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I currently spend $X,000 per day in advertising on facebook. Their reported clicks barely match up within an order of magnitude. I've spent 4 days investigati

I currently spend $X,000 per day in advertising on facebook. Their reported clicks barely match up within an order of magnitude. I've spent 4 days investigating this, so it's worthwhile to share the data. For every 100 clicks I purchase, at a strong CPC ($0.10 - $2.00 CPC), I have found: - GA tells me i got between 40-60 sessions - piwik tells me ~70 - server logs show that page was requested ~400x (not indexed, a FB-only lander). I have IP and UA recorded, and both are rotated. My guess is that FB preloads the HTML LP when the impressions shows from mobile, so the browser is primed to quickly load assets (w/o sig resources to d/l images/etc -- just request the page that initially loads all that) My point is attribution for conversions and link clicks is hard. Any marketer worth their salt avoids the thought of "I paid for 10 clicks but GA only shows 6". A better marketer thinks, "I paid $660 to acquire 2 customers. Is that acceptable?"

shostack 10y ago
This. Experienced marketers know analytics sources will never fully match. That's why you look at things directionally and focus on measuring bottom line impact. Source: someone who has had to deal with clients who insist that all our various js-based tracking methods should 100% match backend data and each other.
pbhjpbhj 10y ago
>A better marketer thinks, "I paid $660 to acquire 2 customers. Is that acceptable?" // You're right, but that doesn't have a bearing on whether the advertising you bought was fraudulently presented though. Yes you should be wise, but we should still imprison people for fraudulent acquisition of other people's money, even if you still thought you ultimately got a good deal.
madshiva 10y ago
"I currently spend $X,000 per day in advertising on Facebook" you are wasting $X,000 per day period.
- maneesh 10y ago
  uh---what if he is making $X,000 * 2 in sales? Is it still a waste?

shostack 10y ago

This. Experienced marketers know analytics sources will never fully match. That's why you look at things directionally and focus on measuring bottom line impact. Source: someone who has had to deal with clients who insist that all our various js-based tracking methods should 100% match backend data and each other.

pbhjpbhj 10y ago

>A better marketer thinks, "I paid $660 to acquire 2 customers. Is that acceptable?" // You're right, but that doesn't have a bearing on whether the advertising you bought was fraudulently presented though. Yes you should be wise, but we should still imprison people for fraudulent acquisition of other people's money, even if you still thought you ultimately got a good deal.

madshiva 10y ago

"I currently spend $X,000 per day in advertising on Facebook" you are wasting $X,000 per day period.

maneesh 10y ago
uh---what if he is making $X,000 * 2 in sales? Is it still a waste?