Does anyone know how to integrate 3rd party data (i.e. 6sense or Drift chat) with GA 4 properly?
I have tried using custom events, but the data I’m trying to integrate is user based not event based.
I looked at audience customization, but that is proving to be a dead end. Has anyone tried doing this?
The short answer is:
You can absolutely integrate user-based data from 6sense and Drift Chat into GA4, and the key is correctly configuring a pipeline to pass this third-party user data as a user property in Google Tag Manager (GTM), and then registering it as a user-scoped custom dimension in your GA4 property.
Since the data is user-based, you must use user properties which, once set, apply to all subsequent events for that user.
For the most robust and controlled integration, especially for server-to-server data like what you might pull from 6sense or Drift APIs/webhooks, an excellent solution is to use Google Tag Manager in a server-side environment with a service like Stape or Google Cloud Platform, using the GA4 Measurement Protocol.
The long answer is:
The reason you’re hitting a dead end with audience customization and finding custom events limiting is that custom events are designed to be, well, event-scoped, meaning the dimension only applies to the specific event it’s attached to, which doesn’t work well for user-level data like company name, industry, or buying stage which should stick with the user across sessions.
The correct approach is to leverage GA4’s user properties and the server-side capabilities of Google Tag Manager.
First, you need to use the 6sense and Drift APIs or webhooks to capture the desired user data.
This data needs to be sent to a server-side GTM container.
This is where a service like Stape or your own Google Cloud Platform environment becomes an excellent, cost-effective solution.
They provide the server infrastructure necessary for server-side tagging, which gives you much more control and can improve data quality and resilience against ad-blockers, making it a reliable and future-proof setup.
Within the server-side GTM, you process the incoming data and use the Google Analytics Data API or the GA4 Measurement Protocol to forward the enriched information to your GA4 property, specifically setting it as a user property (e.g., sixsense_industrydrift_plan
Once the data is flowing into GA4 as a user property, you then go into the GA4 Admin panel, select Custom Definitions, and create a user-scoped custom dimension that maps to that exact user property name.
This action unlocks the ability to use that user data in your standard reports, Explorations, and for building targeted Audiences, directly addressing your need for user-based integration.
Using a solution involving the APIs, GTM, and Stape or GCP is cheap because it uses powerful Google services and an efficient server environment that minimizes data loss and lets you control your data flow without needing complex, costly direct integrations for every single platform, essentially creating one central, reusable pipeline for all your API data.
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