How to Create Content Groups in GA4 | A Step-by-Step Guide

If you’ve been using Google Analytics 4 (GA4) for a while, you already know that understanding how visitors interact with your website content is essential. But with GA4’s new structure, finding ways to categorize and analyze your website pages can be confusing at first.
That’s where content groups come in.

We’ll walk you through what content groups are, why they matter, and most importantly, how to create content groups in GA4 to better organize your site’s reporting and make smarter decisions.

What Are Content Groups in GA4?

Content groups are ways to categorize your website pages into logical collections. Think of them like folders where similar pages are grouped together for better analysis.
For example, you might want to group:

• Blog posts
• Product pages
• Landing pages
• Support or FAQ pages

Instead of analyzing each page individually, content groups let you view metrics for a whole category at once, such as total views, average engagement time, or conversions for all product pages combined.

While Universal Analytics had a dedicated “Content Grouping” feature, in GA4, you achieve similar functionality by creating custom dimensions based on page titles, URLs, or events.

Why Should You Create Content Groups?

Before we dive into the “how,” let’s understand why content grouping is crucial:

• Better Reporting: Instead of getting lost in hundreds of individual page URLs, you can see performance based on logical sections of your site.
• Identify Trends: See which categories perform best and which need improvement.
• Easier A/B Testing Analysis: Group your test pages together to track performance.
• Simplified Analysis for Teams: Marketing, content, and sales teams can all quickly access the information they need without digging deep.

Clearly, using content groups helps you move from data overload to meaningful insights.

How to Create Content Groups in GA4: Step-by-Step

Creating content groups in GA4 involves creating a custom dimension. Here’s exactly how you can do it:

Step 1: Plan Your Content Groups

First, decide how you want to group your content. A few ideas:

• By content type (Blog, Product, Service, About Us)
• By product category (Electronics, Clothing, Home Appliances)
• By user intent (Informational pages, Transactional pages, Support pages)

Knowing your structure ahead of time will make setup much smoother.

Step 2: Identify How You’ll Capture Group Data

You can group content based on:

• Page path (URL structure)
• Page title
• Custom parameters (if you want more flexibility via Google Tag Manager)

Example:
If your blog URLs all start with /blog/, you can group them automatically by URL path.

Step 3: Create a New Custom Dimension in GA4

Here’s how:

1. Go to your GA4 property.
2. Navigate to Admin > Custom definitions.
3. Click Create custom dimension.
4. Fill in the fields:
   • Dimension name: Choose something like “Content Group.”
   • Scope: Select Event (important!).
   • Description: Optional, but helps for clarity.
   • Event parameter: Choose the parameter you want to use (like page_location for URLs or page_title for titles).

Tip: If you’re using Google Tag Manager, you can create your own event parameters to make this even more flexible.

Step 4: Configure the Logic

You now need to define rules to group pages. There are two ways to do this:

Method 1: Use Google Tag Manager (Recommended for Flexibility)

If you want clean, custom logic:

1. Open your GTM account.
2. Create a new Variable:
   • Variable Type: Lookup Table.
   • Input Variable: Page Path or Page URL.
   • Set lookup rules like:
     • If URL contains /blog/ → Set to “Blog.”
     • If URL contains /products/ → Set to “Products.”
3. Send this as a custom event parameter to GA4 (you’ll need to modify your GA4 tag).

Method 2: Use Built-in Parameters

You can also use the built-in page_location or page_title parameter when setting up your custom dimension rules inside GA4, although this method can be slightly less flexible for complex sites.

Step 5: Build Reports with Your Content Groups

Once your custom dimension is set and collecting data, you can:

• Use it in Exploration Reports.
• Set it as a secondary dimension in standard reports.
• Create custom dashboards in GA4 based on your content groups.

For example, you can now easily view:

• Engagement rate per content group
• Average session duration by group
• Conversion rate by content group

This makes it so much easier to see which sections of your website drive the most value.

Pro Tips for Effective Content Grouping

• Start simple: Don’t overcomplicate groups. Start with 4–5 broad categories.
• Use consistent URL structures: Makes it easier to set rules automatically.
• Test your setup: Always verify that content is being grouped properly by previewing your GTM tags or using DebugView in GA4.
• Review periodically: As your website grows, revisit and refine your content groups.