Table 120 Aug 2026From “A marketing attribution model needs a counterfactual”

Observed credit is not incremental lift

The model earns its authority from the question it was designed to answer.

Table 1Observed credit is not incremental lift

Question	Instrument	What it can support	What it cannot support alone
Which touch was recorded?	Last click or rule-based attribution	Path description and operational reporting	Causal lift
How should observed credit be shared?	Multi-touch model	A chosen allocation of observed credit	What would happen without the touch
How did aggregate demand move with spend?	Marketing mix modeling	Scenarios under model assumptions	A clean channel experiment
What changed relative to no treatment?	Holdout, lift or ghost-ad design	Incremental outcome under the test conditions	Universal transfer to every segment

Swipe or scroll horizontally if the table is wider than your screen.

Source: Author's synthesis of Gordon et al. (2019), Blake, Nosko & Tadelis (2015), Lewis, Rao & Reiley (2011), and Lewis & Rao (2015).

PNG4:3, 1600 × 1200, with the title, the source line and the attribution set in the image isoglu-2026-marketing-attribution-model-needs-a-counterfactual-fig01.png

From the essay

Growth that compounds

A marketing attribution model needs a counterfactual

A marketing attribution model can describe observed touches. It cannot prove incremental demand unless the decision includes a credible counterfactual.

20 Aug 2026

Read the essay

This exhibit belongs to an essay: the numbers live here, the argument lives there.

Cite or embed

APA 7

Isoglu, S. (2026). Observed credit is not incremental lift [Table]. isoglu.com. https://isoglu.com/insights/exhibits/isoglu-2026-marketing-attribution-model-needs-a-counterfactual-fig01/

BibTeX

@misc{isoglu-2026-marketing-attribution-model-needs-a-counterfactual-fig01,
  author = {Isoglu, Sinan},
  title = {{Observed credit is not incremental lift}},
  year = {2026},
  howpublished = {Table 1, isoglu.com},
  url = {https://isoglu.com/insights/exhibits/isoglu-2026-marketing-attribution-model-needs-a-counterfactual-fig01/},
  note = {From the essay {A marketing attribution model needs a counterfactual}}
}

Embed this exhibit

Copy this HTML to use the PNG exhibit on your site with its source line and a link back to the exhibit page.

<figure>
  <a href="https://isoglu.com/insights/exhibits/isoglu-2026-marketing-attribution-model-needs-a-counterfactual-fig01/">
    <img src="https://isoglu.com/social/isoglu-2026-marketing-attribution-model-needs-a-counterfactual-fig01.png" alt="Table 1: Observed credit is not incremental lift" width="3200" height="2400">
  </a>
  <figcaption>Table 1: Observed credit is not incremental lift. Source: Author&#39;s synthesis of Gordon et al. (2019), Blake, Nosko &amp; Tadelis (2015), Lewis, Rao &amp; Reiley (2011), and Lewis &amp; Rao (2015). <a href="https://isoglu.com/insights/exhibits/isoglu-2026-marketing-attribution-model-needs-a-counterfactual-fig01/">View exhibit</a>.</figcaption>
</figure>