Attribution and the search for marketing truth

Can we ever know exactly what is working in marketing? In the fourth episode of The Ads Remain the Same, Mick and Tom get into attribution, conflicting analytics, the data we trust and why the search for a single source of truth might be a fool’s errand. They also discuss Christmas advertising, musical discovery and why a great record rarely fits neatly into one genre. The Ads Remain the Same is a Footprint Digital podcast hosted by Mick, Head of Paid Media, and Tom Cox, Senior Paid Media Manager. Listen to the episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZL5lrTW8oU

Episode four of The Ads Remain the Same is called 2+2=5. It takes its name from the Radiohead track, but there’s another reference behind it: George Orwell’s 1984, where the idea that two plus two can equal five becomes a chilling example of being pressured to accept something that contradicts reality.

It’s an appropriate title for a conversation about digital marketing measurement. We have more data than ever, but that doesn’t necessarily mean we have a clearer picture of what is happening.

Google Ads tells us one thing. GA4 tells us another. Shopify or WooCommerce might tell us something else entirely.

Each platform has its own way of recording and attributing activity, leaving marketers trying to work out which numbers to believe and what decisions to make as a result.

Mick and Tom aren’t expecting to solve attribution in an hour. In fact, they admit early on that they probably won’t solve much at all! But they do explore why the industry remains so preoccupied with finding a definitive answer, whether that answer ever existed in the first place, and whether we might be better off accepting a little uncertainty.

Is there such a thing as a single source of truth?

The conversation starts with a familiar problem. A client looks at Google Ads and sees one set of conversion figures. They open GA4 and find another. Then they check their ecommerce platform and discover that the numbers don’t match there, either.

It can become a “trifecta of confusion”.

There are reasons for the differences, of course. Platforms use different attribution models, reporting windows and methods of collecting data. A conversion might be credited to one channel in one report and another channel elsewhere.

Tracking limitations can also mean that not every interaction is captured.

But knowing why the numbers differ doesn’t necessarily make it any easier to decide where to focus a budget or how to explain performance to a client.

Mick approaches the different platforms with different purposes in mind. Google Ads is particularly useful for campaign optimisation. It allows him to assess the actions being tracked, understand what the campaigns are delivering and make decisions about which conversions to prioritise.

GA4, meanwhile, provides a broader view of what is happening across the website and marketing activity. It can help the team look beyond the immediate conversion and understand how users behave, how channels interact and what might be happening further along the customer journey.

Then there are the business’s own systems, such as Shopify, which can provide the commercial picture of what has actually sold.

For eCommerce businesses in particular, Mick argues that the sales platform can be the starting point. Once you understand what has sold, you can begin to investigate how advertising and other marketing activity contributed to that result.

That distinction matters because a conversion recorded by an advertising platform is not necessarily the same thing as a profitable sale for the business.

Returns, margins and overheads can all change the picture. A campaign might appear to deliver an impressive return on ad spend, but what happens when customers send products back? What if the business has sold several items to the same customer, only for most of them to be returned? And how much of that apparent revenue actually translates into profit?

As the pair discuss, a sale can sit on a spreadsheet looking like a success even when the commercial reality is rather different.

It’s a reminder that marketers need to understand more than the numbers generated by the platforms they manage. The business context matters just as much.

The danger of narrowing your focus too far

Tom reflects on how marketers have traditionally been encouraged to compare channels and identify the strongest performers in analytics. From a paid media perspective, the logic makes sense. If you’re spending money on traffic, you want that traffic to be relevant and to generate a return.

Paid search should, in theory, have an advantage here. You can target specific keywords, shape the messaging and send users to a relevant landing page. Unlike organic traffic, where algorithms and search results can introduce a degree of unpredictability, paid traffic gives marketers a more direct way to influence who sees an ad and where they land.

But Tom points out that there’s a danger in taking that logic too far.

If you repeatedly narrow your focus to the products, audiences, keywords or landing pages that have already generated the best results, you can end up missing new opportunities. You might improve conversion rates while restricting the volume of potential customers you reach.

In other words, the most efficient-looking option isn’t always the one that creates the greatest overall opportunity.

This is where attribution becomes more complicated than simply deciding which channel gets credit for a conversion. A customer might first discover a business through one channel, research it through another and finally convert after a paid search visit. Looking at the final interaction alone could lead you to undervalue the earlier activity that helped make the sale possible.

Tom remembers being encouraged to work towards a single, definitive view of performance, as though everything would eventually line up and reveal the answer.

But, as he puts it, “I don’t think there was ever a single point of truth that we were able to work with.”

The industry may have spent years looking for that holy grail, but real-world marketing rarely behaves so neatly.

Why the customer journey matters more than the last click

One of the most useful parts of the conversation is the pair’s discussion of assisted conversions and the importance of understanding where marketing activity sits within the customer journey.

Tom explains that he has long used assisted conversion reporting to understand the contribution paid media makes beyond the conversions directly attributed to it.

A campaign might be credited with 50 conversions in Google Ads, for example. That looks straightforward enough. But when you look more closely at the wider journey, you might discover that paid media also played a role in another 20 conversions.

Those additional interactions matter.

If you judge the campaign only on the conversions it receives direct credit for, you risk overlooking part of its value.

The same principle applies to channels that are often dismissed because they don’t appear to generate many immediate sales.

Mick talks about working with a greetings card business that had recently launched Pinterest ads. Pinterest might not be the first platform that springs to mind when thinking about direct sales, but the early conversion journeys suggested that it was playing a role much earlier in the process.

That doesn’t automatically mean every channel deserves more budget. It means marketers need to understand what each channel is doing before deciding whether it is working.

The challenge is to look at the evidence without becoming so obsessed with attribution that the reporting itself starts to dictate the strategy.

Mick also sees paid media as a useful testing ground for broader marketing decisions. Advertising can provide relatively immediate feedback on keywords, messaging and value propositions. If a campaign generates impressions but very few clicks, that might tell you something about the way the offer is being presented or whether the audience is responding to it.

Those insights can then inform activity elsewhere, including SEO and content.

For Mick, brand uplift is another important part of the picture. An increase in people searching for a company by name can be a useful indication that awareness is growing. It suggests that more people know who the business is, which can make it easier to bring them further down the funnel later.

Brand building can sometimes be treated as a secondary consideration in PPC, particularly when marketers are focused on immediate conversions. But Mick argues that a strong brand provides foundations that non-brand activity alone cannot.

If you stop investing in a particular non-brand campaign, the traffic it generates may disappear. A brand that people recognise and actively search for gives you something more enduring to build on.

As Tom suggests, if the foundations aren’t there, you can end up constantly adding activity on top without creating anything solid underneath.

Can we trust Google?

The conversation inevitably turns to Google itself. After all, Google provides the advertising platform, the analytics platform and many of the tools used to track the results. So how much confidence should marketers place in the information it supplies?

Tom raises the question after discussing a conversation with a Google representative. If Google tells you that making a particular change could improve conversion rates by 14%, how should you interpret that claim?

The recommendation may be based on historical trends and performance data, but that doesn’t make the outcome guaranteed. Marketing is too dependent on context, competition, customer behaviour and business conditions to be reduced to a predictable formula.

As Tom observes, if it were really that straightforward, he’d be doing it himself.

Mick agrees that there isn’t necessarily a simple alternative. Google remains central to search, and its tools are deeply integrated into the way many businesses measure their marketing. Other analytics platforms can offer different perspectives, but switching systems doesn’t magically remove the underlying challenges.

The question becomes less about finding a platform that can tell us everything and more about understanding the strengths and limitations of the information available.

There’s also a growing conversation around first-party data and the quality of the information businesses feed back into advertising platforms.

Tom discusses a client that has reached a point where further campaign optimisation is unlikely to deliver significant improvements on its own. The next opportunity may come from improving the quality of the data available to the system, potentially through a new CRM and a better connection between marketing activity and what happens within the business.

The goal is to build a clearer picture of the customer journey, from the first exposure to a marketing message through to the eventual sale or conversion.

Tools such as Google Tag Gateway may help address some of the gaps in tracking, while CRM integration can help connect advertising activity to business outcomes. But implementation is not always straightforward, and these systems require the right technical knowledge and support.

As Tom points out, tracking is essential, but it isn’t necessarily something a PPC manager spends every day configuring. You might set it up, manage campaigns for weeks and then return to investigate when something looks unusual. Having access to specialists who work with tracking and measurement regularly can make a real difference.

The wider point is that better reporting doesn’t always come from another dashboard. Sometimes, it comes from improving the underlying information and making sure the marketing team can connect it to what the business actually needs to achieve.

First-party data, privacy and the education gap

Improving data quality sounds sensible in theory, but Mick and Tom acknowledge that clients can be reluctant to share information with advertising platforms.

For businesses operating in regulated industries, or those with particularly strict compliance requirements, concerns about privacy and data handling are understandable. News stories about large technology companies can also make organisations cautious about giving them more information.

There can be a misunderstanding about what happens when customer data is uploaded to an advertising platform, too. Some clients associate sharing a customer list with remarketing to those exact people, when the data can also be used to help platforms identify audiences with similar characteristics and behaviours.

Tom describes this as something like a lookalike audience “with steroids”. The technology can use patterns and signals to identify people who may be relevant to a business, rather than simply showing ads to a list of existing customers.

That doesn’t mean concerns about privacy should be dismissed. Businesses still need to understand what data they are sharing, why they are sharing it and how it is handled. The important thing is to have a clear, informed conversation rather than assuming clients either understand the technology or should automatically agree to use it.

Education is a recurring theme throughout the episode. Marketers need to understand the systems themselves, but they also need to explain them in a way that helps clients make confident decisions.

And there’s a practical skills gap to consider. New tracking tools and features can be introduced with the expectation that businesses will implement them, but the steps required to connect systems, configure tags and send data back to platforms can be technically demanding.

For teams without specialist support, that can become a barrier to getting the full benefit of the technology.

The answer isn’t necessarily for every marketer to become an expert in every technical system. It is to understand enough to ask the right questions, recognise when something isn’t working and know when specialist help is needed.

Are marketers overthinking attribution?

After exploring all these complexities, Mick and Tom come back to a more uncomfortable question: are marketers too obsessed with attribution?

Tom thinks there is a tendency to over analyse the numbers. Marketing managers, particularly those working in paid media, are often detail-oriented people. They don’t like gaps in the data because they know that something important could be missing.

That attention to detail is useful, but it can also become counterproductive.

Tom admits that he can put so much detail into reports and emails that he creates opportunities for every figure to be questioned and pulled apart. Sometimes, a simpler explanation of the results might be more helpful to the client.

He jokes that if he could simply say, “Hey, you spent £2,000, you got £10,000 back, and you got a thousand conversions. See you next month,” plenty of people would be perfectly happy.

Of course, the reality is more complicated than that. But his point is that clients ultimately want to know whether marketing is adding value to their business and whether they can trust the team managing it.

They don’t necessarily need to participate in every technical discussion about tracking and attribution.

That doesn’t mean marketers should stop caring about the detail. Tom believes there is a genuine need for manual intervention and for people who understand how the data is collected and interpreted. He is also interested in developing his own knowledge in this area, because a better understanding of measurement can make him a more confident and effective marketer.

Mick makes a related point about the value of uncertainty. He admits that he enjoys the more challenging conversations during reporting week, particularly when the numbers reveal something unexpected.

If every month produces exactly the same conversation, there may be little reason to change anything. But when something doesn’t work, or the results challenge an assumption, there is an opportunity to test a different approach.

Tom agrees that confidence in the data matters because it influences the decisions marketers are prepared to make. If you don’t trust the information in front of you, you may become more cautious about changing a campaign, even when a change is needed.

That confidence doesn’t come from pretending the numbers are perfect. It comes from understanding what each platform is telling you, comparing the evidence and making a reasoned decision.

As Tom explains, “The more confident you are in that data, the more confident you are that, yeah, I know exactly what I’m doing next week, tomorrow, month’s time, whatever, and you just go ahead and do it.”

Perhaps that is the most useful way to think about attribution. It is not about eliminating every unknown. It is about having enough reliable information to make better decisions.

Christmas advertising: can we have a little more time, please?

The conversation takes a seasonal detour when Tom mentions seeing a Christmas campaign from Devon. It is still October, and he is already thinking about the Christmas advertising that will soon be everywhere.

His response to the campaign is immediate: he watches a few seconds and decides it is awful.

The problem is not necessarily the use of celebrities or recognisable faces. It is the feeling that the advert is trying to force everyone into a festive mood before they are ready.

Tom is particularly unimpressed by the idea that Christmas should arrive with an instruction to be cheerful. As he puts it, “If I want to smile, I’ll smile.”

Mick understands the wider marketing context. Christmas campaigns need to be planned well in advance, and by late October the team is already working on seasonal activity for clients. The challenge is that the planning cycle and the public’s appetite for Christmas do not always move at the same pace.

They also touch on the annual anticipation around the John Lewis Christmas advert, particularly the speculation about which song will feature. Tom remembers his early agency days, when people would eagerly wait for the advert to launch and debate the music almost as much as the campaign itself.

Christmas advertising can become a cultural event, with the soundtrack playing a significant role in how people remember it. But the pair’s conversation also raises a broader question about timing and tone: just because a brand can get attention early doesn’t necessarily mean it should.

Sometimes, getting the message right means understanding when the audience is ready to hear it.

The music bit: GURRIERS, DICE, Beck and the joy of discovery

As always, The Ads Remain the Same finishes with music, and this episode offers a particularly good reminder that discovery often happens when you are willing to step outside what you already know.

Mick arrives wearing a T-shirt from a recent gig in Norwich by Irish band GURRIERS, whose name draws on a Dublin term for a scally or ruffian. Tom had introduced Mick to the band a few years earlier, when they were still relatively early in their career.

Mick had since seen them at Glastonbury and was impressed by their energy and stage presence. He particularly remembers the bass player, who looks remarkably young, performs in a dress and does backflips while playing. At the Norwich gig, the low ceiling meant there was no room for that particular trick, but the performance still made an impression.

The crowd was another interesting part of the experience. There were long-time gig-goers, rock fans and students, with plenty of Fontaines D.C. T-shirts in evidence. The pair talk about the current wave of Irish bands, including Fontaines D.C., Sprints and Kneecap, and how one discovery can lead naturally to another.

For Mick, GURRIERS are a band with real energy and a sound that feels exciting in a live setting. Their second album has given him another reason to keep listening, and the T-shirt is proof that the gig made an impression.

Tom’s pick takes a different route into music. He talks about his interest in Aphex Twin, remembering the unsettling music videos he encountered as a child in the Virgin Megastore at Piccadilly Circus. One video in particular stayed with him because it was so strange that he couldn’t look away.

That memory leads into a discussion of music as something much bigger than the sound itself. Tom is interested in artists who work across different creative forms, combining music with visual art and other kinds of multimedia. Aphex Twin is an example of someone whose work goes well beyond the idea of a person standing behind a laptop.

Tom also mentions Flying Lotus and the electronic music he has discovered through these connections. It might not always be his usual listening choice, but he appreciates artists who experiment and create something that doesn’t fit comfortably into an established category.

His album recommendation is Something to Consume, the 2025 record by DICE, released on Jack White’s Third Man Records. The four-piece Australian band caught his attention through a recommended Instagram video, and he was struck by how much intensity they could create.

Tom is wary of the habit of immediately comparing new bands with established artists. DICE might share elements with noisy, abrasive bands such as My Bloody Valentine, Mudhoney or L7, alongside heavier metal influences, but he sees them as having their own identity.

The combination is what makes the record work for him. Tracks such as “Throw Yourself to the Sword” and “Punishers” offer a sound that is loud, forceful and distinctive. The album was produced by Will Yip, whose work spans a range of rock and alternative acts.

For Tom, discovering DICE through an unexpected social media recommendation is part of the appeal. The algorithm introduced him to something new, but it was the music itself that made him stay.

Mick, meanwhile, has returned to Beck after seeing that the artist would be supporting a forthcoming tour date in South America. The announcement prompted him to revisit Beck’s music and, in particular, the 1996 album Odelay.

It brought back memories of the period when Beck was building momentum, with tracks such as “The New Pollution” and “Jack-Ass” standing out. Mick remembers buying the “Jack-Ass” CD single, which came with a poster of Beck alongside Willie Nelson, dressed as farmers. The B-side, “Strange Invitation”, reimagines the song with a slower, more acoustic feel and a dreamy, almost Mexican-inspired atmosphere.

Part of what Mick admires about Beck is his ability to move between genres and collaborators. Across his career, Beck has worked in pop, rock and electronic music, explored different musical traditions and collaborated with artists from very different backgrounds. Mick sees that willingness to experiment as something approaching Prince’s extraordinary creative range.

Their discussion turns to the cross-pollination between rock and dance music in the 1990s. Mick remembers a time when musical tastes could feel more rigidly divided, before remixes and collaborations began bringing club culture into rock and pop in increasingly interesting ways.

Artists such as Aphex Twin, UNKLE, Howie B and Soulwax helped blur those boundaries. Remixes could introduce listeners to a new artist or genre, while a collaboration might take something familiar and transform it into something entirely different.

For Mick, that creative exchange is part of what makes music so rewarding. A remix isn’t just a different version of a song. It can change the way you hear the original, introduce you to a new musical world or make you reconsider the boundaries between genres.

It also provides a neat connection back to the episode’s title. Tom suggests that Radiohead’s music was influenced by the sounds and techniques that emerged from late-1980s and early-1990s dance and club culture. Rather than keeping those influences separate, the band absorbed them into its own songwriting, creating something that felt both familiar and new.

The result is a reminder that creativity often comes from bringing different ideas together, rather than trying to keep everything in its own lane.

The takeaway: marketing is rarely as simple as 2+2=4

Mick and Tom finish the episode without claiming to have solved attribution. In fact, they openly acknowledge that they haven’t come close to resolving every problem they discussed.

But that is part of the point.

Digital marketing is full of systems that promise greater clarity, more automation and increasingly sophisticated ways to measure performance. Yet the reality is that customers move between channels, data is imperfect, platforms report things differently and business outcomes depend on far more than the campaign itself.

The answer is not to abandon measurement or stop asking difficult questions. It is to recognise that no single dashboard can tell the whole story.

Good marketing requires an understanding of the platforms, the customer journey and the business behind the numbers. It requires marketers to explain what they know, be honest about what they don’t and use the evidence available to make informed decisions.

And perhaps, just as importantly, it requires the confidence to accept that some things will remain uncertain.

After all, if two plus two doesn’t always appear to equal four in your reports, it doesn’t necessarily mean the whole campaign is wrong. It might mean you’re looking at only one part of a much bigger picture.

Listen to episode four of The Ads Remain the Same, 2+2=5, to hear Mick and Tom’s full conversation about attribution, analytics, trust and the music that keeps them curious.

The Ads Remain the Same is a Footprint Digital podcast hosted by Mick, Head of Paid Media, and Tom Cox, Senior Paid Media Manager. Listen to the episode on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZL5lrTW8oU