Reevaluating ROAS, Attribution and Engagement

🔴 Understanding Google and Meta’s 2026 Updates

Google and Meta have both recently acknowledged, in different ways, that their highly relied upon dashboard views of advertising were incomplete.

• Google says many marketers have been working with “foggy windshield, hindered by data gaps and dashboards that overindex on short-term credit.”
• Meta says it is “updating advertising measurement and attribution” to help advertisers “better understand the impact” of different click types.

Taken together, these statements suggest that advertising investment decisions were often made using incomplete data, leading to incorrect conclusions about what was actually driving sales. Google warns that last-click is only “a high-definition photo of the finish line, while the rest of the race is blurred,” and says marketers risk a “visibility gap” when they cannot tell “which ads are building desire and which are just ringing the register.” It goes further, warning of “wasted spend” and continued spending of “lazy dollars.”

Meta’s change reinforces the same concern. In its own wording, it says it is “shifting conversions that came from a share, save, or other non-link click actions to be included in engage-through attribution,” which is a meaningful acknowledgment that what may have looked like direct sales impact from likes, shares, comments, and other engagement was not the same as a true link-driven conversion.

For tourism marketers, the implications are especially important because travel decisions are shaped across the full journey — before arrival, through research, recommendations, and trip planning, and once in market through concierge guidance, maps, street-level visibility, and same-day comparisons of what to do next. Google’s point is that some media is “creating new demand by building the familiarity required for a future sale,” even if another channel gets the final credit.

Successfully convincing prospective consumers of your “worth‑it factor” requires a full‑funnel, multi‑media campaign. Google and Meta’s recent announcements are useful reminders to look beyond ROAS alone, and to consider whether some media is being undervalued, especially when it plays an essential role in converting interest into visits.

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Original Sources:

Meta-Simplifying Ad Measurement for a Social-First World

Google-The Science of Demand: Ads Measurement in the AI Era

David Miller

CEO
Davler Media/City Guide