Analytics Tracking

Analytics Tracking

Check whether marketing tracking is reliable enough to make decisions about budget, funnel performance, and growth.

Start With Decisions

Ask what decisions the data is supposed to support:

• Which channel gets more budget.
• Which campaigns convert.
• Which pages or steps leak users.
• Which leads become revenue.
• Which lifecycle messages work.
• Which experiments win.

Tracking is not trustworthy because tags fire; it is trustworthy when the decision chain is complete.

Inspect The Chain

Trace:

• Source capture: UTMs, referrer, click IDs, campaign naming.
• Event capture: page views, leads, signups, purchases, activation, qualified lead, revenue.
• Identity: anonymous to known user, lead to account, account to deal.
• Destination: analytics, ad platforms, CRM, warehouse, dashboards.
• Definitions: what counts as a conversion, lead, MQL, opportunity, customer.
• Consent and privacy boundaries.
• Reconciliation: totals across systems and expected gaps.

Flag Trust Breaks

• Events fire but are not tied to the business outcome.
• Multiple systems define the same metric differently.
• UTMs overwrite or disappear.
• Test traffic pollutes reports.
• Duplicate conversions feed paid bidding.
• PII leaks into analytics or ad tools.
• Dashboards hide uncertainty.
• Offline revenue never connects back to campaigns.

Judge Data Confidence

For each decision, state:

• Trust level: high, usable with caveats, directional only, not usable.
• Known gaps.
• Acceptable uncertainty.
• Reconciliation owner.
• Next check that would raise trust.

Output

Tracking trust read:
[one paragraph]

Decision chain:
Question -> Required signal -> Source -> Destination -> Owner

Decision trust:
| Decision | Trust level | Known gaps | Acceptable uncertainty | Reconciliation owner |

Trust breaks:
| Break | Evidence | Decision affected | Fix | Priority |

Measurement plan:
| Event | Trigger | Parameters | Destination | Success criteria |

Naming rules:
- [UTM or event rule]

Reconciliation checks:
1. [check]
2. [check]

Privacy risks:
- [risk]