Journal
Reading last-click reports without getting trapped
Most growth teams in the United Kingdom still receive a last-click table from someone — an agency, a junior analyst, or an export that has been pasted into the same slides since 2019. Throwing the table away is rarely possible. Trustees and commercial directors recognise it. The work is to stop it from being the only voice in the room.
Start by labelling capture. Branded paid search, some retargeting, and a portion of email will look heroic on last-click because they sit at the door. That is not an argument for cutting them; it is an argument for not giving them the credit that belongs to the article, the outdoor site, or the partner newsletter that put the person in motion.
When we run an attribution review we print last-click beside assisted paths on the same spread. The eye can hold both. If you only show a model that ‘fixes’ last-click, the budget holder smells a trick and returns to the table they already trust.
Ask a dull question: which campaigns would still be funded if they lost their last-click halo? Write the answers down before anyone opens a file. Then see whether the files agree. The disagreement is the briefing.
Do not replace last-click with a single blended score and call the matter closed. Growth teams need to know what is being assumed. A map with holes is more useful than a confident number that cannot be walked back to a row in the CRM.