Northbeam vs. WorkMagic

Northbeam and WorkMagic both provide measurement and attribution for e-commerce brands, but they have fundamental differences, mainly around measuring incrementality.

In this post, we will breakdown the core capabilities and features of the two platforms to help marketers better understand how they compare. Ultimately, the two platforms are very different and after reading this article, you should be able to confidently choose which tool is right for your team.

Note: You may have noticed by now that we're comparing our platform, WorkMagic, with another. We'll be first to admit that we are biased, but we have done our best to give Northbeam a fair review. We built WorkMagic because, as marketers and data scientists ourselves, we felt there was no tool that solved all the challenges of attribution and measurement. So we hope you find the solution you are looking for and solve your measurement problems.

WorkMagic vs. Northbeam at a glance

WorkMagic vs. Northbeam: Which offers the most accurate attribution?

Traditional attribution methodologies, like what Northbeam uses, fail to factor in incrementality. They only consider if an ad touch happened prior to a purchase, without proving that the ad touch caused the purchase to happen. Therefore, Northbeam accuracy is inherently limited as it doesn't measure causation, meaning it might be giving channels credit for purchases they didn't cause. At best, it offers "directionality of what views are driving incremental revenue" (Northbeam's words). But there is no way to verify if and how directionally accurate it is. You (and Northbeam) don't know if it's 80% accurate, or 60% accurate, or 40% accurate. The only way to know for certain is to run incrementality tests - a measurement approach that Northbeam doesn't use.

We believe attribution is only valuable if it's accurate. That's why we at WorkMagic created incrementality-based attribution, an attribution methodology that combines incrementality testing with data-driven attribution. It is attribution that factors in what truly matters, incrementality, the impact or lift generated by a specific marketing activity beyond what would have occurred without it.

Each incrementality test creates a data feedback loop that continually increases the accuracy of your attribution model. In essence, each incrementality test is an audit of the accuracy of your model, giving you confidence that your measurement is accurate.

Incrementality testing shouldn't be just a one-time thing, but rather an ongoing process of testing. Having an incrementality testing program in place is how you ensure your attribution stays accurate. WorkMagic automates the whole testing process end-to-end, making it simple for brands to execute without needing any internal data science resources.

For marketers, looking to increase their Marketing Efficiency Ratio (MER) and profits, measuring and optimizing for incrementality is what really matters.

Conclusion: WorkMagic is more accurate as it measures incrementality and factors it into its attribution models.

WorkMagic vs. Northbeam: How do they measure sales channels?

While DTC is the main channel for most modern ecom brands, it's common for brands to use an omnichannel sales strategy selling across multiple channels including Amazon, TikTok Shop, retail, wholesale, other marketplaces, and through other emerging channels. If you sell across multiple channels, it is important to be able to measure your marketing's impact on sales across all your sales channels.

Northbeam is limited to only measuring direct sales, only able to measure what they can put their pixel onto.

Meanwhile, WorkMagic is able to measure marketing channels' impact on any sales channel with our incrementality tests. For example, a WorkMagic customer learned that 43% of TikTok Ad driven sales were happening on Amazon. This measurement approach gives brands a comprehensive and accurate measure of their advertising's true impact on sales.

Conclusion: WorkMagic measures ad channels' impact on all sales channels, while Northbeam only measures DTC sales.

WorkMagic vs. Northbeam: Ease of set up and use

A tool is only useful if you use it, so let's compare how easy each tool is to set up and use.

Northbeam setup requires you to add code to your site. Also, depending on your store and channel mix, you might need to connect to Northbeam's API for them to access your data. For some brands, this may be a significant hurdle due to limited technical resources. Northbeam cost data only includes ad spend, excluding any spend data, like shipping, that may be helpful for profitability analysis.

WorkMagic's setup is no-code. To integrate a data source, all you need to do is log in to the channel or app. WorkMagic also includes integrations with common shipping platforms to provide a more accurate measure of profitability. While WorkMagic doesn't have as many channel integration as Northbeam currently, we are adding them quickly, prioritizing whatever channels our customers use.

Conclusion: WorkMagic setup and use is no-code while Northbeam commonly needs internal technical resources to setup.

Summary

Marketing measurement and attribution is only useful if it is accurate.

Northbeam's approach of using Multi-touch Attribution and MMM has inherent limitations when it comes to accuracy as these methods don't measure causation. This could lead to brands misallocating budgets to inefficient channels and decreasing the return of their advertising and marketing efforts.

WorkMagic provides the most accurate measurement as it takes the scientific approach of using incrementality tests to directly measure the incremental impact of ad channels on all sales channels (DTC, Amazon, retail, etc.). The results of each brand's incrementality tests are used to calibrate a brand specific incrementality-based attribution model that makes it simple for brands to optimize their media for incrementality, increasing their ROAS and MER.