SGS Engineering x Paapi: Making Sense of the Ad Spend

The challenge

SGS Engineering faced a common yet costly problem in modern e-commerce: fragmented data across multiple platforms that made it nearly impossible to understand the true customer journey.

While tools like Google Analytics and Meta’s in-platform reporting provide them with surface-level insights, SGS struggled to answer critical questions about channel performance, product profitability, and customer attribution.

"We were looking at ways to get better insights, better data out of both advertising campaigns, offline and online" explains Andrew Rushbury, ecommerce manager, SGS. The company needed to move beyond siloed platform data to understand which channels genuinely drove value and which were simply claiming credit for conversions they didn't actually influence.

This challenge was particularly acute with affiliate marketing. SGS had significant spend going through affiliate programs but lacked clarity on whether these channels were truly driving new customers or simply intercepting existing ones at the end of their journey.

The solution

SGS decided to turn to Paapi, to help them gain comprehensive visibility across their entire marketing ecosystem. Rather than relying on disparate platform reports, Paapi unifies data from Google Ads, affiliate programs, social, email, and other channels into a single analytical framework enabling SGS to track complete customer journeys, from initial touchpoint through to purchase, and properly attribute value across channels.

The results

Immediate cost savings

The impact on affiliate marketing was immediate and measurable. By properly attributing customer journeys, SGS discovered that many affiliate commissions were being paid for conversions the affiliate didn't actually drive.

"One of the most unequivocal savings was in affiliates, saving us between 5 to 10% per month" Rushbury notes. "We can attribute it to the order value on the SGS website and look at the customer value from it. These customers weren't attributed to certain channels, so it gives us more value in terms of where we can push spend."

The process became remarkably efficient. Instead of manually reviewing affiliate claims, SGS could export Paapi data and immediately identify which conversions didn't qualify for affiliate attribution. This saved time while freeing up the budget to reinvest in better-performing channels.

Deeper product intelligence

Beyond affiliate optimisation, Paapi revealed insights about product performance across channels. SGS could finally answer questions like: Which channels drive sales of our top products? Does a tool chest sell better through social media, email, or paid advertising?

"There aren't many technologies that can give you deep dive analysis into channel performance and attribution around how you can get more out of your products" Rushbury explains. With thousands of products, understanding which channels work best for specific items enables the SGS team to have smarter budget allocation and much more precisely targeted campaigns.

True ROAS visibility

Perhaps most valuable is SGS's newfound ability to calculate genuine return on ad spend. By understanding complete customer journeys, including multi-touch attribution and the difference between new and returning customers, the company can accurately assess campaign profitability.

This visibility extends to understanding customer lifetime value by acquisition channel, enabling SGS to make informed decisions about where to invest marketing budget for maximum long-term return.

Looking ahead 

SGS views their Paapi implementation as an ongoing journey of discovery. Each analysis session generates new questions about customer behavior, channel performance, and optimization opportunities.

"The more questions we ask, the more we learn about Paapi, Paapi learns about us, and we can develop it further" says Rushbury. The SGS team is particularly excited about expanding social media attribution, including TikTok performance tracking, and creating dashboards accessible to everyone from the CEO needing high-level overviews to data analysts requiring granular detail.

For SGS, Paapi represents more than a reporting tool, it's the foundation for truly understanding what drives their business and making decisions based on complete data rather than platform-siloed assumptions.