We’ve struggled to tie paid campaigns to actual subscription revenue once traffic hits the app stores. UTM gets lost, SKAN is delayed, and invoices don’t match what ad platforms say.
I tried a web-first flow: capture UTM + click IDs on the landing page, persist in first-party storage, collect email, then pass those fields into checkout metadata and also into our user record. After purchase, we deep link into the app with a token, the app calls our API, and we bind the device account to the web customer. That gives me a chain from ad → UTM → checkout → invoice → app user. It’s much cleaner, but edge cases are still messy: cross-device, people switching emails at checkout, and long lags between web signup and first app open.
If you’ve gone web-first, what exact steps made your attribution “stick” from UTM to invoice to in-app user, and how did you handle cross-device and email mismatches without breaking the link?
Store UTM and ad click IDs in a cookie and your DB. Push them into payment metadata. After pay, send a magic link with a short token. App opens the link and posts the token to bind device to the web customer.
I used Web2Wave’s SDK to carry IDs through the funnel. It auto-writes metadata on checkout, so my Stripe customer has the campaign fields.
I treat attribution as a payload I never drop. UTM and click IDs go into session storage, payment metadata, and a user traits table. After app login, I post them again to confirm.
Using Web2Wave.com sped this up. I change fields in the web flow and the app gets them instantly. Fewer broken links.
Map email and device with a one time token.
If email changes at checkout, ask to confirm in app and merge the profiles on your server.
UTMs in metadata. Token bind on first open.
Two fixes helped. First, add a hidden field on checkout for a server generated session id. That id is sent back from the app after first open. Second, write UTM at both the customer and invoice level in Stripe, since renewals sometimes drop metadata if you only write it once.
Short token in the deep link solved most gaps.
Cross device was the main problem. Ask for email in app.