"We struggle to attribute conversions to the right acquisition channels."

The reality

Google Ads reports 80 conversions. Meta claims 100. Your CRM counts 130. Analytics shows 220. Every platform argues its own case — and that's precisely the problem. This is classic over-attribution: channels overlap and routinely claim credit for the same client. The result is artificially inflated ROAS figures and no single source of truth to actually steer by. The strategic question remains unanswered: which channel is genuinely generating your most qualified leads? Until that answer is clear, every budget decision is guesswork.

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Why it's happening

This isn't a glitch. It's a structural measurement problem.

— Incompatible attribution windows: Google typically claims a conversion up to 30 days after a click. Meta sometimes claims a sale 24 hours after a single view. You're comparing figures that were never designed to be compared.

— Last-click bias: most of the market still runs on last-click attribution. But the traveller's journey is fragmented — a prospect discovers your offer on Instagram, compares options on a tablet, and converts two weeks later via direct access. Last-click ignores everything that happened before that final touchpoint.

— Signal loss: between iOS restrictions, the end of third-party cookies and consent refusals, a significant portion of the journey has simply become invisible. Platforms fill those gaps with statistical modelling — which introduces an inevitable margin of error.

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What to do about it

The goal isn't perfect measurement. It doesn't exist. The goal is a coherent measurement protocol that everyone works from.

1. Tag plan audit: verify the integrity of every pixel and tag. A single misconfigured conversion event — firing twice on page reload, for instance — is enough to corrupt the entire reporting.
2. Attribution window alignment: to compare channels fairly, the rules need to be the same across all of them. We typically impose a click-only view or a reduced window — seven days — across all platforms to limit overlap.
3. CRM reconciliation: this is the only neutral ground. Using GCLIDs and UTMs, we push CRM data back to the platforms. You stop optimising towards leads generated and start optimising towards leads qualified — or signed.
4. A unified view: stop pitting channels against each other. Build a dashboard that assigns each lever its actual role — Meta for incrementality and discovery, Google for capturing existing demand.

It's only by moving from a siloed analysis to a joined-up view that you genuinely regain control of profitability.