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How revenue is allocated

Each won deal goes to the page the customer landed on. Its value is then split across the searches that sent that page clicks over the last 13 weeks, by each search's share of the page's clicks. Clicks from searches Google hides keep their own line. Deals from other channels, or with no matching page, are left out and listed.

What it doesn't do: Search Console never says which search one visitor typed, so this is an allocation by a stated rule. It doesn't prove a search caused a sale, and RankUpside always calls the result "allocated", never "earned".

Updated

The rule in four steps

  1. 01Won deal
  2. 02Landing page
  3. 03Its searches, by share of clicks
  4. 04Searches Google hides keep their own line
  1. A won deal arrives with the page the customer first landed on (CSV, webhook or the form snippet).
  2. It's matched to that page's Search Console data.
  3. The page's search clicks over the last 13 weeks are the denominator.
  4. Each named search gets its share of the deal. What the named searches don't take stays with the searches Google hides.
share  = deal value × search clicks ÷ max(page clicks, sum of named search clicks)
hidden = deal value − sum of shares

Each share is rounded down to the cent, so the hidden line also absorbs the rounding. No search ever gets more than the deal.

Worked example

The fictional Copperline Gutters home page had 32 search clicks in the window and one won deal: gutter guard install, $4,200.

D-1042, $4,200, landed on the home page

Sample data
How one won deal splits across the page's searches
SearchClicksShareAllocated
gutter guard installation13.1%$131
gutter covers installation13.1%$131
Other searches and searches Google hides3093.8%$3,938
Computed by the attribution code the app runs. Fictional business on a reserved .example domain; amounts shown to the dollar.

Each named search sent 1 of the page's 32 clicks, so each is allocated $4,200 × 1 ÷ 32. The rest of the deal stays on the hidden line, because Google didn't name the searches behind most of the page's clicks.

Which deals count

How each deal is treated
DealTreatment
Won, dated from the start of the revenue window up to todayCounts toward revenue when its source is organic or blank.
Source names search: organic, seo, search, google, bing, duckduckgo, yahooOrganic. Allocated by the rule above.
Blank sourceCounted, and flagged so you can fill it in.
OpenShown as pipeline, not revenue.
LostIgnored.

Which deals are left out

Deals left out of search revenue
Source or situationExamples of words matched
Adscpc, ppc, paid, ads, adwords, lsa, local services
Social and emailfacebook, meta, instagram, tiktok, social, email, newsletter
Directoriesyelp, angi, thumbtack, homeadvisor, nextdoor
Other channelsreferral, direct, offline, print, mail, phone book
Business Profile or Mapsgbp, gmb, google business, business profile, maps, map pack, local pack
Any other named sourceA source that names none of the search words is treated as another channel too.
No landing page, or a page with no search clicks in the windowListed as unmatched, with its total.

Tag the client's Business Profile website link with ?utm_source=gbp so map-pack leads carry that source. See Form snippet.

Calls and form leads

Calls and form leads arrive by webhook. A won deal links to a lead when both carry the same phone or email (compared as salted hashes), the deal closed on or after the lead, with one day of slack for time zones, and within 120 days. The link shows the journey from call to deal. The revenue itself is still allocated by the rule above.

Coverage

The report shows the hidden share next to every revenue split, so the client can see how much of a page's clicks came from named searches. On the sample site, 84% of all clicks came from searches Google hides. Read more about hidden queries.

Wording we use

  • “Allocated revenue” for a deal split by this rule. Never “earned” or “generated”.
  • “Estimated value” for anything priced from market data.
  • “Consistent with the change” when a tracked fix moves. Never “caused by”.

Ad-equivalent value is separate

The search traffic value prices a client's clicks at Google Ads cost per click, as an estimate, and shows how many clicks it could price. It's never added to revenue. See ad-equivalent value, allocated revenue and click-share attribution, or the full methodology. RankUpside reports revenue only when won deals are connected; see revenue by search.

Something missing or out of date? Email hello@rankupside.com.

Questions.

Why split by clicks instead of giving the deal to one search?
Search Console reports clicks per search per page but never per visitor. Splitting by share of clicks is the closest honest rule: each search gets credit in proportion to the traffic it sent the page.
Why does so much revenue sit on the hidden-searches line?
On many small business sites, Google hides the search terms behind most clicks. Those clicks still reached the page, so their share stays on its own line instead of inflating the named searches.
Are map-pack and Google Ads deals included?
No. A deal whose source names ads, social, directories or the Business Profile is excluded from search revenue and listed separately. Tag the Business Profile website link with utm_source=gbp so those leads are labeled.
What window does the revenue split use?
The last 13 full weeks of Search Console clicks. Deals count from the start of that window up to today, so a deal closed this week counts before its week of search data has synced.