📉 Why I Changed My Mind About Attribution Tools (And What I Use Instead)

Hey Founder,

For years, I told brands to invest in attribution tools. I believed they were the answer to the age-old question: “Which channel is actually driving my growth?”

But I’ve changed my mind.

Here’s why.

🧪 The Test That Changed Everything

I was working with a well-established DTC brand - mature in its space, with strong organic traffic and a high rate of returning customers.

We installed Triple Whale, and diligently set it to linear attribution. The goal? Get a balanced, multi-touch view of how Meta and Google were contributing to conversions.

Here’s what it showed us:

• Meta was losing money - tracking less than 1X ROAS

• Google was printing gold - showing a 5X ROAS

Now, I know Meta’s tracking has been patchy post-iOS14. But this looked bad. The data said Meta was burning cash, and Google was doing all the heavy lifting.

But something didn’t feel right.

🔍 So We Ran a Holdout Test

We turned off Google in a few key markets. Guess what? Revenue barely dropped. A blip.

Then, we switched off Meta.

Revenue dropped instantly. In some markets, almost by half.

So while Triple Whale was confidently telling us that Meta wasn’t driving value, the real-world experiment told a different story - Meta was the main engine of growth, and Google was just mopping up demand from people who were already convinced.

📊 Why Attribution Tools Can Mislead You

Here’s the problem: Attribution tools - even the fancy ones - rely on click data.

But click data alone doesn’t tell you the why behind the sale. It doesn’t tell you which platform created the demand - only which one got the last assist or happened to be in the conversion path.

If you're running a brand with any level of:

• Organic traffic

• Returning customers

• Multi-session paths

• Word-of-mouth

Then no tool can give you clean, definitive answers.

✅ What I Recommend Instead

If you really want to understand what’s driving your growth, there are only two methods I trust:

1. Holdout testing - turning off channels in controlled markets and watching what happens to revenue

2. Spend-to-revenue correlation - push spend aggressively, then monitor sitewide revenue lift

This is how you get past vanity ROAS and into real attribution insight.

🔎 But Here’s What Attribution Tools Are Good For

I’m not throwing the whole toolbox out. Tools like Triple Whale can still be useful, if you know what to look at.

For example, I love using it to track new customer revenue by campaign.

Why?

Because it shows me things like this: Even when I run Meta’s Advantage+ campaigns with very hard exclusions, the majority of revenue is still coming from returning customers — meaning it’s functioning as a retargeting engine, not new customer acquisition.

That’s powerful insight, and a key lever for budget allocation.

🎯 Final Word

Attribution tools are helpful. But they’re not truth. They’re just one lens.

If you want real answers about what’s driving your growth, you need to test in the real world. And be brave enough to switch things off when the numbers don’t add up.

X

Jessie