Attribution.

What is attribution?

Attribution is the method of deciding which marketing touchpoints get credit for a sale or enquiry. A customer might see a LinkedIn post, click a Google ad a week later, then come back by typing your name into a search engine before filling in a form. Attribution decides how much of that enquiry each step earned.

The rules used to split the credit are called attribution models, and different models can tell very different stories about the same customer.

Why it matters

Attribution quietly shapes where your budget goes. If your reporting hands all the credit to the last click, branded search and direct visits look like heroes and the channels that first introduced you look like waste. Cut those introductory channels and, a few months later, the branded searches start drying up too. For any business spending real money on ads, content or events, the attribution model decides which of them survives the next budget review.

The main models

• Last click All the credit goes to the final touchpoint before the conversion. Easy to explain, but it consistently undervalues anything that creates demand.
• Data-driven attribution The default in GA4 and Google Ads. It uses your conversion data to estimate each touchpoint's contribution, but it can only weigh the touchpoints Google can see.
• First click and linear Older rule-based models that credited the first touch or spread credit evenly. Google phased them out of Google Ads and GA4 during 2023, though other tools still offer them.
• Self-reported source Asking customers 'How did you hear about us?' on the form or on the call. Low-tech, and often the most revealing source you have.

What to do about it

Add a 'How did you hear about us?' question to every enquiry form and ask it on the phone too. Make sure every paid and email link carries UTM parameters so GA4 can tell campaigns apart. Then compare three views each month: what the ad platforms claim, what GA4 reports under its model, and what customers actually say. Where all three agree, act with confidence. Where they disagree, treat the gap as a question to investigate before cutting any channel.