Growth & updates
Paid and organic Roblox traffic: avoid attribution errors
Ads starting when Home changes does not establish causality. Paid inflow can change the blended average, attribution, and a returning player's entry surface even when the organic RFY cohort does not weaken.
Focused deep dive
Three reports, three questions
Ads Manager describes delivery and attributed plays, playtime, and earnings under its windows. Acquisition compares player sources and mature source outcomes. Home Recommendations describes organic delivery and behavior of RFY users. Do not join rows unless definitions, windows, and time zones match.
Roblox says other sources can accelerate retrieval while Recommended for You ranking uses organic users from that surface. This is neither a promise that spend lifts organic reach nor proof that paid inflow cannot expose product capacity problems.
| Claim | Evidence needed | Insufficient evidence |
|---|---|---|
| Ads brought players | Delivery and attributed plays | CTR alone |
| Paid cohort is useful | Source and mature retention/playtime | Blended D1 |
| Organic weakened | Organic Home before/after plus alternatives | Timing alone |
| Ads paid back | Incremental value versus counterfactual and cost | Attributed revenue |
Hypothetical analysis
Before ads, 100 organic players produce 20 returns. Another 100 paid players produce five; blended D1 becomes 12.5% while organic remains 20%. This is mix arithmetic with invented values, not a Roblox model. If Home impressions also fall, inspect the organic row, seasonality, releases, and artwork changes.
In MARPLA, saved ad spend is a partial daily snapshot. Do not substitute budget for spend or merge a Europe/Lisbon spend day with a UTC audience day without qualification. Record coverage and the limitation.
- Record the source and attribution window for every measure.
- Compare paid and organic cohorts separately.
- Check concurrent releases, creatives, and seasonality.
- Keep the conclusion within the available attribution level.
Primary sources
Put this into practice in MARPLA
Separate organic Home from other sources, inspect countries and supported joint breakdowns, then relate audience changes to Home set history and record a hypothesis in a note.
- Compare audience composition and qualityCompare a complete period with its predecessor and separate audience mix change from within-segment metric change.Step-by-step guide →
- Investigate Home and new audiencesCheck source, countries and cohort maturity to separate audience-mix changes from a worse game experience.Step-by-step guide →
- Compare Home creatives and setsDistinguish set changes from statistics days.Step-by-step guide →
Where this deep dive applies
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