Study first
Review the ideas behind the questions
These notes separate attribution setup from attribution claims, so reports can guide decisions without overstating what campaign data proves.
Choose the conversion being measured
Attribution reports can answer different questions depending on whether the conversion is contact creation, deal creation, or revenue.
- Contact-create attribution helps explain which interactions contributed to new contacts or leads.
- Deal-create attribution shifts the question toward interactions associated with new opportunities.
- Revenue attribution depends on closed-won revenue and should not be read as the same metric as contact creation.
Understand model assumptions
Campaign influence and attribution models distribute credit according to rules, not neutral truth.
- A primary-source model can assign all credit to one campaign even when other touches exist.
- First-touch, last-touch, even-distribution, and custom models can produce different answers from the same journey.
- Custom influence models need governance because manual edits, automation, and recalculation rules can change records.
Check relationship and time-frame rules
CRM attribution depends on the relationships that connect contacts, campaigns, opportunities, and conversion dates.
- Campaign influence can depend on campaign membership, opportunity contact roles, and the configured influence time frame.
- Changing close dates, campaign membership, or influence settings can recalculate some model records.
- Reports should disclose filters, models, conversion type, and time windows before teams compare results.