👋 Hey, it’s Sundar! Welcome to experiMENTAL: a weekly newsletter on B2C Marketing & data science how-to guides, frameworks, and stories from 15 years including early Uber.

Barbara Galiza is marketing analytics consultant helping marketing teams leverage data for better results and founder of 021 Newsletter.

Marketing attribution goes beyond UTMs and MTA—it's about understanding the true business impact of your advertising investments.

This article, by Barbara, explores why traditional attribution methods fall short, how blind trust in "good enough" data leads to costly mistakes, and five key advantages of investing in better measurement: 1) maximizing ROI through smarter budget allocation, 2) justifying brand investments to leadership, 3) preparing for a cookieless future, 4) capturing value in channels your competitors overlook and 5) understanding impact of product.

The Problem with "Good Enough" Attribution

Let's start with what marketing attribution really is. Forget complicated multi-touch models for a moment—at its core, attribution is about understanding which of your marketing efforts are actually driving business results. It's about connecting the dots between your advertising spend and real outcomes like revenue, customer lifetime value, and profit.

Here's the thing: most marketing teams are working with attribution data they know isn't perfect, but they trust it anyway. Why? Because it's better than nothing, right? Well, not exactly.

Making decisions based on flawed attribution is often worse than making decisions with no data at all. 

Here's why:

• When you trust incomplete data, you systematically undervalue crucial marketing activities that don't generate direct clicks 

• Teams end up shifting budgets toward easily trackable channels, even if those channels aren't driving incremental growth

• Marketing leaders struggle to justify vital brand investments because traditional attribution models can't capture their impact 

• Critical channels like word-of-mouth, content marketing, affiliates, and OOH get cut because their value is harder to measure

I see this all the time with clients. A brand notices their paid search campaigns show great ROI in their attribution model, so they shift budget away from "underperforming" brand campaigns. Six months later, their overall acquisition costs have skyrocketed—but by then, rebuilding brand awareness takes twice as long and costs three times as much.

Five Business Advantages of Better Attribution

Ready for some good news? Investing in better attribution isn't just about avoiding mistakes—it's about capturing opportunities your competitors are missing. Let's look at five key advantages you'll gain from upgrading your measurement approach.

1. Maximize ROI Through Smarter Budget Allocation

Measurement strategies like MMM (Marketing Mix Modeling) can be a great asset in understanding the ROI of each individual channel. But attribution i's not just about knowing which channels work—it's about optimizing every dollar within those channels and making smarter decisions about where to invest next.

Think about your paid search campaigns. Basic attribution might show certain keywords have a high cost per acquisition, tempting you to cut spending. But what if those same keywords are bringing in your highest-value customers? I've seen teams slash their most profitable keywords simply because they couldn't connect the dots between acquisition cost and customer lifetime value.

In a recent project for VEED.io, we rolled out granular ROAS reporting at the keyword level. We discovered certain features were attracting much higher-value users than others. This insight led to a 20% growth in subscriptions while maintaining CAC—proof that better attribution can transform both channel-level strategy and within-channel optimization.

The companies getting this right typically: 

• Reduce wasted ad spend

• Identify hidden gems in "expensive" campaigns

• Optimize for long-term value instead of just short-term conversions

• Make budget decisions based on real business impact, not just clicks or conversions

2. Finally Justify Brand Spend to Leadership

Let's talk about everyone's favorite challenge: explaining to the CFO why brand marketing matters. Traditional click-based attribution makes this nearly impossible because, well, brand campaigns usually don’t generate click and certainly not conversions within the lookback window.

But alternative forms of attribution, like MMM, rule-based MTA (using synthetic clicks), How Did You Hear About Us (HDYHAU) surveys and incrementality tests can change the game.

Imagine walking into your next budget meeting with clear data showing how brand investments drive down acquisition costs across all channels. That's the power of better attribution.

3. Get Ahead in the Post-Cookie World

Here's the reality: third-party client-side tracking is dying. But that's actually great news if you're ready for it. While your competitors scramble to adapt, you can build a measurement system that's more accurate and more privacy-friendly.

Yes, it takes work. You'll need: 

• Server-side tracking capabilities, bypassing browser constraints

• Zero-party data collection

• Data warehouse + data modeling

But the payoff? You'll have reliable measurement while your competitors are still trying to figure out why their old tracking stopped working. Or, even worse, they won’t notice it’s only working for certain channels (e.g. Paid Search) and overinvest there.

4. Beat Competitors in Channels They Can't Measure

As you’ve probably noticed by now, this is the biggest advantage of better attribution: it lets you profit from channels other companies can't measure properly.

Take podcast advertising. Most companies struggle to track podcast ROI, so they either avoid it entirely or cut it when budgets get tight. But the smart ones? They implement dedicated landing pages, custom voucher codes, and post-purchase surveys. 

They connect these data points to customer lifetime value. And suddenly they're acquiring high-value customers through a channel their competitors won’t invest in because they can't measure.

5. Bridge the Gap Between Product and Marketing

Attribution reveals the crucial interplay between product and marketing performance. Most companies treat these as separate worlds, but the reality is they're deeply interconnected.

Great attribution analysis helps you understand: 

• How product engagement affects marketing campaign performance 

• Which product features drive the highest marketing ROI

• How marketing channels influence product adoption

• Where product improvements could boost marketing efficiency

  

Take WeTransfer's experience: they discovered their attribution wasn't capturing how marketing affected product virality and revenue. By building a comprehensive growth model that connected these pieces, they created a common source of truth that transformed how their product and marketing teams worked together.

The result? Both teams could finally: 

• Make data-driven decisions about resource allocation

• Understand how product metrics impact campaign performance

• Identify their biggest growth opportunities across both areas

• Build strategies that amplified each other's impact

Is your attribution sacrificing business results?

The gap between "good enough" and truly effective attribution isn't just about better data—it's about competitive advantage. While other companies optimize for what's easy to track, you can optimize for what actually drives business growth.

Start by asking yourself:

• Are you making decisions based on what's easy to measure, or what really matters?

• Which marketing channels have you neglected simply because they're hard to track?

• How much do you trust your current attribution data?

• Can you confidently explain the ROI of every marketing investment?

Your answers will probably reveal some immediate opportunities for improvement. 

👉If you’re interested in learning more about attribution, don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter on the intersection of marketing and data.

👉And if you’re looking into rolling out improvement attribution on your organization (like ROAS, payback period, rule-based MTA, MMM), head to my website and let’s talk projects.

Want to learn more about implementing advanced attribution? Sign up for the 021Newsletter where I regularly share detailed technical guides and case studies on marketing measurement.

Need help developing your attribution strategy? Barbara works with select clients to implement sophisticated measurement frameworks. Contact her to discuss your specific needs.

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