Facebook Ads Manager Reporting vs. Google Analytics UTM Reporting
To trust Facebook Ad Manager Analytics or Google UTM Analytics … that is the question.
One of our Foxwell Founders Member posed the below question about discrepancies between Facebook reporting and Google reporting, and which one to trust and use for decisions to scale (or not to scale).
PS - not sure how to use Google Analytics and UTMs to track your Facebook Ad Performance? Check out this blog.
Background info:
$30 AOV (Impulse buy)
66% of post-purchase survey results say purchasers came from FB or IG
Google UTM reporting is set to last click
Scenario 1:
A whitelisted ad campaign has the better CPA and ROAS in Facebook Ad Manager (7DC/1DV attribution)
In Google Analytics, the same campaign has almost 30 less purchases attributed
Is this because those “extra” 30 purchases are happening after 1-day click/1-day view (but before 7-day click/1-day view), thus being reported in Facebook and not in Google? Would you trust FB's reporting here and scale?
Scenario 2:
A different prospecting interest-based campaign (also 7DC/1DV) is reporting 24 purchases at an awful CPA in Facebook reporting
But in Google Analytics, the campaign has 46 attributed purchases, which gives it a great CPA, especially compared to what's being reported in platform
Do we trust Google Analytics or turn it off based on Facebook's reporting?
Scenario 3:.
A 1DC/1DV broad prospecting campaign has 20 attributed purchases in Facebook, but Google Analytics is saying there are 36
Note that Google Analytics is supposed to be last-day click
Trust Facebook or Google here?
Our take:
If it looks good in either Facebook or Google, let it run.
If it looks terrible in both, then you can confidently turn it off
Check what your post-purchase survey says for the “How did you hear about us question” to determine generally where your customers are coming from
Check your Google Analytics for how it’s set up with attribution settings and check Google Analytics first-click attributed conversions vs. last non-direct. Look at how the UTMs look across first click, last-click, and last non-direct click
Scenario 1: Test the campaign optimizing for 1DC/1DV and see how that does. Could also check Google Data Studio to determine how many conversions are view-through, meaning many of the conversions may be view-through'
Scenario 2: Generally you should be able to trust Google Analytics here, but if there aren’t many audience exclusions, it could be acting as a retargeting audience/ad set. It may be where another ad set is doing the heavy lifting, but that ad set is finding a pocket of people who might have already seen an ad before. So Google Analytics is showing last non-direct click credit, but Facebook is saying otherwise, since another ad is getting the first click.
Scenario 3: This is most likely a situation where conversions are a second or third Facebook touch happening and it's not 100% pure prospecting
