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You can run "ghost ads": pretend that you did bid and won an ad auction, log this information, and measure what would have happened in terms of conversions for

You can run "ghost ads": pretend that you did bid and won an ad auction, log this information, and measure what would have happened in terms of conversions for this counterfactual set of users. Both Google and FB have experimental products to do that, as well as a couple of third party companies. It's very difficult to set up properly, and the ROI numbers don't look good at all which is why big platforms are not super reluctant to offer it broadly, even though it would be a better and more honest way of measuring advertising effectiveness.

adamsb6 7y ago
Ah, I think I understand. So, you'd measure whether this person made a purchase without ever having viewed the ad. Thanks for explaining. I can see why platforms would be reluctant to offer this feature. If you're running ads on multiple platforms and only one offers this feature, it will make itself look uniquely bad. However, the other platforms probably also provide little extra value compared to running ads on a single platform.