A buyer may see a Meta ad, search your name on Google a week later, enquire on a portal and finally book after a referral call. First-touch attribution credits the Meta ad; last-touch credits the referral; multi-touch spreads the credit. Small teams usually record the first source and the most recent source on each lead and look at both.
Attribution also flows back to ad platforms. When a lead books a visit or a deal closes, sending that event to Meta through the Conversions API or to Google Ads as an offline conversion lets the ad systems learn which people turn into buyers, rather than optimising for anyone who fills a form. In channel-partner sales, attribution has a money side: it decides which CP earns the commission.
Example
One buyer, three touches (illustrative)
A Hyderabad buyer clicks a Google ad in July (first touch), enquires on MagicBricks in August, and books in September after a WhatsApp follow-up. The CRM records Google as first source and MagicBricks as latest. The marketer sends the booking back to Google Ads as a conversion so future bids favour similar searches.
Questions about Lead attribution
Which attribution model should a broker use?
Start simple: record first source and latest source on every lead and report bookings by both. Multi-touch models need clean tracking across ads, website and portals, which most small teams do not have; two fields used consistently beat a complex model with gaps.
Why send offline conversions to Meta or Google?
Ad platforms optimise for whatever event you report. If they only see form fills, they find people who fill forms. Reporting qualified leads, visits or bookings teaches them to find people who become buyers, which usually improves lead quality over a few weeks.
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