A customer journey can involve several channels
Imagine a customer sees a Meta advert on Monday, searches the business name on Google on Thursday and purchases on Friday. Meta may report the purchase because the customer viewed or clicked the advert. Google may report it because the customer clicked a paid search advert before buying.
Each platform sees its own evidence
Meta has detailed information about Meta advert interactions. Google has detailed information about Google advertising interactions. Neither necessarily has a complete, neutral view of the entire customer journey.
Attribution windows affect the claim
An attribution window is the period during which a platform can credit a conversion after an advert interaction. Different platforms, campaigns or reporting settings can use different windows, making direct comparisons difficult.
View-through and click-through are different
A click-through conversion follows an advert click. A view-through conversion may be credited after a person saw an advert without clicking it. View-through influence can be real, but it is normally less certain than a direct click path and should be explained separately where possible.
Do not simply add platform revenue together
If Meta reports £12,000 and Google reports £10,000, that does not automatically mean advertising generated £22,000 of unique revenue. Some orders may appear in both totals.
Questions to ask your agency
- Which attribution window is used in each platform?
- Can click-through and view-through conversions be shown separately?
- How much of Google performance is brand search?
- Are platform totals compared with verified ecommerce or CRM outcomes?
- Could the same sale be claimed by both Meta and Google?
How AdSpend Lens should communicate this
Platform values should be labelled as tracked or attributed. Cross-platform summaries should display an overlap warning rather than presenting the sum as confirmed unique revenue. Later integrations can compare platform claims with ecommerce, CRM or accounting records.