Same User, Multiple Goal Completions Across Multiple Sessions
We defined last non-direct click attribution here. What we didn’t clarify was a scenario where a user completes more than 1 goal across multiple sessions in the selected date range. Does the source / medium associated with the last session “hijack” (i.e., get credit for) goal completions from source / medium pairs associated with previous sessions for that same user?
Say a user visits a website across multiple sessions in the selected date range, with source / medium attribution as follows:
- [ Row 1 in snag below ] From an organic search results link click (source / medium = “google / organic”) as a new user, completing a goal, and
- [ Row 2 in snag below ] In the same time period, from a paid ad click (source / medium = “google / cpc”) as a return visitor – completing more goals.
In the above scenario, will the paid ad click get credit for all goal completions for this user across all sessions in the selected date range?
No! See below the snag that shows source / medium, with custom dimension “GA Client ID” as a secondary dimension (see explanation of Google Analytics Client ID in the first paragraph of this page). GA Client ID shows the same user associated with sessions across 2 distinct source / medium pairs, with goal completions uniquely associated with the respective source / medium and session where the user completed the goals.
