Server-side tracking and CAPI.
Without server-side tracking implemented properly, Meta attribution is fiction. Without CAPI, Google’s smart bidding is bidding on incomplete data. Both are baseline, not premium.
06 . Ecommerce
The foundation broke in 2021. Most stacks never recovered.
Post-iOS 14, ecommerce attribution went from approximate to fiction. The agencies that kept reporting platform ROAS as truth produced the worst returns of the last five years. We rebuild the foundation, then run the media.
01 . Challenges
Four things most ecommerce agencies miss.
Blended CAC, not platform ROAS.
Platform ROAS double-counts and overstates. Blended CAC, calculated across the full revenue and spend stack, is the only number that survives CFO scrutiny.
Performance Max structure.
PMax with no asset group structure, no brand exclusion, and no conversion value rules is the slowest leak in the average ecommerce account. Standard at most agencies, rare to find fixed.
Retention as acquisition.
The cheapest customer to acquire is the one you already have. Lifecycle email, loyalty mechanics, and second-purchase economics belong in the same dashboard as the acquisition funnel.
02 . System
The ecommerce system, top to bottom.
- 01Server-side tracking, Elevar or custom GTM.
- 02GA4 and BigQuery, owned and queryable.
- 03Google Ads, Performance Max structured, Shopping properly tagged.
- 04Meta, CAPI, audience tiers, creative iteration.
- 05TikTok, where the unit economics support it.
- 06Email lifecycle, integrated with acquisition data.
- 07Blended CAC dashboard, daily.
Start with the number underneath the numbers.
The first call calculates your actual blended CAC, not the platform-reported one. The number is usually different. Sometimes very different.