The short answer
Paid search often drives more pipeline than your report shows. On a long B2B deal, the first click can land months before the deal closes, and a single-touch report tends to credit the most recent step rather than the campaign that started it. That is the nature of a six to twelve month buying journey, not a fault of the platform.
Hold the source at the company level
To give paid search fair credit, hold the source at the company level instead of relying on one touch. Identify the company when it first arrives from paid, record where it came from, and keep that link as the company moves through your pipeline over months. When the deal lands, the campaign that brought the account in still gets the credit.
This usually makes paid search look better, because it surfaces the long-cycle pipeline a last-touch view misses.
The honest catch
It works at the company level, and offline steps still sit outside it. But it stops your long-cycle campaigns from going uncredited. See the full method in our B2B paid ads attribution guide.
Frequently asked questions
Why does paid search look weaker on long deals?
Because the first click can expire from a single-touch report before the deal closes, so the most recent step gets the credit.
How do I give paid search fair credit?
Hold the source at the company level over time, rather than relying on one touch.
Does this help or hurt my paid search numbers?
It usually helps, by surfacing long-cycle pipeline a last-touch view misses.
Keep the original source attached to an account across a long sales cycle, so paid search gets the credit it earned.