Incrementality: did your ads make a difference?

In a world where information is power, the biggest players have never been inclined to share data and play nice. 

The digital ecosystem has become increasingly fragmented. Google and Meta operate within their own vast data ecosystems, while privacy changes introduced by Apple have restricted the ability to track users across apps and platforms. 

Modelled data is just one version of events

In the absence of holding hands and singing kumbaya, platforms have become increasingly sophisticated at assigning credit to conversions, giving advertisers 'modelled' views of the customer journey but none of these are foolproof and the result is that there is still no single attribution model can provide a complete view of the customer journey.

AI drives zero click conversions that muddy the waters

AI has transformed already muddy waters into black holes, sucking people up and spitting them out at random points later in the purchase journey with no sight of where they've come from. AI-generated answers and recommendations can influence customer decisions without a single click through to a brand’s website, leaving traditional click-based attribution with an even less complete view of the journey. Bain & Company explores this shift towards zero-click discovery and our own Andrew Burgess asks if we should re-introduce the 'misc.' code to cope with the uncertainty.

In a world where we're losing even more visibility of where a journey starts, what it entails and what exactly influences what, the most important question is now: 

"What would have happened if we hadn't run the campaign at all?"

This is incrementality. 

It is particularly relevant for paid social – the obvious player being Meta.

Traditional last-click attribution frequently and woefully undervalues Meta because it rewards the channel that closed the sale rather than the channel that influenced consideration. On the other hand, Meta's platform-reported attribution can appear overly generous, attributing conversions that may have happened regardless of ad exposure.

Then there's GA4, which often tells a different story altogether.

The result is marketers are increasingly finding themselves looking at three separate versions of reality and wondering which one to trust.

With AI in the mix, traditional Attribution Analysis is no longer enough

In simple terms, attribution asks: 

"Which channel should get the credit?"

Incrementality asks: 

"Would this conversion have happened without the advertising?"

Incrementality can help

Incrementality measures the true impact of advertising by identifying the sales, leads or conversions that occurred because of marketing activity, rather than simply assigning credit to touchpoints within the customer journey.

Alongside traditional attribution models, marketers can use a few techniques to actually measure attribution and answer the question: 

"Would this have happened anyway?"

• Conversion lift studies: Compare people who saw your ads with those who didn’t to get a clearer picture of what’s working.
• Geo testing: Compare regions where you’re advertising with regions where you’re not.
• Holdout tests: Leave part of your audience out of the advertising to create a control group.
• Media mix modelling (MMM): Look at how channels contribute over the longer term across your marketing mix, beyond platform-reported numbers.

What this means for paid social campaigns

For many advertisers, the reality sits somewhere between last-click and platform-reported attribution.

Meta often contributes significantly more value than traditional analytics platforms suggest. Howver, it may also drive fewer incremental conversions than platform reporting claims. That is why the industry's focus is increasingly shifting away from conversion claims and towards measurable business outcomes.

The most important question is no longer: "How many conversions did Meta claim?" It's: 

"What would have happened if we hadn't run Meta at all?"

The brands that can confidently answer that question will make better media investment decisions and build more effective, accountable marketing strategies.

Contact us to explore how equimedia can help you decipher the numbers, to understand what’s really driving results and invest with confidence.