What is acquisition channel performance analysis?

A comparison of how well each traffic source, such as organic search, paid, email, direct, and social, converts visitors into leads or customers. It answers which channels are worth increasing investment in and which are underperforming relative to their cost.

How do I compare marketing channels in GA4?

Use the acquisition report with session default channel group as the primary dimension. Add sessions, engagement rate, conversions, and revenue as metrics. Filter to the last 90 days. Sort by conversions to see which channels drive outcomes, not just traffic.

Why does direct traffic look so large in GA4?

GA4 assigns sessions to direct when it cannot attribute them to a source: bookmarks, UTM-stripped shares, in-app browsers, email clients that strip referrers, and dark social all inflate direct. A large direct share usually means attribution problems upstream, not actual direct intent.

How do I know which channel to invest more in?

Look at cost per conversion relative to lifetime value, not just conversion rate. A channel with a lower conversion rate but much lower cost per click can outperform a high-converting but expensive channel. Add channel cost data to GA4 through data import or a CRM connection to make this calculation possible.

Can an AI agent analyze acquisition channel performance?

Yes. With GA4 connected, the agent pulls channel data, computes conversion rates and revenue per channel, and returns a comparison with trend lines. Sequel provides the GA4 connection over MCP and the acquisition-channel-performance playbook.

Marketing

Acquisition channel performance

Compare traffic sources and marketing channels on volume, engagement and conversion rate to decide where to spend more and where to cut: which channel gives the best return, whether to shift budget between paid, organic, referral and email, and how each is trending.

Install into your agent

Which marketing channel converts best?
Should we shift budget between paid and organic?
How is each channel trending this quarter?

The playbook

The question behind this is always "where should we spend more?" Sessions alone can't answer it — a channel with half the traffic and triple the conversion rate is the better channel.

Steps

Pull channel-level performance. google_analytics.run_report with dimensions: ["sessionSourceMedium"], metrics: ["sessions", "totalUsers", "newUsers", "engagementRate", "averageSessionDuration", "conversions"] (add "totalRevenue" if the property tracks it), over a 30-day window, limit: 50.
Compute per-channel efficiency. Conversions ÷ sessions per channel. This ratio, not raw sessions, is what should drive the recommendation.
Add a trend. Re-run with dimensions: ["date", "sessionSourceMedium"] to see whether each channel is growing or shrinking. A small but fast-growing channel is often the real finding.
Break organic down further (if Search Console is connected). GA4 collapses all organic search into one bucket. google_search_console.query with dimensions: ["query"] splits it into branded vs non-branded — filter by whether the query contains the brand name. Branded organic mostly reflects demand you created elsewhere; non-branded is what SEO actually earned. Reporting them as one number consistently overstates SEO.
Report. One table sorted by conversions: channel, sessions, engagement rate, conversions, conversion rate, and 30-day trend. Then name the highest-efficiency channel, the biggest-volume channel, and where they differ — that difference is the recommendation.

Gotchas

Never rank channels by sessions. It always flatters whatever is cheapest to buy.
Direct traffic is a junk drawer. It absorbs untagged campaigns, app opens, and lost referrers. A large direct share usually means a UTM tagging problem, not genuine type-in traffic — say so.
GA4 conversions depend on configured key events. If conversions come back as zero everywhere, the property likely has none configured. Report that finding rather than concluding nothing converts.
Attribution is last-click by default. Channels early in the journey (organic, social) get systematically undercredited. Flag this before recommending anyone cut spend.
Don't join GA4 organic sessions to Search Console clicks and expect them to match. They count different things (sessions vs clicks) with different bot filtering. Trends are comparable; absolute numbers aren't.

Use it in your agent

sequel install

Installs the Sequel MCP server and skill into your coding agent. Full setup

Works with

You don't need all of these connected. The agent adapts the playbook to the sources you have, and offers to connect a missing one.

Sequel CLI

Install Sequel skills into your agent

One command connects your agent to Sequel and installs the Sequel skill, so it knows this playbook exists and reads it when a question matches. The CLI signs you in, provisions a scoped API key and writes the config for you.

Already have an MCP client?

https://api.sequel.sh/mcp

Point it at this URL and sign in when prompted, or send an API key from Settings as a Bearer token. Skills come with it; nothing else to install. Manual setup per client

1
Install the Sequel CLI
One line installs the latest CLI with whatever package manager you have.
```
curl -fsSL https://sequel.sh/install | sh
```
2
Sign in
Authenticate in your browser and pick an organization.
```
sequel login
```
3
Install into your agent
Writes the MCP config and installs the Sequel skill file for agents that support skills. Pick an agent from the list, or target one directly by its slug.
```
sequel install
```
- Claude Code
  sequel install claude-code
- Claude
  sequel install claude
- Cursor
  sequel install cursor
- VS Code
  sequel install vscode
- Windsurf
  sequel install windsurf
- Zed
  sequel install zed
- Codex
  sequel install codex
- OpenClaw
  sequel install openclaw
- Hermes
  sequel install hermes

Other Marketing skills

Lead source to revenue attribution

Measure marketing ROI by source: trace channels and campaigns through to closed revenue by joining CRM deals with payment records, so revenue per lead and return on spend are known instead of stopping at lead counts.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

What is acquisition channel performance analysis?: A comparison of how well each traffic source, such as organic search, paid, email, direct, and social, converts visitors into leads or customers. It answers which channels are worth increasing investment in and which are underperforming relative to their cost.
How do I compare marketing channels in GA4?: Use the acquisition report with session default channel group as the primary dimension. Add sessions, engagement rate, conversions, and revenue as metrics. Filter to the last 90 days. Sort by conversions to see which channels drive outcomes, not just traffic.
Why does direct traffic look so large in GA4?: GA4 assigns sessions to direct when it cannot attribute them to a source: bookmarks, UTM-stripped shares, in-app browsers, email clients that strip referrers, and dark social all inflate direct. A large direct share usually means attribution problems upstream, not actual direct intent.
How do I know which channel to invest more in?: Look at cost per conversion relative to lifetime value, not just conversion rate. A channel with a lower conversion rate but much lower cost per click can outperform a high-converting but expensive channel. Add channel cost data to GA4 through data import or a CRM connection to make this calculation possible.
Can an AI agent analyze acquisition channel performance?: Yes. With GA4 connected, the agent pulls channel data, computes conversion rates and revenue per channel, and returns a comparison with trend lines. Sequel provides the GA4 connection over MCP and the acquisition-channel-performance playbook.

Put this playbook to work

Connect a source, ask the question, and the agent follows these steps. Free to start.

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