Marketing Attribution: All You Need to Know

In a world where brands are adopting omnichannel strategies for reaching their customers through multiple channels, marketing attribution can help them understand what is effective and what is not. 76% of marketers use marketing attribution currently or will have it in place in the next 12 months. So, if you are not using marketing attribution, it is about time that you should. Your competitors are probably using it. Marketing attribution will help you outshine your competitors by bringing insights that will help you to optimize your campaigns for the best results. 

This post will serve as a beginner’s guide to marketing attribution. In a nutshell, it will explain:

·         What is marketing attribution?

·         What is a marketing attribution model?

·         Types of marketing attribution models

·         Which model is best for your business?

Let’s begin.

What is Marketing Attribution?

Your customers connect with your brand on various channels. The average customer utilizes 10 channels to stay connected with companies. And as a brand, you must know that a customer journey is hardly ever a straight line. It has peaks and crevices, and that’s why it is called a journey.

Marketing attribution helps marketers assess which marketing strategies or channels get credit for generating leads, traffic and conversions. For example, it can help you see how your recent Amazon ad campaign impacted your sales last month.

There are various marketing attribution techniques. You can choose the one aligned with your business goals.

What is a Marketing Attribution Model?

A potential customer discovers your brand through a Facebook Ad that leads them to visit your Facebook Page. Then they visit your website and sign up for a newsletter. A few days after their first visit, they receive an e-mail but they ignore it. They only purchase your product after seeing a retargeted ad on Instagram.

The above is an example of a customer’s journey. A marketing attribution model will help you determine how specific touchpoints in a customer’s journey will be given credit for sales and conversions. In the example above, the touchpoints will be the Facebook Ad, Facebook Page, sign-up form, website, e-mail, and Instagram Ad.

There are numerous touchpoints in a customer’s journey. Marketing attribution models help brands to focus on the ones important for their business.

Types of Marketing Attribution Models

Marketing Attribution Models are broadly divided into two categories: Single-Touch Models and Multi-Touch Models.

Single-Touch Models

As the name suggests, single-touch models only consider one touchpoint in the customer’s journey. It is usually the first touchpoint or the last one. Let’s understand them in detail.

·         First Touch/Interaction Model

This model gives all the credit for the sale to the first touchpoint. This method is often used to know what is attracting customers to your brand. So, if a customer discovered you through a Google Search Ad, visited your website and then made a purchase, all the credit will be given to your search ad.

This model is helpful for brands that have longer sales cycles and wish to create brand advocates.

 

·         Last Touch/Interaction Model

The last touch model is also known as the qualified lead model. This model gives 100% credit to the last interaction the customer had with the brand before converting. Google Analytics and various other platforms use this model as the default. It helps businesses be conscious of the marketing channels or campaigns that are driving conversions. This model is helpful for businesses that have shorter sales cycles. As per a report, 41% of marketers use the last-touch model for online attribution.

 

·         Lead Creation Model

This model takes the difference between a prospect and a lead seriously. It gives 100% credit to the touchpoint where a prospect gets converted to a lead. It will help you to understand where the prospect voluntarily shares their personal information and becomes a lead.

 

·         Last Non-Direct Click Attribution Model

Non-direct interaction refers to all the traffic that has been directed to the website from another source. This model gives 100% credit to the customer’s last non-direct touchpoint. A few examples of non-direct touchpoints are social media posts, e-mail, LinkedIn Ads, etc.

 

·         Customizable Last Most Important Touch Model

This model is customizable. The last touchpoint of the specified channel is given 100% credit. So, all the reports will depict one channel as the driving force for all the sales. 

 

 Multi-Touch Models

Multi-touch models are used by 75% of companies to measure marketing performance. These models take into consideration the entire customer journey while giving different weights to different touchpoints. There are various types of multi-touch models depending on the purpose they solve. These are explained below:

·         Linear Attribution Model

This model divides the credit equally amongst all the touchpoints in the customer’s journey. So, if there were four touchpoints in the customer’s journey, each will get 25% credit for the sale.

 

·         Time Decay Attribution Model

Like linear attribution, each touchpoint is given credit in this model. The only difference is that the most recent touchpoints are awarded more credits and the older interactions get less credit.

 

·         U-Shaped Attribution Model

This model is also known as position-based attribution. Here, the first interaction and the touchpoint where the prospect gets converted to a lead, get 40% credit each. 20% of the remaining credit is spread out amongst all the other touchpoints.

 

·         W-Shaped Attribution Model

The credit is split up between first-touch interaction, last touch interaction and the qualified-lead milestone. Each of these points gets 30% of the credit. The rest is given to the other touchpoints but it is not significant.

 

·         Z-Shaped Attribution Model

All the touchpoints in the customer journey are given credits in this model. The four most important touchpoints are given 22.5% of the credit. The remaining 10% is equally split amongst the touchpoints that are left.

Which model is best for your business?

The answer to this question isn’t as easy as it may seem. Usually, experienced marketers use a combination of marketing attribution models for the best results. It isn’t one size fits all. You may use one model but the insights will be limited. For example, if you use the last-touch model, you’ll miss out on the entire customer journey before that point. The presence of brands on multiple channels makes the process even more complicated.

If you wish to venture into the world of marketing attribution considering its benefits, you should get in touch with us so that we can present a tailor-made marketing attribution model just for your business.