Retail Media Networks and Privacy-First Measurement in Indian E-Commerce: An Empirical Quantitative Analysis of Attribution Accuracy, ROI and Consumer Trust Effects

Abstract

The rapid decline of third-party cookies has pushed Indian e-commerce brands toward retail media networks such as Amazon Ads, Flipkart Ads, Myntra Ads, Blinkit and Zepto, all of which rely on first-party purchase data for targeting and attribution. But how true the claim is, whether ROI is a true measure of incremental value or a closed loop measurement bias and how using heavy first party data affects consumer trust are empirically unproven, especially outside of Western markets. This study aims to fill that void by developing a model that links the adoption of retail media, the ability to measure it in a privacy-first way, the integration of Marketing Mix Modelling (MMM) with retail media, maturity of data governance, attribution accuracy, ROI, consumer trust, perceived fairness and marketing decision quality, while testing consumer privacy concern as a moderator. Partial Least Squares Structural Equation Modelling (PLS-SEM) with bootstrapping of 5,000 samples was used to analyze the data obtained from 312 respondents from India (156 managers/marketers and 156 consumers). All 19 hypothesized relationships were confirmed (p < .05). The strongest predictors of ROI were attribution accuracy (β = 0.38, p < .001) and the impact of data governance maturity on consumer trust (β = 0.31, p < .001), which in turn was strongest predictor of perceived fairness (β = 0.43, p < .001). The effects of governance appropriateness, transparency and personalization appropriateness on fairness and decision quality were fully mediated by consumer trust and privacy concern significantly weakened the transparency-trust (β = -0.18, p = .009) and personalization-trust (β = -0.22, p = .002) relationships. The model accounted for a significant amount of variance in consumer trust (R² = 0.53) and attribution accuracy (R² = 0.48) and all constructs had good predictive relevance (Q² > 0). Results expand privacy calculus theory to the retail media space and guide platform and regulatory approaches in cookie less advertising contexts.