Ads attribution in HubSpot

Attribution refers to the rules that determine how your marketing assets and channels receive credit for converting visitors into contacts and customers. HubSpot's ads tool offers five different models of attribution.

By default, a new contact is attributed to one of your ads when a click on that ad led to the web session where the visitor converted via a form submission for the first time. In order to track conversions:

• The HubSpot tracking code must be installed on the page your ad directs visitors to. HubSpot pages include the tracking code by default, but if you're using an external page, ensure that the HubSpot tracking code is installed.

• Auto-tracking must be enabled for your ad account.

  • Note that tracking does not work retroactively; after auto-tracking is enabled, HubSpot will only be able to associate future ad clicks with contacts.

  • When you enable auto-tracking, HubSpot will only track ads that are active or under review. However, if you make status changes to ads or ad campaigns in your ad account, changes are not guaranteed to be reflected immediately in HubSpot.

• HubSpot forms, pop-up forms, or non-HubSpot forms that use the HubSpot Forms API must be used to capture form submissions on your pages. If you're using the HubSpot Forms API, you must include the parameters to pass the page URL and the HubSpot tracking cookie.

Filter ad campaigns by attribution report

You can filter your ad campaigns by attribution report to see how your ads are influencing your contacts across every stage of their customer journey.

• In the upper left of the ads dashboard, click the Attribution Reports filter and select an attribution report.

Please note: If you're using HubSpotCRM Free, Marketing Hub Starter or legacy Basic accounts only have access to the First form submission report. Marketing Hub Professional and Enterprise accounts have access to all other attribution reports.

You can filter ad campaign data by the following attribution reports:

• First form submission: shows contacts that clicked a tracked ad, then submitted a form on your website for the first time during the same session. The conversion does not have to be a form submission, it could be for example, a Shopify signup, to count in this report. This report is selected by default, and helps identify which ads are the most effective at getting new visitors to interact with your website.
• First web session: shows all contacts whose ad clicks resulted in their first session on your website. Contacts in this report will have an Original source of Paid search or Paid social by default, because their first visit to your website was driven by an ad. This report helps identify which ads are the most effective at driving visitors to your website and making them aware of your business.
  

• Influenced first form submission: shows contacts that clicked a tracked ad, then submitted a form on your website for the first time at a later time. This is similar to the First form submission report, except that the contact’s ad click and their first form submission did not occur during the same session. This report helps identify which ads influenced visitors to return to your website.
• All form submissions: shows contacts that clicked a tracked ad, then submitted a form on your website during the same session, regardless of whether it was their first form submission, or if they previously existed as a contact in your HubSpot account prior to clicking the ad.
• Re-engagement: shows contacts that clicked a tracked ad after becoming a contact in your HubSpot account. This report helps identify which ads are the most effective at re-engaging your existing customers.

Selecting different attribution reports will change the Contacts metrics, and affect any metrics that are affected by the number of contacts (e.g., Customers, Cost per contact, Revenue from deals). Contacts may show up in multiple attribution report types, and some overlap is expected between the different attribution reports.

Filter ad campaigns by date and status

You can further filter your ad campaigns by date and status.

• Click the Date filter and select a date range. This will filter only ad interactions, based on what you've chosen in the Attribution reports filter, that occurred during the date range. For example, if you've chosen First web session and Last month, the results will show contacts with first web sessions that occurred in the last month.
• Click the Status filter and select Active, Paused, or Deleted. This will filter out ad campaigns that have that specific status.