a suede and cotton blend, these slippers are sure to keep feet warm and comfortable all season long. Plus, they're stylish with Barbour's classic tartan lining. Geologie Whether you're on the lookout for practical gifts or are looking to treat yourself this holiday season, Geologie has got you covered.  Geologie’s Shopify store is running Universal Analytics and Google Analytics 4 (GA4) in parallel, so they can not only understand this year’s BFCM performance but also run year-over-year analysis in the years to come.  A great starter set full of fresh scents including their signature bergamot and juniper scent, the Signature Body & Hair Gift Set is a great way to try out the brand. This set includes a Superclean Body Wash, a Natural Deodorant, and a Hair Co-Wash, all of which are made with highly effective formulas that promote great skin care. The award-winning Allstars have been put together as the Geologie Bestsellers Gift Set that includes a Hair Co-Wash, 2 Salicylic Acid Face Washes, and a Dark + Puffy Under Eye Cream. This is the perfect gift for anyone who wants to start and finish their day feeling refreshed.  Living.Fit For the fitness gurus on your list, Living.Fit offers everything they need to get their at-home gym up and running. With a range of gym equipment and apparel available, you can start your fitness journey at home with ease. For those that prefer guided workouts, Living.Fit’s got you covered there too! Give the gift of Living.Fit’s exclusive membership is powered by Recharge Payments subscription service. Living.Fit leverages Littledata’s out-of-the-box integration with Recharge to get a complete view of the subscriber journey, differentiate between one-off, first-time, and recurring orders, and optimize the subscriber experience.  If you’ve ordered your equipment but aren't quite sure how to use it properly to get the best results, don't worry - Living.Fit has a wide range of workout plans that you can purchase online and follow along with at your own pace. A great way to learn without paying the price of a gym membership.  Flux Footwear Flux Footwear is the ‘world's most adaptable footwear’, with incredible flexibility that allows you to feel as if you are walking barefoot without sacrificing style or comfort. With a simple design and commitment to quality.  Flux is fine-tuning its Facebook and Instagram campaigns to help shoppers find the perfect pair for their loved ones. With Littledata’s Facebook Conversions API integration, Flux built dynamic product ads to retarget abandoned carts and target potential customers. One year after launch, Flux scaled its revenue 600% and powered its growth primarily through paid social. There is no occasion too big or too small for Flux Footwear. Flux’s Adapt Trainers are the perfect gift for anyone on your list. Their limited-edition colorways won't last long, so grab them while you can!  So you’ve got your equipment and workout plan sorted with Living.Fit, but you need a trainer that offers durability, increased flexibility, and uncompromising grip. Then look no further than the Adapt High-Top with Graphene. These sneakers are great for any workout and will help you get the most out of your training. A must-have for any fitness enthusiast.  Happy shopping! In this holiday season, why not take advantage of these fantastic businesses that make use of Littledata to make their data work harder and treat your loved ones (and yourself!) to something special!

It’s been a banner year for Littledata on BigCommerce. Our Google Analytics app for BC has been highlighted and recommended by BigCommerce merchants and account managers, and we were recently honored with a multi-week feature in their app marketplace! Our data experts work with thousands of DTC Brands and know what brands are looking for in their advanced Google Analytics integration for their ecommerce store. At the core our customers care most about getting accurate and detailed information about customer behavior, from finding the best organic marketing channels to understanding granular details like how to improve checkout conversion rates and build better retargeting audiences. Our fast growth on BigCommerce hasn’t come by accident. With full support for both GA3 (Universal Analytics) and GA4 (the newest version of Google Analytics), we’ve met a major need for BigCommerce brands to have accurate, unified data in the tools they are already using – while preparing for a world without cookies. Our first customer review on BigCommerce app store might still say it best: “Google Analytics is a monster, and overwhelming to new users like myself. When the data in GA does not match the data in BigCommerce, making proper marketing and ad budget decisions becomes an even more difficult task. The Littledata Connector for Google Analytics and their All Website data configuration in GA opens a whole new world of clarity….confirming the true conversion value of Google (cpc), Bing, Social Media as well as referral revenue and conversions” The announcement of Google sunsetting Universal Analytics and the implementation of GA4, have some people in the industry confused and worried. But have no fear, Littledata is the first app to offer automated server-side tracking for Google Analytics (UA + GA4) including subscription analytics (Recharge) and Facebook Conversions API (BETA). We’re seeing especially strong growth from BigCommerce merchants on enterprise plans, which now drive more than 70% of BC’s ARR. What’s driving that growth? A big part of it seems to be multi-storefront capabilities. This feature is super slick and makes it easy to run several different storefronts in sync, whether different country stores for different regions/locations or different microsites for unique customer segments, such as separating out men’s fashion from women’s fashion or just overall clothing from accessories. The best part is that Littledata tracks any number of BigCommerce storefronts, allowing you to have a global overview of your business while still being able to segment through each storefront's data in Google Analytics. So if you’re making data-based decisions and looking for an easy to implement solution for your BigCommerce store, reach out to us to learn more! 

Edward Upton, Founder & CEO at Littledata, was recently featured on the Ecommerce Coffee Break Podcast. Watch the interview above as he discusses how to use server-side tracking on ecommerce sites and the changes it has brought to the ecommerce world. In this episode, you'll learn: How to use server-side tracking on ecommerce sites What's the difference between first and third-party cookies The benefits of server-side tracking How to choose the suitable attribution model for your business Still, have burning questions after tuning in? Explore our recently published white paper on First-Party Data, "A World Without Cookies" where our experts share about these new changes to data and tracking.

With Universal Analytics’ deprecation date quickly approaching, merchants and agencies alike have been looking to ecommerce platforms, like Shopify and BigCommerce, to lead the way in integrating their stores with GA4. But little progress has been made by ecommerce platforms, leaving merchants to their own devices.  But one thing’s for sure: with the right partners, you’re not alone. Last week we joined forces with some of the best and the brightest in the ecommerce analytics world to answer merchants' biggest questions about migrating to Google Analytics 4: What’s different between Universal Analytics (UA) and Google Analytics 4 (GA4)? What exactly is event-based tracking? Why hasn’t Shopify offered a plug-and-play solution for GA4? Whether you’re working with an ecommerce agency like Irish Titan, an ecommerce reporting tool like Daasity, or an ecommerce data platform like Littledata, data should be at the core of every business decision you make.  Up until this point, 87% of Shopify stores have relied on Universal Analytics as a trusted reporting tool for their store’s sales and revenue, marketing attribution and campaign performance, and for a complete view of their customer journey.   And that’s why we held last week’s webinar: to gather the top GA4 experts in ecommerce analytics to answer your most asked questions about GA4, provide some clarity around your migration, and arm you with the tools you need to succeed in the next generation of Google Analytics. Watch the full webinar on-demand>>> Key takeaways Custom reporting Merchants have grown accustomed to the 50+ built-in reports that UA offers, and are understandably uneasy with GA4 providing only a fraction of those reports out-of-the-box.  But the good news is that all the reports you’ve grown to know and love in UA can be custom-built in GA4, offering the opportunity for you to zero in on the metrics specific to your business’s unique set of goals. In a matter of minutes, your Source/Medium Report or Sales Performance Report can be up and running.  Find out how to build custom reports in GA4 with our series of free GA4 courses on YouTube. Once you’ve set up your GA4 property, the next step is crucial. Ensure that all your events are set up properly, including any custom and ecommerce events that you’re tracking in UA. Your events set the foundation for your reports and ensure that your custom-built reports work seamlessly. The easiest way to do this is with a GA4 connector Shopify app.  [tip] Whichever GA4 connector you choose, make sure it takes advantage of server-side tracking. Otherwise, your data discrepancies will just get worse! [/tip] New data model GA4’s tracking is fundamentally different from UA’s. Previously, Google captured data based on hits or sessions, whereas GA4 uses event-based tracking. Similarly, Google has shifted away from its last-click attribution model and has turned to data-driven attribution instead. What exactly is event-based tracking, and what does this mean for many of the metrics you’ve relied on in UA? Some of the metrics merchants have used to monitor their store’s performance have changed in meaning or are no longer available.  ‘Events’, for example, track actions within a page in UA, including video views, widget clicks, and downloads. In GA4, ‘events’ measure every user interaction with your website or app, including loading a page, clicking a link, and completing a purchase. With GA4’s event-based tracking, merchants are no longer limited to UA’s predefined hit types and can create custom events to track any action or piece of information that they like. [tip] Stay in the loop on GA4’s new terms, metrics, and reports with the GA4 Glossary.[/tip] Some other small but impactful changes have been made to metrics that many merchants are familiar with, including ‘sessions’ being redefined. ‘Bounce rate’ and ‘session duration’ are no longer available in GA4, instead, they have been replaced with engagement metrics. ‘Bounce rate’ can be understood with its inverse, ‘engagement rate’, which measures the number of engaged sessions divided by the total number of sessions over a specified time period. While these new metrics may cause some confusion, Google’s new engagement metrics help merchants uncover a detailed look at how customers interact with their website or app more accurately and will empower merchants to identify their conversion rate optimization areas with ease. https://youtu.be/XFrDq6VSU5M Google’s data-driven attribution model provides a holistic view of all of the touchpoints that contribute to a conversion and distributes credit for the conversion based on data for each conversion event. GA4 allows merchants to funnel in multiple data sources, including your website, app, email marketing platform, and advertising platforms, like Meta, to properly attribute sales across your marketing efforts. Google’s data-driven attribution model will help brands maximize their marketing efforts and budget, which is especially important in today's uncertain economic climate. Merchants can now leverage Google’s machine learning capabilities with predictive audiences, providing insights into what users are likely to purchase are doing on your website, and comparatively, what users who are likely to churn are doing on your website. Built on first-party data In a way, GA4 is Google’s response to increasing privacy regulations and tracking prevention. With the growing absence of third-party cookies, we’ve seen accuracy in client-side tracking slip away over the past few years. Unlike UA’s reliance on third-party cookies, GA4 is built on first-party data, offering merchants accuracy in tracking and in-depth insights into how users interact with their website and app. Exporting GA4 data into BigQuery Many of the features that were previously limited to GA360 users on UA (for the hefty price of $100k+ annually) are now available to all GA4 users, free of charge. This includes the ability to export raw data from GA4 to BigQuery, and from BigQuery to any destination of their choice.  GA4’s automatic BigQuery export not only relieves merchants of the tedious and costly manual data export, but also opens up opportunities for data transformation and analysis outside of GA4’s interface and API constraints — the possibilities are endless! Watch the full webinar on-demand>>> What you should do now As echoed by all of our speakers, you should start tracking your ecommerce analytics in GA4 now! And with the right tools, getting complete Shopify or BigCommerce insights in GA4 is simple. If you haven’t started already, now is the time to start tracking in parallel with UA and GA4. You won’t be able to export UA data into GA4, which is why it’s so important to get as much overlap as possible, especially if you’re serious about understanding your store’s performance year-over-year.  For a step-by-step guide to creating your GA4 property, read GA4: What Shopify stores should do TODAY. “Make a data plan. Determine which are your brand’s most important marketing and business questions, and build exploration reports to answer those questions with data. In doing so, you’ll be surprised with how quickly you become an expert in GA4!” —David Pascu, Head of Client Services at Littledata Once you have created your GA4 property, ensure that you’re tracking your ecommerce analytics in parallel, or sending data to both UA and GA4. This lets you capture browsing behavior and sales performance in both places, so you can analyze the data, build comparative attribution models, and start to get a sense of how UA and GA4 are different — as well as where they converge. https://youtu.be/oqGAX1xgZGE The easiest (and most accurate) way to do this is with an ecommerce data platform like Littledata. Littledata automatically captures ecommerce events in UA and GA4 and links them to the original touchpoint. Book a demo to learn more.

Littledata’s team is 100% remote, with hubs across London, New York, and Romania. We have plenty of video calls to keep our global team connected on a regular basis, but at our core we love to spend time working, planning, and learning together in person. And that is exactly what we did in Barcelona, Spain in early October.  At these regular company offsites, we bring everybody together to share ideas and get to know each other. Meetings take a variety of forms. Sometimes they look organized, planned, and presented, and sometimes – personal favorite – they look like a cold pint by the pool soaking up the sun and getting “to the point” of things. Our teammates are based in different parts of the world with various backgrounds and skill sets that drive healthy debate and problem-solving. So, what was the aim of this offsite, you ask? Setting the stage for growth Setting the stage for what is next for Littledata and planning for the future success of the 2000+ brands that use Littledata with other top Shopify and BigCommerce connections like Google Analytics, Recharge, Segment, and Klayvio. Littledata has continued to develop its offerings, products, and resources to help DTC brands be inspired by data and grow their brands. This takes detailed ambition for how and what we will do—much of which comes from our in-person conversations.  Making work fun In our downtime, you can find team members playing games around the hotel, grabbing a company-sponsored massage, exploring the local scenery, doing lite yoga, and more. The venue for each offsite is totally different, but the common thread is togetherness and enjoying the culture the teams have built.  When asked Natalie Upton, Head People and Operations at Littledata, why we make this investment each year she said, "When we invest in in-person offsites, it pays off. We genuinely see our offsites being an excellent learning opportunity as well as bonding as a team and having fun. We have a very curious team, and in-person offsites help us to build confidence in our company's journey. Offsites at Littledata build the DNA of our culture and, in turn, help us to grow faster." Learn and share In the first half of the week, we held several 45-minute learning sessions conducted by team members from different departments. We call this the “Unconference,” inspired by the great times our team has had at MeasureCamp meetups around the world. The learning and discussion sessions covered specifics about our product and roadmap, new challenges on the horizon, sales and marketing, and insights to better understand the current industry happenings.  Littledata has been fortunate to have team members who have both grown with the company and uprise of ecommerce analytics, as well as new joiners who bring fresh ideas to the table. Embracing an always-learning mentality has helped Littledata separate in the quality of the product and customer experience. This has not happened by accident but through the constant pursuit of excellence and education about the ecommerce industry.  You might be visiting us for the first time so in a nutshell, Littledata is a top-rated Shopify app that provides accurate data for modern DTC brands—once you log in to your Shopify account it literally takes ten minutes to set up we start tracking and sending data to top destinations, like Google Analytics or Segment. This removes a huge barrier for brands to have proper attribution for data analysis and building their audiences—saving time and money.  We geek out on the data. However, we are a creative bunch full of new ideas and willing to take on new challenges and long term bets. Working in technology, our team always has an eye on the changing landscape and what data or tactics can lead our customers down the road to success faster. An example of this was discovered on a call with one of our amazing customers, Flux Footwear, who went from zero to six figures using Littledata and Segment Twilio to launch their brand.  Meeting in person to celebrate and learn from these success stories is crucial to our culture and motivates our teams for what is next. Post meetings, you will often see unplanned pods of team members reviewing code, looking at campaign outlines, or talking about any core projects — this is where we truly thrive as a team and working together. Sounds fun, right? We are always looking for the right people to join our team  Littledata has an evolving need as we grow for problem solvers and solution finders. You might be thinking this sounds like a great place to work. It is! Whether or not you see an open position that fits your skillset, we’re always on the lookout for motivated team members to join us on this journey to be inspired by data.  Want to be a part of a workplace that goes beyond the regular 9 to 5 and offers something more? Somewhere to grow professionally and personally, surrounded by teammates who make you feel at home wherever you are in the world? Check out our open positions and apply to become part of the special culture we’ve fostered at Littledata!

Shopify tracking is our bread and butter here at Littledata, so we were excited to learn that Shopify has released a new Web Pixel extension API to help stores track key customer events via tracking ‘pixels’, and a Shopify pixels manager to manage these pixels. Together this is Shopify’s Web Pixel feature. There are a couple of things to clarify at the outset. Firstly, Shopify’s Web Pixel is not really a pixel at all, but a way of managing and triggering pixels across a merchant store. Most websites today use some type of Web Pixels to track customer behavior, but Shopify’s standardization and centralization of their own Web Pixel tools is a big deal for both merchants and the partners who work with them. The new Web Pixel signals a change in both how client-side events are tracked, and in how related technologies, such as Google Tag Manager (GTM) and Google Analytics, can access those events. I welcome the move to standardize the data layer for Shopify tracking, and remove some of the challenges for stores using GTM to trigger events. But I believe Web Pixel is being rushed out to fix a problem for tracking Shopify’s new checkout, and that there are a number of problems with tracking customer behavior in modern browsers that Web Pixel can’t solve. I welcome the move to standardize the data layer for Shopify tracking...but there are a number of problems with tracking customer behavior in modern browsers that Web Pixel can’t solve. In this post I look at what Web Pixel is, how it does (and doesn’t) change customer tracking for Shopify stores, and the benefits and challenges of different approaches to tracking. I explain why we think that Shopify Web Pixel currently misses the mark, and what we’re looking forward to as Web Pixel evolves. Let's dive in. Does Web Pixel change customer tracking for Shopify stores? Shopify merchants can track customer events in a variety of ways. Almost every Shopify merchant uses third party marketing platforms like Facebook Ads to drive traffic. And they all want to improve ROAS by sharing customer actions from the storefront and checkout (product views, checkout steps such as Add-to-Cart, etc.) back with those marketing platforms for retargeting and audience building. Historically, this has been done via a client-side browser tracking library: gtag for Google Ads and Google Analytics, Facebook Pixel for Facebook & Instagram Ads, the Pinterest Tag for Pinterest, etc. And there were three main ways stores could get these ‘pixels’ firing on the page: Via a Shopify app Triggered by Google Tag Manager (GTM) A developer adds the tag directly to the store theme In the case of 2 & 3, the challenge was both triggering the events at the correct time (e.g. listening for the click of ‘Add to cart’ button and sending the event before the page reloaded)  and having access to the right page, product and customer details at that time (e.g. product price, variant ID). What is Shopify Web Pixel? Shopify has seen stores struggle to implement tracking over the years, and wanted to make it easier for stores to track without Shopify directly supporting the data destinations. Shopify has been burnt trying to support third party platforms like Google Analytics and Facebook Ads (see the reviews for their Facebook Channel), and would prefer to push that support back to the third parties, or app developers that work with them. In comes Web Pixel. In Shopify’s own words, using the Shopify pixel manager allows: Access to a stream of customer events on your online store, including checkout events An additional layer of security for your online store and your customers, including greater control over the customer data that you share with third-party services Prevention of third party code running non-performing Javascript, or interfering with your online store and checkout Built in tools for privacy compliance Let's look at each benefit in detail, with my commentary. Access to a stream of customer events: this is solving the challenge of triggering the right event. This was always most difficult for the checkout, and will become impossible for Checkout 1 (see "Common problems tracking Shopify’s new checkout", below). However, Littledata already offers proven server-side tracking for any Shopify checkout, including headless builds. An additional layer of security. Yes, restricting access to the storefront by loading the pixels in a sandbox removes the risk of rogue scripts scraping personal data. But it makes it much harder to populate all the data fields that need to be shared with third parties. Littledata’s solution to do that product and customer enrichment server-side is both secure and comprehensive. Prevention of third party code running non-performing Javascript. I've previously written about the 'Wild West’ of stores using the Additional Scripts field. I'm all for removing this risk, but again there’s a trade-off between security and the richness of the data captured. Built in tools for privacy compliance. Shopify launched the customer privacy API back in 2020, but it hasn’t had much adoption among tracking apps. With Web Pixel, Shopify is making every pixel respect the customer cookie consent (as managed by a cookie banner app). This is great, but Littledata already respects customer privacy with complete cookie banner integrations. For stores and app developers I see the key benefit of Web Pixel is robustly triggering standard events and data context for common customer actions. Web Pixel removes the need to build a GTM data layer with an app like Elevar, or set up GTM to use this data layer in the tags. But this, too, is not without complications. What’s wrong with Web Pixel? There are several issues with Shopify's Web Pixel as it exists today. Firstly, it is not solving the key problem in modern web analytics: the increasing gap in client-side tracking due to ad blockers, browser restrictions on cookies and handling customers opting out of tracking. The solution to this is fully server-side tracking, which Littledata is launching in Q4. From a technical perspective, there’s a major limitation with how you could use the tracking library (e.g. gtag) within the Web Pixel callback. To send data to Google Analytics, you would need to load the gtag library on the parent page (either from the theme or a script-tag) and, after the library has loaded, pass the gtag function to the sandbox the Web Pixel runs. This removes most of the security benefits Shopify is touting (not loading additional scripts) and massively complicates setup of custom pixels. Shopify's Web Pixel doesn't solve the key problem in modern web analytics: the increasing gaps in client-side tracking. And then there are a number of gaps in the standard events currently tracked via Web Pixel. I know Shopify intends to patch some of these, but it’s not there yet: No context on the collection being viewed in collection_viewed events No product list impression events No product list click events No remove from cart event No shipping step on the checkout No waiting before page reloads to trigger add to cart events Very limited access to the browser window context (including page URL) for the pixel No post-purchase events (refunds, cancellations, fulfillments) Common problems tracking Shopify’s new checkout Shopify has long said it wants to lock down scripts running in the checkout to protect customer security and privacy. The latest version of the checkout (labelled "Checkout 1"), rolling out for Plus stores in Q4 2022, does this by allowing more checkout customization via API but removing customizations and scripts in checkout.liquid. So if you're a Plus store, and added a GTM container to the checkout.liquid file, these tags will stop working before December. You have three options to continue to track the checkout: Use Littledata’s server-side checkout tracking Use another app making use of the Web Pixel extension Build a custom pixel using Shopify pixel manager If you're not on Shopify Plus then only Littledata’s checkout tracking will work for you right now. Want to learn more? Find out the differences between client-side tracking and server-side tracking. Why is Shopify restricting scripts on the checkout? Google Tag Manager (GTM) is a powerful tool to manage marketing tags, but i’ve written before about how it provides a backdoor for malicious code to be injected into the checkout. For example, hackers can add a keystroke tracking script which relays credit card details as they are typed to the hacker’s server. Or in another hack we saw, the user was directed away from Shopify’s checkout to a similar-looking bogus checkout. Shopify has signaled that they see checkout as core to the ‘OS of ecommerce’ and they want to protect their brand from association with such scams. If that means blocking safe tags like Google Analytics or Google Ads, then that’s a worthwhile trade off for better security in their view. Should your store use the Shopify pixel manager? In short, no. We do not recommend using Shopify's pixel manager. At least not yet. The main use for adding Web Pixel right now is tracking the checkout, but Web Pixel is missing a key step of the checkout (shipping) and are difficult to implement via a custom pixel (for example, loading the tracking library or passing through that library to the sandbox). If you need to add back checkout tracking, or start tracking Google Analytics 4, you’d be far better using a proven analytics app for that. If you want to remove Google Tag Manager from your storefront for performance or security reasons that is understandable, but I’d suggest you wait until 2023 and some of the issues with Web Pixel have been ironed out. For now your options are: Make more use of server-side tracking, which will speed up your site Use Littledata’s GTM data layer to remove custom code that triggers events Web pixel should be useful next year for stores moving to Shopify Hydrogen. For headless Shopify stores we expect Web Pixel to make it easier to track pre-checkout events like page views, product views and add to carts - in addition to the server-side events Littledata tracks for headless stores. Some predictions for the future From our conversations with Shopify, I think the ability for apps to add script-tags to the Thank You page might be removed in 2023. That would make Web Pixel the only way to track purchase events on the Thank You page – but it wouldn’t impact purchases tracked server-side. I don’t think Shopify can or should deprecate script tags across the pre-checkout storefront, because there are lots of uses for additional JavaScript besides from tracking. I predict the impact on the tracking app ecosystem will be similar to when Shopify opened up subscriptions in the checkout in 2021 - a proliferation of apps offering generic functionality, and a race to the bottom in app pricing. I’d expect to see many more free tracking apps - for common platforms, like Facebook, and for niche ones like Roku and Verizon Media - because the technical complexity of launching client-side tracking is reduced. This is especially true for Google Analytics 4. Many brands are waiting for Shopify to release an official GA4 integration, but I don’t think this fits with Shopify’s strategy. They prefer to make it easy for app partners to connect to GA4, and leave these partners to help brands with Google Analytics queries. [tip]See what Shopify stores can do today to prepare for GA4[/tip] And yet I expect an increased demand and perceived value for apps that solve the real challenges of data accuracy and marketing attribution, through server-side tracking and other innovations. I know many brands willing to pay for quality data, and Web Pixel is not able to deliver that just now. [subscribe]

Direct-to-consumer (DTC) brands continue to innovate worldwide, and we know that by 2023 both large and small DTC brands will bring in over $150 billion in the United States alone.  While these brands bring value via their products, many today go the extra mile in their mission to support the environment, healthy lifestyles, or other social causes. Intelligent buyers want more out of brands than a good product—they want to find their tribe.  But how does your tribe find you? Littledata has seen consumers unite behind brands like Grind, Rothy's, and Flux Footwear, bolstering support, sales, and awareness. What do these brands have in common? Besides offering high-quality products and an unmatched user experience, they are all purpose-driven brands who have taken a data-driven approach to audience building and ecommerce growth marketing. And to do that they have built a modern data stack. Step One: Finding the data In today’s increasingly crowded market, DTC brands need to find a way to set themselves apart from the rest. Appealing to consumers' ethos, values, and lifestyles is one of the most effective ways we’ve seen. [tip]Brands use first-party data, collected directly from their customers and websites to re-engage their ideal customers using Google Ads or Facebook Conversions API.[/tip] So how do DTC brands dial in on these values to help navigate company decisions?  We believe all good business decisions are backed by a healthy dose of data discovery—understanding the ins and outs of how customers engage with your brand online and their key demographics.  Finding a single source of truth for that intel is crucial for developing user personas and personalized content for your customer.  One important source of truth is how consumers interact with a brand's ecommerce storefront, but it can seem overwhelming to try to get accurate data about what’s really going on with online shoppers. Our friends at Twilio Segment say it best, “Investing in data quality will improve trust in your data, reduce time spent navigating and validating data, and ultimately allow your business to grow faster.”  Customer data from Shopify or BigCommerce stores can be reported directly in Google Analytics neatly and accurately. This brings to the surface marketing attribution, shopping behavior, checkout experiences, and how subscription customers engage with ecommerce stores.  [tip]Littledata now offers a connection to Google Analytics 4 while running in parallel with Universal Analytics.[/tip] These metrics give way for technical leaders and ecommerce managers to make data-driven decisions that drive personalization. Shopify encourages merchants to drive more personalized emails using analytics. Reviewing how customers engage with your website, from what channel, and their demographics can help brands improve email campaign performance. Step Two: Data-driven personalization Personalization lets the customer know brand care, and when 308 billion emails are sent every day it's important to stand out with unique and targeted emails.  [tip] First-party data is information collected directly from customers or website visitors. This could be on your website, in your app, or through channels such as email and text/SMS. Learn more in our new White Paper: A World Without Cookies [/tip] We’ve seen this first-hand at Littledata, and the issues have become even more urgent during the pandemic and the recent economic downturn. “For purpose-driven brands in particular, organic channels such as email and SMS marketing aren’t just optional – they’re the key to unlocking rapid growth with limited budgets and more brands competing for conscious consumers,” says Littledata co-founder and CMO Ari Messer. Littledata’s customers use apps like Klaviyo and Attentive for customer communications, and we help them get the data they need to turn those channels into personalization superstars. “For purpose-driven brands in particular, organic channels such as email and SMS marketing aren’t just optional – they’re key to unlocking rapid growth” Data for business growth is no longer something that needs to be overly complex or left only in the hands of data scientists. With both no-code and low-code solutions, most customers can access and implement the Littledata app in about 10 minutes. Littledata has meticulously developed a no-code tracking solution that brings you the most accurate and needed data (including custom dimensions for LTV) that your team can use to reach new heights and continue to make an impact.  "We launched our shoe brand utilizing Littledata's integration and data layer. While they handled our ata we were able to focus on other parts of the business. We're a little over a year old and with the help of Littledata, we've gone from generating 6 figures of revenue in our first 2 quarters to doing 6 figures a month. They've been our central tool for linking Google Analytics, Facebook CAPI, and Shopify" —Flux Footwear, Co-Founder Benjamin Loschen Customers today are more educated and motivated by brands—how they buy influences the things they care about. Brands who understand these motivations and can pinpoint opportunities. They can connect behavioral data to marketing tactics and campaigns. Then when brands step back and look at customer LTV and AOV, they can see which customers are the most engaged and re-target them more granularly. Focusing on the product they are selling but also on the impact and mission they are contributing to by being a loyal customer of that brand.

Will you join us today at Twilio SIGNAL? Powered by Shopify, Littledata and Twilio Segment, Veronica Beard used 1st-party data to elevate paid social, turning it from a place where they sold markdowns to the channel with the best lifetime value customers (online shoppers with the highest LTV). Find out how >>> Since debuting at New York Fashion Week in 2012 Veronica Beard has continued to expand both offline and online. How did they do it? Not only with good design and solid materials, but with a data-driven approach to growth. Veronica Beard's Head of Data, Maxime Lagresle, is speaking at SIGNAL today to share insights into using first-party data to grow an industry-leading fashion brand. Maxime’s chat is on “How Veronica Beard moved to first-party data, reduced CAC by 20%, and stopped worrying about cookies”. You can register for free here and not to worry about timing -- all sessions are available on demand videos to accomadate different time zones! Powered by Shopify, Littledata and Twilio Segment, Veronica Beard used 1st-party data to reduce CAC by 20% while increasing customer LTV Interested in learning more about how Shopify Plus brands like Veronica Beard use Littledata and Segment together? Dive into a recent case study we did with our friends at johnnie-O who built a personalized user experience with Shopify, Littledata, and Segment. As their agency puts it: "Littledata’s Segment connector saved the day by streamlining the integration and allowing us to bypass what would have been months of planning and development work implementing an ecommerce tracking plan from scratch." Learn more about connecting Shopify and Segment Check out our latest white paper on first-party data Learn more about Littledata Plus Looking for more detailed interview about how to use Shopify and Segment to accelerate growth? Check out our interview with Rothy's about data-driven growth.