February 2026 Google Analytics Training for Certification Study Group

Want to dramatically improve your SEO skills? Want to be a better online marketer? Earn your Google Analytics Certification!

Why learn Google Analytics?

What about Google Analytics makes learning how to use it essential? First of all, Google Analytics is the most widely used web analytics tool worldwide, providing valuable information about your website’s overall effectiveness and marketing efforts.

Additionally, some of the other benefits of Google Analytics include:

• It offers a basic, free version that provides significant data.
• Setting up Google Analytics is simple.
• It has a user-friendly interface.
• With Google Analytics, you can collect, analyze, and visualize data through its customizable reports and dashboards.
• In addition to the free basic version, you can use advanced Google Analytics when needed.
• It offers quick, easy integration with other Google products, such as Google Tag Manager and Google Data Studio.
• It offers post-click integration with non-Google traffic sources, including Facebook, Bing, and Yahoo.

A mastery of Google Analytics is more important in 2026 than ever!

• As more consumers better understand web privacy and web browsers implement privacy settings, it is more complicated than ever to attribute the success of your marketing campaign.
• As consumers shift to AI chatbots (and away from conventional Google Search), we need to find new ways to measure the success of our search campaigns (and to provide objective data amid the hype surrounding AI).
• As web development projects are on the decline, with AI tools seeming to make design easier and an uncertain economy, developers need to find new ways to provide value to clients. GA mastery can give that value while creating a distinction between you and your competitors.

Who should take the Google Analytics Certification?

You don’t have to be a data analyst for Google Analytics to be useful. Anyone interested in better promoting their business through their website will benefit from this certification, whether or not you’re using search engine optimization to promote your business. It’s not that websites that use Google Analytics inherently do better in marketing. Learning Google Analytics, however, helps you make better marketing decisions. This could include:

• People who are confused about GA4 want to learn how to use the most widely used data analysis tools. If you’re familiar with Universal Analytics, come with your questions to learn how it’s different now.
• Business owners who want to make sure they understand what marketing efforts are working- and which aren’t using marketing analytics.
• Marketers who want to show the success they’re getting from their efforts.
• Web developers and designers who want to learn Google Analytics to offer more value (and show value) from their products.

What will you get from this Google Analytics Study Group?

There’s a lot to gain from joining this group:

• How to understand the data in Google Analytics.
• How to set up my account for the most detailed data collection.
• What’s important.
• More importantly, what’s not important in Google Analytics
• How to connect my data with my clients’ marketing ROI.
• I’ll add my experience with Google Analytics for some insider tips.
• You’ll receive certification from Google (after you take their exam). You’ve learned a lot! Flex and show potential clients how much you know with the Google Analytics Certification!

How will this Study Group work?

Starting on February 2nd, we will meet (every Monday from 3:30 to 4:30 pm Eastern Time) for an hour to review what we’ve learned. That means you’ll be expected to complete the different video lessons in the Google Analytics course before attending the study group session. Expect this to take a couple of hours each week (in addition to study group time).

Here’s the schedule:

• February 2nd: Introductions and Expectations.
• February 9th: Come prepared to discuss “Get started using Google Analytics.”
• February 16th: Come ready to discuss “Manage GA4 Data and Learn to Read Reports.”
• February 23rd: Come prepared to discuss “Dive Deeper into GA4 Data and Reports.”
• March 2nd: Come ready to discuss “Use GA4 with Other Tools and Data Sources.”
• At that point, you should be equipped to take the Certification Exam!
• March 9th: Meeting to Celebrate the Completion of our Exams.

For each week, I will:

• Record the call and send it to all participants. This way, if you have to miss a week, you can keep up with other people’s questions.
• Come prepared with a brief lesson covering the topics about which we’re discussing.
• Answer your questions about the content or return with answers from the previous week.

Here’s what you’ll need to join the group:

1. A Gmail or Google account so you can log in to Google’s lessons here: https://skillshop.docebosaas.com/learn/courses/14810/google-analytics-certification
2. Four hours each week to review Google’s material and time to meet with the study group. I’d estimate two or three hours each week. It will take you an additional two hours to take the exam.
3. Pick one website you’d like to focus your attention on. This might be your business website. It might be a client’s website. You might manage several websites, but pick one to focus on, and I think you’ll get more out of this.
4. Access to a Google Analytics account. If you don’t have one, I might be able to help by giving you access to a test account. Just ask.

Although this latest group has already started, you can fill out the form (below) to find out the next time we run this group.