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Metricanic connects a visitor’s arrival with the destination they see and the events they generate later. This lets you compare traffic sources, ads, landings, and offers using the same visits, costs, and revenue. A campaign is the connection between these pieces. Creating an offer alone does not start tracking. A campaign needs a traffic source and a working route to an offer, then its tracking link or script must receive traffic.

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Follow one visitor

For a redirect campaign with a landing, the journey is:
Metricanic records the arrival as a visit and chooses a destination through the campaign’s rotator. A landing’s tracked CTA creates an offer click. Later, the advertiser or affiliate network sends an event using the Metricanic click ID it received. The callback does not have to arrive in the same browser session. Its click ID connects the event to the original attribution context. The campaign’s event settings decide whether it counts as a conversion and contributes revenue or cost. With Direct Script Mode, the ad opens a configured page directly. The script on that page registers the visit. Choose this when you can install the script on the arrival page. Read tracking modes before choosing the integration.

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What each element does

Landings and offers are URL records. Your hosting provider or advertiser serves the pages.

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Keep the two click IDs separate

The traffic source may send its own ad click ID. Metricanic stores that as External ID and exposes it through {external_id} when sending data onward. Metricanic also produces its own signed {click_id}. Pass this value to the offer and have the conversion sender return it unchanged. A campaign ID, an external ad click ID, and a Metricanic click ID are different identifiers. For example, the ad network sends extid=ad-123. The offer receives subid={click_id} after Metricanic expands the macro. The offer’s conversion callback returns that expanded value. An optional outgoing postback can then return ad-123 to the traffic source.

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Read the numbers in context

A source ad click usually creates a Metricanic visit. The report’s Clicks measure tracked offer clicks, so they can differ from the source’s ad clicks. A redirect straight to an offer can create a visit without a separate landing click. An event becomes a conversion through Count as conversion in the campaign settings. A signup can be counted as a conversion without revenue. A paid purchase can contribute revenue. Visit costs and included event costs contribute to total cost. Start with one source, one offer, and one campaign. Complete your first campaign, then add landings, rotation, and extra events after the basic path works. For an assistant working through the API, use the same concepts with the AI integration guide.