# What is the difference between lead source and channel in Salesforce?

Lead source is the what — the specific origin of a record, set once and never changed. Channel is the where — the budget bucket you group spend and performance under. They answer two different questions, and conflating them into one field is the most common attribution failure.

Both dimensions nest like Russian dolls: a high-level grouping, the value itself, a level of detail, and a free-text exact. Depth is a choice — match it to the questions the exec team actually signed off on rather than maxing it out by reflex. Lead source should be immutable first-touch; channel is what marketing plans and reports budget against.

## Sources

- **Method** — [Attribution playbook — Blueprint](https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge/playbooks/attribution-playbook/)

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Cluster: Attribution · https://www.leanscale.team/knowledge/answers/lead-source-vs-channel/