How to Create a Performance Dashboard in Google Analytics
Instead of digging through dozens of Google Analytics 4 reports every week, a custom performance dashboard gives you a single, at-a-glance view of your most important metrics. This centralized hub saves you time and keeps your team focused on the numbers that actually matter. This guide will walk you through, step-by-step, how to build a powerful performance dashboard inside GA4, cover its limitations, and provide best practices for creating a report that's genuinely useful.
Before You Build: Define Your Dashboard's Purpose
A dashboard without a clear purpose is just a collection of charts. Before you add a single widget, you need to answer a few key questions. Skipping this step is the fastest way to build something that no one, including you, ever looks at again.
1. Who is this dashboard for?
Different stakeholders need different information. The metrics that matter to your CEO are different from what a paid media specialist needs to see.
For Leadership (CEO, Founder): They need a high-level summary. Think sessions, users, total conversions, revenue, and cost. They want to know if the business is healthy and growing.
For Marketing Managers: They need channel-level performance. They'll want to see traffic and conversions broken down by source (Organic, Paid Social, Paid Search, Email).
For Specialists (e.g., SEO or PPC): They need granular data specific to their job. An SEO specialist will care about landing page performance from organic search, while a PPC specialist needs to see campaign-level conversion rates and ROAS.
Define your audience first. This article will focus on building a general marketing performance dashboard, suitable for a marketing manager or a hands-on business owner.
2. What key business question(s) is this dashboard answering?
Every good dashboard has a central question it aims to answer. This question transforms the dashboard from a data repository into a decision-making tool.
Some examples of strong central questions:
"Which of our marketing channels are driving the most qualified leads this quarter?"
"What is the return on investment for our latest paid advertising campaigns?"
"How effectively is our new blog content converting readers into email subscribers?"
3. What are your Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)?
Once you know your question, you can define the handful of metrics (KPIs) that best answer it. Resist the temptation to track everything. A good dashboard has between 5 and 9 core KPIs. Simplicity is your best friend.
For a general marketing dashboard trying to answer, "Which channels are driving traffic and conversions?", your KPIs might be:
Users: How many unique individuals are visiting our site?
Sessions: How many visits are we getting?
Sessions by Channel: Where is our traffic coming from?
Conversions (by event name): How many goal completions are happening?
Conversion Rate: What percentage of users are converting?
Engaged Sessions: Are people actually interacting with our content?
With these fundamentals defined, you’re ready to actually build the thing.
How to Build a Custom Dashboard in Google Analytics 4
Google Analytics 4 has a built-in reporting feature called the "Library" where you can create and save custom reports. These appear just like the standard reports in the left-hand navigation, making them easy to access.
Step 1: Navigate to the Reports Library
This is the trickiest part for most people new to GA4. You don't build reports from the main "Reports" view. Here's where to go:
On the far left menu, click Reports.
At the very bottom of the report menu that appears, click Library.
This is your command center for creating and managing all custom reports.
Step 2: Create a New Blank Report
In the Library, you’ll see your current "Collections" (the sections in your navigation pane like "Lifecycle" and "User").
Click the blue button labeled + Create new report and select Create blank report.
Step 3: Add Widgets (Cards) to Your Report
You’re now looking at a blank canvas. This is where you bring your dashboard to life by adding “cards,” which are your charts, graphs, and tables.
On the right-hand sidebar, you'll see a panel called "Cards". This is where you add visualizations.
Example 1: Adding a Scorecard for Total Users
Scorecards are great for showing a single, important number.
In the sidebar, click + Add card.
You'll see a list of pre-built cards. For this, search for the metric "Users" in the search box.
You'll see a Scorecard showing "Users" as the metric. Select it and click the blue Add Card button.
Your first widget will appear on the canvas! You can drag and drop it anywhere you like. Repeat this process to add scorecards for other major KPIs like Sessions, Conversions, and Engaged sessions. Keep these important, high-level numbers at the top of your dashboard for easy viewing.
Example 2: Adding a Line Chart for Sessions Over Time
Line charts are excellent for visualizing trends.
Again, click + Add card.
Find a suitable card, like a line chart showing Sessions or Users. Let's customize it.
If you can't find the exact one you want, pick a similar one and click the pencil icon to edit it. You can define the Dimension (what you're measuring by, like 'Time') and the Metric (the number you're counting, like 'Sessions'). For a simple trendline, use 'Date' as an ad-hoc dimension.
Example 3: Adding a Table for Performance by Channel
Tables are the best way to see detailed breakdowns.
Click + Add card.
Find a table. A good one to start with is a table using the dimension Session default channel group.
Add metrics to this table to see the performance of each channel. You can do this in the customization menu on the right. Typical metrics here would be: Users, Sessions, Engaged sessions, and Conversions.
Step 4: Arranging and Saving Your Dashboard
Drag your cards into a logical order. We recommend top-to-bottom importance:
Top Row: Scorecards of your most important KPIs.
Middle Row: A trended line chart of your primary KPI (e.g., sessions or conversions).
Bottom Row: Bar charts or tables breaking down data by channel, device, or country.
Once you are happy with the layout, click the blue Save button. Give your report a descriptive name, like "Marketing Performance Overview."
Step 5: Publish Your Dashboard to the Navigation
One final, crucial step! Saving the report only adds it to your Library. To make it easily accessible, you need to add it to a "Collection," which publishes it to the left-hand navigation.
Back in a Collection menu (e.g., "Lifecycle").
Find your saved report, and drag it from the "Reports" list on the right into your collection's navigation structure on the left.
Click Save.
Now, your "Marketing Performance Overview" report will appear in your main navigation for one-click access.
Beyond GA4: Best Practices for an Effective Dashboard
The tool is only one part of the equation. A truly effective dashboard follows a few key design principles to ensure its clarity and usefulness.
1. Keep it Simple (Less is More)
Resist the urge to pack your dashboard with every metric available. A cluttered dashboard is an ignored dashboard. Focus only on the 5-9 KPIs you decided on at the start. Use headlines and whitespace to group related charts and guide the viewer’s eye.
2. Use the Right Chart for the Job
Don't default to tables for everything. Different charts tell different stories.
Line Charts: The best for showing trends over time.
Bar/Column Charts: The best for comparing values across categories (e.g., sessions by channel).
Tables: Ideal for showing precise values or multiple dimensions at once.
Scorecards: Perfect for single, up-to-the-minute KPIs.
Pie/Donut Charts: Use sparingly, and only for showing proportions of a single whole with fewer than 5 categories (e.g., Device Category breakdown).
3. Provide Context at All Times
A number without context is meaningless. Is 1,000 conversions good or bad? You don't know without a comparison. Most GA4 (and Looker Studio) widgets allow you to add "compare to previous period" data. This automatically shows you if your numbers are up or down versus last month or last year, which is infinitely more valuable.
Hold on... What About Looker Studio?
While GA4’s built-in reporting is powerful and convenient, it has its limits. For more advanced needs, Google's free visualization tool, Looker Studio (formerly Data Studio), is the logical next step. You should consider Looker Studio when:
You need to blend data sources: Looker Studio can pull data from Google Analytics, Google Ads, Google Sheets, HubSpot, Salesforce, etc., and display it all on one dashboard.
You need full design control: You have pixel-perfect control over branding, colors, layout, and chart styles.
You need interactive filters for viewers: You can add date range pickers, dropdown filters, and other controls that allow end-users to explore the data themselves.
The principles of good dashboard design remain the same, but Looker Studio unlocks a much higher ceiling for customization and cross-platform reporting.
Final Thoughts
Building a performant dashboard puts you in command of critical data efficiently, saving you from tedious manual reports. Whether you're using the built-in reports of GA4 or extending to Looker Studio, the focus remains on a small set of metrics that drive your company forward.
Even though tools are becoming more accessible, the setup process can still be time-consuming, particularly when integrating Google Analytics data with platforms like Salesforce or Shopify. This is why we built Graphed - to address these exact challenges and streamline the creation of dashboards without the need for complex manual setup. Simply state your requirements, and you'll have dashboards ready to provide strategic insights without the steep learning curve.