Google Certification | Google Data Analytics Certificate
If you too want to get this Google Analytics certification, which is free, online and easy to pass with a little work, here is how we did it, step by step. This training prepares you intensely for the passage of the Google Data Analytics Certificate and ensures that you can justify new skills in the use of this analysis tool and in the understanding of its fundamental principles.
Become a Google Partner and add the rope of Analytics expertise to your arc of digital skills. We accompany you from the preparation until the passing of the exam and give you all the advice and tools to succeed in this new challenge!
1. Take Google Analytics Academy courses
First, you need to start by taking the Google Analytics Academy free online courses. All you need is a gmail account to log in.
We sincerely recommend these video lessons! Very progressive, the apprenticeship course includes several educational modules:
- Google Analytics for Beginners
- Advanced Google Analytics Course
- Getting started with Google Analytics 360 (Updated July 7, 2018: this tool will soon be part of Google Marketing Platform)
- Google Tag Manager Basics
- Ecommerce Analytics: From Data to Decisions (select “U.S. English (EN_US)” at the bottom right of the screen to bring up this latest course)
- Each module is divided into 3 or 4 units. Each unit has multiple videos, step-by-step demonstrations of the tool, links to resources, and MCQs (Multiple Choice Questionnaires). Here is the intro video:
Don’t worry: you don’t need to be fluent in English to follow the training. Admittedly, the videos and demos are made in English, but they are subtitled in Spnaish, French and other languages (very practical for revising).
If you want to go further or deepen certain concepts, you can click on the links provided at the end of each chapter which refer to pages in the Google Analytics Help Center.
Frankly, this training taught us a lot of things about Google Analytics, even though we have been using this free website audience measurement tool for years.
The training is free and online, with no prerequisites. All you have to do is register and get motivated!
2. Evaluate your knowledge, still on Google Analytics Academy
At the end of each unit, you can pass an evaluation MCQ in French, with 10 more or less complex questions. You must obtain at least 80% of correct answers to validate the unit. This assessment is not very difficult to pass because you can retake it as many times as you want (with the same questions).
If you pass all the assessments of a module, you get a kind of “certificate of achievement” which “certifies that you have successfully completed the Google Analytics course”. Strangely, you can’t download it in pdf, just take a screenshot.
Read also: SEO Optimized URLs | How to make them Google Friendly?
You can view this certificate, valid for one year, in your private profile on Google Analytics Academy. Unfortunately, it does not have an “official” URL accessible to everyone online. Its reassurance value with customers is therefore limited, since it cannot be verified by a third party.
3. Pass the Google Analytics Individual Qualification on Academy for Ads
To be truly Google Analytics certified, i.e. to obtain the Google Analytics IQ (Individual Qualification), you have to pass another exam on another brand new website: Academy for Ads. Previously, this review was on Google Partners (Updated July 7, 2018).
As soon as you have obtained the Google Analytic Academy certificate of achievement, log in with your Gmail account to Academy for Ads to take a new exam. Good to know: it is not necessary to have followed all the modules of Google Analytics Academy to pass it: only the first two modules are necessary for the exam.
This MCQ is a little more complex to obtain than the previous ones… You have to answer 70 questions in a limited time (90 minutes anyway) and obtain at least 80% correct answers. If we miss it, we can iron it but only after a fortnight.
You then obtain a certification valid for 18 months. Unfortunately, it is no longer possible to share a link to its certification, as was previously possible in Google Partners. Unable to share a public URL to their own certification on their LinkedIn profile or website. It’s really a pity!
You can still download in pdf a “Google Analytics Individual Qualification Certification”, oddly named “Completion Reward” in the interface. This document mentions your name, the date of taking the exam, a “completion ID” number and the validity period, with the Google logo.
In all, it took us about 3 weeks to go through all the course modules and pass the exam, at the rate of half an hour to an hour a day.
How is the exam going?
Here is a link to official Google documentation with everything you need to do to take the test.
Goto:
- Go to Google Partners
- Click “Certifications”
- Click “See exams”
- Hover over an exam section and click “Exam Details”
- Click “Take Exam”
- The exam will now start in your web browser
Time allowed for assessment
You have 90 minutes to answer all questions.
Admission score
To pass the assessment, a minimum score of 80% is required. It’s not impossible, but it’s not that easy the first time you take the assessment.
Retake the assessment
If you fail the assessment, you can retake it the next day. To increase your chances of success, take the time to review the Google Analytics training for beginners and Google Analytics advanced course.
How do you maintain your Google Analytics Certified Analyst status?
To keep your personal certification current, you must pass the assessment every 12 months. And yes, it goes fast! Remember to put a note in your calendar so you don’t let it expire.
What do the questions look like?
Attention, one of the things that we regret is that it is one thing to understand how the tool works and it is another to pass the exam. You will be tested on your knowledge, but not necessarily on what you use every day while doing your analyses.
We advise you to take the time to read everything. The questions are sometimes “treacherous”. You will have to answer many questions that are very similar.
The right questions that test your knowledge aren’t the ones that are going to be the hardest.
How to pass the test for Google Data Analytics Certificate?
Advice from two experts who have been taking this exam regularly for more than a decade
Take a tactical approach. You have no time to waste:
- There are 70 questions
- You need to have 56 correct answers to pass the Google Analytics certification.
- What if we can’t pass the Google Analytics certification on the first try?
If you fail the assessment, don’t panic, you can retake it the next day. It’s really fast compared to the times expected in the past.
Keep your personal certification up to date
To keep your personal certification current, you must pass the assessment every 12 months.
Sources: PinterPandai, Google
Photo credit: Andrea1597 / Pixabay
