One buyer’s path, from ad to order
Emil Becker was first seen in the sample shop, Acme Shop, 11 days ago, through an Instagram ad.
Acquisition files that visit under Paid social. A few days later he clicked the newsletter, a visit
under Email. Then he searched Google, came back through Organic search and paid €328.
His page under People shows the three visits in order, with the pages he saw and the order at the
end. First touch credits the purchase to the Instagram ad, last touch to the Google search. First touch
shows what found him; last touch shows what brought him back.
First touch vs. last touch explains which view answers which
question.
Why his visits join up
Emil agreed on the banner, so the script kept an id in his browser’s localStorage and knew him on every
return. For a visitor who declines, nothing is sent unless your pages count decliners without consent;
then each visit counts on its own, and an order sent from the browser counts as an event without a person. That is why buyers per channel cover the people who agreed.
A paid order from your server lands on the person when the page passed the same customer id to
identify, for example at sign-in. Without that id, the line on the confirmation page is what ties the
order to the person.
Where to look first
After the first week, open Acquisition › Ads and compare cost per buyer across campaigns. In the
sample shop, Performance Max costs €15.32 per buyer, twice the average, and is the campaign to question
first. How to see your Google Ads cost per buyer walks through the
screen.