impact.com & Google Analytics Tracking — What You Need to Know

If you’re using Google Analytics or another reporting tool alongside impact.com, you may notice some differences between the reported data. Discrepancies are normal — different platforms can report data in differing ways. This article offers a few key things to know about the differences between impact.com and Google Analytics. It also covers differences specific to Google Analytics 4 (GA4).

About GA4: Google Analytics 4 follows a tracking model that favors attribution to Google channels over affiliate channels. You can change your GA4 settings in order to better align the 2 attribution methodologies, and return more alike data reports.

Tracking differences

In general, different analytics platforms can report different data depending on how they're configured and what they're reporting — variances should be expected.

Clicks vs. sessions

impact.com tracks Clicks. Google Analytics tracks Sessions.

Clicks

A Click occurs when a customer clicks on content containing an impact.com tracking link, then lands on your site. If that customer has clicked on the same tracking link multiple times, impact.com can consider this a single click, since a rolling 30-minute window is used. Each time the tracking link is clicked, the rolling window resets.

Click counts in impact.com can differ because multiple clicks on the same media source can count as a single click. Each time the ad content is clicked, the 30-minute rolling window resets.A Session is defined as a 30-minute window of user activity that starts when the user lands on your site.

Sessions

A Session can include multiple page views, devices, or conversions within those 30 minutes. If a user is determined to be inactive after 30 minutes (i.e., leaves your site), the session ends. If they return the following day, a new session is created.

Google Analytics can have differing click counts depending on whether the Session has expired — multiple clicks within the same session are counted as 1, but once the Session expires, clicks on the same tracking link will count as new clicks.

Direct vs. affiliate conversions

When a conversion is reported to impact.com, it’s immediately attributed to the partner or network that drove the “winning” click and becomes an attributed action to that partner or network. In most cases, this is the “Last Click” before the conversion. Depending on your referral window configuration, a partner can be attributed for a conversion if it occurred within this window, whereas Google Analytics might report it as a direct conversion.

The referral window may vary based on the contract established with each partner. You can review referral window configuration in your template terms. This value represents the time period after a click is tracked during which the action can still be attributed to the referring partner.

Example: "Last Click within 30 days” means the partner that drove the last click in a conversion path will be attributed with driving the conversion, even if up to 30 days have passed between that click happening and the conversion occurring.

How do I better align GA4 metrics with my impact.com metrics?

If your impact.com credit policy is last click, consider changing the attribution settings in GA4 to align with this.

Your account must have the Editor role in your GA4 account to do the following.

1. Log in to your GA4 account.
2. In the bottom-left corner, select Admin.
3. In the Property Settings column, select Attribution Settings.
4. Under Reporting attribution model, from the [Drop-down menu], select Last Click.
5. Under Conversion window, configure the timeframe to align with your payout window on impact.com.
6. Select Save.

Revenue differences

impact.com reports revenue based on the contracts you've established with your partners and networks. Keep in mind that these contracts may include custom click referral windows, which can affect how revenue is attributed.

Why are my affiliate channels being assigned less revenue than before?

If you have noticed a decrease in affiliate channel revenue with the introduction of GA4, this is likely due to GA4’s updated Data-Driven Attribution (DDA) model. The current DDA model is best suited for tracking interactions on Google channels such as YouTube, Display Ads, or Search, as opposed to affiliate channels.

In your previous Google Analytics version, you may have had the Last Click attribution method set up instead of DDA, which would have caused revenue to be spread out more accurately among your affiliate channels. To revert your GA4 attribution to the Last Click method, see How do I better align GA4 metrics with my impact.com metrics? above.

Other discrepancy factors

• Cookieless Tracking: Google Analytics tracks entirely via cookies. impact.com, in addition to a cookie, also takes a “fingerprint” of the browser (IP address, browser type, version, OS, etc.). If we can’t find the cookie, we will look at the fingerprint in order to track the traffic, resulting in higher, more accurate numbers. Some browsers also restrict cookies.
• Conversion De-duplication: A big benefit of impact.com is that all conversions are automatically de-duplicated, meaning only one touchpoint will be credited as the winner. This can result in a lower number of conversions recorded, which of course the advertiser desires because they don’t double-pay for a conversion.
• Frequency Caps: impact.com users can set various frequency caps in contacts, such as “stop after payouts reach $10K.” When a cap is reached, impact.com no longer registers new conversions. If Google Analytics is unaware of these terms, it will continue counting.
• Time Zones: Do both vendors use the same time zone? Vendors that report based on different time zones return different results.

Supplement your GA4 tracking: GA4 can be a helpful tool to continually reassess the value of all your cross-channel marketing touchpoints, but we recommend against using it as your sole source of truth for forecasting and budgeting. For a more comprehensive view, you may want to supplement GA4 with impact.com’s Forecasting and Anomaly Detection reports as you plan for the future.