GA4’s New Benchmarks Give You Real Numbers—Use Them to Buy Calls, Not Clicks

Google Analytics 4 Benchmarking now includes 20 unnormalized metrics (like New Users and Total Revenue) so you can compare raw counts to industry peers by percentile, not just ratios. Google scales peer normalized metrics to your active user count and shows where you fall (25th, median, 75th), refreshed daily and gated by sufficient peer data. For contractors, this enables practical planning and bidding decisions tied to revenue and calls, not vanity rates like engagement. Ensure your industry category and conversion/revenue tracking (including call and booked job values) are accurate before relying on the benchmarks, then use them to diagnose reach vs. monetization gaps and choose between tighter manual bidding or automated strategies.

TL;DR Google Analytics added 20 unnormalized (raw) metrics to Benchmarking—think New Users and Total Revenue—so you can finally compare your actual counts to industry peers by percentile. This is practical ammo for budget and bidding decisions, not vanity rates.

Google quietly made GA4’s Benchmarking actually useful for local service businesses: you can now see how your raw volumes stack up against similar sites, not just ratios. That matters because you don’t deposit “engagement rates.” You deposit revenue from booked jobs and calls that turn into installs and service tickets.

What changed and why it matters for contractors

GA4 Benchmarking now includes 20 unnormalized metrics (examples: New Users, Total Revenue). Instead of comparing only normalized rates (per user), Google estimates what your peers would do at your scale, then shows where you land by percentile (25th, median, 75th). Peer groups are assigned by industry category using your setup data and property signals. The data is encrypted, aggregated, refreshed daily, and only shows up when there are enough similar properties to make it reliable.

Translated to the real world: if the median peer would generate $X in revenue or Y new users with your same active user count, you can see whether you’re under-producing or over-performing in raw numbers. That’s the stuff you can plan around—budgets, staffing, and bidding strategy.

How Google builds the benchmark (in plain English)

Google takes your peer group’s normalized metric (for example, revenue per active user) and multiplies it by your active user count for the same period. The result is a benchmark number tailored to your traffic level. Then they show percentiles so you can tell if you’re below 25th, near the median, or pushing top quartile.

Key point: these aren’t someone else’s ratios pasted onto you. They’re scaled for your traffic reality, which removes a big chunk of hand-waving. If you have 6,000 active users this month, you’ll see what median peers would do with exactly 6,000 users—not with 60,000 or 600.

What to watch before you trust it

• Confirm your industry category is correct; peer selection hinges on it.
• Make sure your conversion and revenue tracking are tight. If you don’t import call revenue or booked job values, your “Total Revenue” benchmark comparison will be garbage-in, garbage-out.
• Mind the refresh window—data updates every 24 hours, so give changes a day to settle.
• Benchmarks only appear when there are enough peers. If you don’t see them, narrow expectations or try broader categories.

Use benchmarks to guide bidding: manual vs automated

Let’s get practical. Say you’re an HVAC contractor heading into shoulder season.

Scenario (hypothetical numbers): last 28 days you have 5,000 active users. GA4 shows your peer group’s median revenue per active user implies a $40,000 Total Revenue benchmark at your traffic level, with 25th at $30,000 and 75th at $55,000. You’re sitting at $29,000. You’re below the 25th percentile—under-producing for your traffic.

Decision path

• If your New Users benchmark says you’re around median but your Total Revenue is bottom quartile, your traffic is fine; your monetization is weak. Don’t hand the wheel to “Maximize Clicks” or broad Smart Bidding yet. Tighten intent: exact/phrase on core terms, cut junk queries, send traffic to service-specific pages with phone-first CTAs. Consider manual CPC or tCPA with strict negatives until call quality rises.
• If you’re below 25th for New Users and Total Revenue, you have a reach problem. If your call tracking and offline conversion imports are solid (e.g., phone calls and booked jobs flowing back to Ads), consider Maximize Conversions or tROAS to expand efficiently. If tracking is incomplete, use manual CPC with bid caps and staged budget increases while you