How to Use the New Facebook Attribution Tool

Facebook has created several tools to help businesses measure and optimize their campaigns’ success over multiple platforms. The Facebook Attribution tool is free to use and made specifically for you, as a marketer, to provide a holistic view of your ad performance on and off Facebook.

The Set Up

In your Business Manager, you will find something a new feature: the attribution section. Go to your settings, and in the upper left-hand corner you’ll see this section.

Facebook will then ask you to describe the line of business you’re in. Are you a small business? An agency? Do you have multiple brands? There are many different factors that Facebook needs to take into account, including the possible multiple brands you’re involved with.

Pixel

When your pixel has been set up, you will need to integrate it into your attribution tool as you’re setting it up. Pixels have always been important because its through pixels that Facebook can track interactions with your brand, website, pages, etc.

Adding Platforms

The next step is adding the additional platforms on which you conduct business. It could be Google or AppNexus, to name a couple. Adding these platforms will give you a holistic view of all the platforms you’re using, which allows the attribution tool to actually work.

Your user is not just on Facebook. They could be on another platform at any given moment, including Snapchat, Twitter, Pinterest, LinkedIn, etc. All these different platforms are trying to integrate data into a cross-platform attribution model.

Once you’ve completed the integration, the attribution tool is going to come up with a ton of data that you can analyze.

Attribution model and window

The credit that each touchpoint is given for a conversion is determined by attribution models. You will see results on your conversions and ad performance more clearly through these attribution models.

All touchpoints that you want to consider are specified by attribution windows. It will let you choose what the model should look for in touchpoints to credit the conversion.

Facebook’s default setting is a last-touch model with a 28-day click window and a 1-day impression. For instance, if a purchase was your chosen conversion with this default setting, you will see the results of purchases that happened 28 days before the purchase via last ad click, or 1 day within a purchase and its last ad impression — whichever comes last. However, you can always change the settings to suit your preference.

Reporting Sections

Facebook attribution reporting has three sections:

• Performance. Compare your ads’ impact across different touchpoints: direct, organic, and paid. You can use the data-driven attribution model, which gives a certain percentage of credit to every touchpoint on the basis of progressive impact on your business goals.
• Cross-device. Discover how your audience engages with your business and other platforms across different devices.
• Custom Reports. Customize your reports with breakdowns according to your campaign names.

The Facebook Attribution tool has advanced further than Google and Amazon. Google’s still in beta and Amazon is reportedly making initial tests. That said, with the help of this tool you can adjust your campaigns to have better traction and conversion. There’s definitely more to come, as this is just the beginning for cross-platform marketing.