Analytics

How Flockly revenue attribution works

Understand how Flockly connects tracked social visits with attributed Shopify revenue.

Reviewed 2026-09-06

Flockly attributes Shopify orders when the available Shopify journey provides reliable evidence of a supported social or Shop Grid visit. It prefers verified Flockly link tracking, then recognised Shopify UTM information, then a recognised social visit source or referrer.

Attribution can include supported social channels and Shop Grid links. It is not limited to posts created inside Flockly.

Flockly does not claim an order when the available Shopify data does not connect the order to a tracked social visit. This keeps the attributed total separate from the store's complete Shopify revenue.

What can appear in Analytics

Where the required data is available, Flockly can show:

  • attributed Shopify revenue and orders for the selected reporting period;
  • average order value calculated from attributed revenue and attributed orders;
  • a channel breakdown on plans that include sales by channel;
  • Shop Grid clicks, attributed orders and attributed revenue on Growth and Scale.

Starter includes an overview attributed revenue total, including verified Shop Grid outcomes. Growth and Scale add attributed sales by channel and detailed Shop Grid clicks, orders and revenue. Plan differences control the breakdown, not the underlying attributed total. See Flockly plans and features for the complete plan comparison.

How a visit becomes attributable

  1. A visitor follows a social or Shop Grid link carrying recognised campaign information, or Shopify receives recognised social referral information.
  2. The visitor reaches the Shopify store and completes a checkout.
  3. Shopify makes the relevant journey and order data available to Flockly.
  4. Flockly checks verified Flockly link evidence first, then a recognised UTM source, then a recognised visit source or referrer.
  5. Flockly includes the order in the relevant social or Shop Grid view only when that evidence is sufficient.

Shop Grid product and custom-link clicks use tracked redirects before sending the visitor to the merchant's chosen destination. This records anonymous aggregate clicks and adds campaign information where appropriate. Learn how to configure the public page in Shop Grid and link-in-bio tracking.

Historical and future attribution

Flockly retrieves historical orders using Shopify's approved older-order access and stores only the normalized fields needed for reporting. An initial or extended history sync can take time. Until the selected period is covered, Flockly treats attribution as collecting or unavailable instead of reporting a made-up zero.

Historical orders use the journey, UTM and referrer evidence Shopify actually recorded for them. Consistent Flockly campaign and content identifiers make links created from now on more deterministic, but they cannot retroactively improve older orders.

Why attributed revenue differs from Shopify revenue

The attributed total is deliberately narrower than the store's complete revenue. Flockly does not claim orders when the available journey does not connect them to a tracked social visit.

An otherwise relevant order may be absent when the journey crosses devices, an ad blocker removes information, the customer returns through another route or Shopify does not make enough attribution data available. Direct visits, email and unrelated campaigns are not counted as social revenue. Paid activity can appear in a channel view when its campaign information or referrer matches that channel.

For a fuller explanation, see why an order may not be attributed.

Check a report

  1. Open Analytics and select the period you want to review.
  2. Compare the attributed revenue and order totals for that same period.
  3. Open the relevant channel view when your plan includes sales by channel.
  4. On Growth or Scale, review the separate Shop Grid section for grid clicks and attributed outcomes.
  5. Treat Not available as missing source data, not a zero or an estimate.

The selected Analytics period applies exactly to Shopify attribution without a separate 30- or 60-day order clamp. Social-network analytics can still have different plan and provider history limits, and the data returned by each source affects what is shown.

Interpreting the figures

Revenue attribution is a measurement of tracked journeys, not a guarantee that every social-influenced sale will be counted. It is not an audited financial record and should not replace the store's complete Shopify reporting.

If a figure looks unexpected, first check the reporting period and whether a channel or Shop Grid link was used. For a store-specific review, contact Flockly with the Shopify store name, reporting period and affected channel. Do not send customer information.