Which Ad Drove This Telegram Lead? A Practical Attribution Guide

Why the question is difficult

Two systems each hold half of the answer. Meta records the click with its campaign, ad set and ad. Telegram records a user id when someone joins or sends a message. The two systems do not share data, and because the person switches apps between them, cookies and page scripts no longer apply. Without a deliberate link between the click and the Telegram action, the originating ad cannot be identified.

What lead attribution requires

An identifier created at click time that carries the campaign, ad set and ad.
A way for that identifier to persist when the person moves into Telegram.
A record of the lead's action inside Telegram, tagged with the same identifier.
A report that connects each ad to the leads and revenue it produced.

Setting it up

Use a Tellmetric tracking link as the ad destination. The redirect generates a click id and stores fbclid, UTM values and sub-ids against it.
The redirect sends the person to your bot with the click id as the start payload, or issues a single-use invite link. In both cases the id is carried into Telegram.
When the person joins or sends a message, the bot matches the Telegram user to the click id and records the lead event.
Report the sale later with the same click id through the postback URL.

Example

Illustrative example: two ads target the same audience and lead to the same group. In Ads Manager their cost per click and reach are similar. In Tellmetric, ad A produces 84 conversations and 11 deposits, while ad B produces 90 conversations and 1 deposit. Ad B generates engagement; ad A generates customers. On that basis, budget can be shifted to ad A.

Mistakes that prevent attribution

Sending traffic to a t.me link, so the click id is never captured.
Sharing one bot deep link across ads, so every bot start looks the same.
Relying on time-window matching, which credits the wrong ad whenever two campaigns run at the same time.
Not sending the result to Meta. The report informs your decisions; the event informs the platform's optimisation.

How Tellmetric handles it

Every lead event in Tellmetric carries the campaign hierarchy from its click, matched by invite link or deep-link payload rather than by timestamp. The funnel-by-campaign view shows conversations and deposits per ad, and cohort reports show which ads produce leads who continue to pay. Conversations and deposits are sent to the connected ad platforms with the click id and hashed identifiers (Google Ads receives deposits), so each platform optimises on the same outcomes you report.

Frequently asked questions

Can I identify the ad, not just the campaign?

Yes. Include the ad id in your URL parameters and it is carried on every event.

Does it require a website?

No. The redirect performs the capture, so ad-to-Telegram funnels work without a page.

What if two campaigns run at the same time?

Matching is by click, not by time, so overlapping campaigns do not affect each other's results.

Are organic leads attributed?

Leads that arrive through a tracked link are attributed. All others appear as unattributed.

How to identify which ad drove the Telegram lead