Most e-commerce brands running paid ads want to know where their money is working. Platform-reported numbers from Meta, Google, and TikTok make it hard to tell. Each platform takes credit for conversions the others also claim, and the total never adds up.

We wanted to know what happens when brands get a clearer picture. So we pulled data from 100 e-commerce brands using ThoughtMetric and measured their ROAS over the first six months on the platform. The average improvement was 31%.

This post breaks down what we found, and why it happens.

We looked at 100 brands across a range of verticals and ad spend levels, all running paid campaigns on at least two platforms (Meta and Google mostly). Each brand had been using ThoughtMetric for a minimum of six months.We compared their ROAS during their first full month of using ThoughtMetric to their ROAS six months in. As mentioned above, the average improvement was 31%. 

The short answer is that most brands are misallocating spend before they have accurate attribution. They're over-investing in channels that appear to perform well in platform dashboards and under-investing in channels that are driving revenue.

Meta says it drove 200 conversions. Google says it drove 180. However, the brand only had 250 total conversions that week. Both platforms are counting the same customers, and it’s throwing the numbers off (and probably strategic ad spend decisions). When a brand starts using an unbiased tool like ThoughtMetric, the problem of double counting orders is eliminated. 

Once brands can see which campaigns are genuinely driving new revenue, they reallocate. That doesn't always mean spending more. Sometimes it means spending the same amount but putting it in the right places.

Sure. However, platform-reported ROAS is almost always inflated because of double-counting. A "good" ROAS in Meta Ads Manager might look very different when you account for the fact that Google is claiming the same conversions. 

Independent attribution isn't just showing you a different view of the same data. It's deduplicating conversions across platforms and applying consistent logic to determine which touchpoints influenced a purchase. The numbers are different because they're more accurate, not just because they use a different model.

Google Analytics is helpful for understanding site behavior, but it has a well-known bias toward crediting Google's own channels (it is also not built for e-commerce). For brands spending across Meta, Google, and TikTok, you need a tool that sits outside all three platforms and evaluates them on equal footing.

If you're running paid ads on more than one platform and relying on each platform's own reporting to make budget decisions, your ROAS is almost certainly not what you think it is. ThoughtMetric gives you a single source of truth across all your paid channels. When you know which campaigns are genuinely driving revenue, you can allocate spend accordingly. Based on what we've seen across 100 brands, that reallocation leads to meaningful ROAS improvement.

Book a demo to learn more about ThoughtMetric.