Key Takeaways
- Do you know what is attribution in marketing or what is attribution in digital marketing?
- Attribution models in digital marketing are helping make marketers lives easier and digital marketing optimization accurate!
- Whereas channel attribution in digital marketing helps figure out the appropriate marketing channels. Read our blog to learn all about it!
In the digital era we live in, Attribution in Marketing is the unique method to understand the effectiveness of all your marketing campaigns, be they traditional marketing or digital marketing!
It helps in properly assessing your marketing campaigns’ current performance and thus making plans accordingly to achieve the marketing & business goals in the given time frame.
In this guide, we will help you align your marketing efforts with apt attribution via its importance, benefits, challenges, models, best practices, and more.
If you are a business owner, a digital marketing agency, a digital marketer, or a marketing enthusiast, this blog is about to upscale your marketing campaigns.
A few facts about Attribution in Marketing
- 98% of the marketers feel that Attribution in Marketing are an important aspect of boosting the marketing efforts.
Fig 1. A graphical representation of how marketers feel about Attribution in Marketing. [Source: Revsure]
- The most challenging aspect of implementing Attribution in Marketing is the complex and diverse nature of marketing campaigns.
Fig 2. A graphical representation of all the challenges faced during implementation of Attribution in Marketing. [Source: Revsure]
- Most marketers have received success in Attribution in Marketing. [Source: Revsure]
Fig 3. A pie chart representation of successful Attribution in Marketing. [Source: Revsure]
- Word-of-mouth is the most effective and difficult (52%) form of marketing!
- When Sales and Marketing divisions of any company collaborate using Attribution in Marketing, they get 36% success in conversions and 38% more sales.
Attribution in Marketing: The Understanding
Attribution in Marketing or Marketing attribution is the method that advertisers and marketers use to determine which marketing tactic can be used so that customer interactions can transform into sales!
The marketing metrics used in Attribution in Marketing help in identifying the channels as well as the messages that can inspire the potential buyers to make the right choice.
Attribution in marketing uses various marketing touchpoints or variables to make the apt judgement.
Two important aspects of Attribution in Marketing are,
- Lead Attribution
It focuses solely on leads via a channel, campaign, and touchpoint.
- B2B Marketing Attribution
Since B2B sales take significant time, it is beneficial to use B2B marketing attribution to effectively cover and optimize strategies to convert leads into business or opportunities.
These are two of the new avenues of Attribution in Marketing!
Attribution in Marketing: Importance in Marketing
Imagine you have to ensure that all the marketing efforts across varied marketing channels are working in your favour.
How will you do that?
Either you hire so many resources that no data is left unchecked and the analysis happens simultaneously so that all the marketing campaigns have the common tone and similar user experience.
Sounds like a gargantuan task, right?
With Attribution in Marketing, it can be easily done!
Attribution in Marketing: Benefits
Here are the few benefits that you can ensure for your business if you use marketing attribution and they are,
Marketing Spend Optimization
Wouldn’t it be awesome if you knew exactly which marketing channel or marketing service, need how much budget?
Instead of learning from trial & error, you can use Attribution in Marketing!
Boosted ROI or return on Investment
As your marketing campaigns get optimized by using Attribution in Marketing to accurately implement digital marketing services, your ROI is bound to experience an exponential boost!
User Personalization
Aptly personalizing user experience, or UX, is possible only when you know what your users want!
It is possible via Attribution in Marketing.
Better Product Development
To make those products that will be adored by your customers, you need to know what they want and what they will need in the future!
Thus, Attribution in Marketing can easily chart your product development, too.
Creative Optimization
To make those creatives that make the users stop their scrolling and read your messages, you need Attribution in Marketing to know what kind of content & creatives are being liked & shared by your target audience.
Need we say more?
Attribution in Marketing: Challenges
Here are the few challenges that you might encounter while incorporating Attribution in your Marketing efforts!
Difficulty in Data Collection
Appropriate data collection is a dream that drives all the data analysts and data scientists!
No wonder it is a hassle for a marketer!
Digital Signal Bias
Even when you have the right tools to collect data from your digital marketing campaigns, you still need to know which marketing touchpoints you need to focus on.
Without this information, you will fall into a digital signal bias!
Correlation Bias
When various attribution models try to correlate various events with occurrences, they can give wrong insight as well!
In-Market Bias
It happens when a user who is already out to make a purchase sees your ad and clicks on it, thereby falsely giving your ad the credit of the sale!
Cheap Inventory Bias
Sometimes, due to the nature of your target audience, even the low performing ads might still rake in more revenue.
All these challenges can be tackled with the below mentioned marketing attribution best practices! But first we will get to know various Attribution in Marketing models.
Attribution in Marketing: Models &Measurement
There are two ways marketing attribution models work i.e. either as a single-touch attribution model or a multi-touch attribution model.
| Type | Marketing Attribution Model | Best For | Limitations |
| Single-Touch | First Touch | Demand generation, Lead Forms | Longer sales cycles |
| Single-Touch | Last Touch | Drive conversions | Consideration stage ignored. |
| Multi-Touch | Linear | All touchpoints have equal importance. | Touch points can have different impacts! |
| Multi-Touch | Lead Conversion Touch | Focussing on best performing channels | Might undermine the average and low performing channels. |
| Multi-Touch | Time Decay | B2B Marketing | Brand Equity and Google Analytics ignored. |
| Multi-Touch | Position-based | Specific Touchpoints and the overall picture compilation. | Considers the first and last touchpoint to be most important. |
| Multi-Touch | W-shaped | Important aspect emphasis | Focusses on minor touch points. |
| Multi-Touch | Custom | Experts | Not for novices |
| Multi-Touch | U-shaped | First and last touch point focus | Unclear customer journey |
With this tabular representation, all the marketing attribution models can be understood as well as differentiated accordingly!
Using the above-mentioned attribution models for digital marketing services, you can easily measure varied aspects of a marketing campaign.
It will help you in determining which ads work and which don’t.
And that’s why making the right choice regarding a marketing attribution model is paramount!
Attribution in Marketing: Choosing the Right Model
Here are the few key factors that help you pick the right marketing attribution model for your marketing campaigns!
They are:
- Sales Cycle
Depending upon what kind of sales cycle is used in your company and the length of the sales cycle, you can make the apt choice.
- Customer Journey
You need to understand how the customer touchpoints are divided across your marketing funnel, their concentration, and the marketing channels you are using before you can decide which marketing attribution model to use.
- Campaign Objectives
You need to define properly the goals of your current marketing campaigns and the various types of marketing campaigns you utilize to make the apt choice.
For example,
- A footwear company wishes to learn about its customers after the launch of their email marketing campaign.
- The sales cycle is short, customer touchpoints are condensed, and all marketing efforts are focused on email campaigns, i.e., lesser content and creatives.
- They just need to drive sales.
- They will use the Last Touch marketing attribution model accordingly!
You can make the apt choice regarding marketing attribution model after categorizing your business, customer touchpoints, sales cycle, marketing channels and marketing goals!
Attribution in Marketing: Best Practices & Reports
Here are the best practices to follow when you wish to do the best possible Attribution in Marketing!
- Choosing appropriate KPIs or key performance indexes for tracking via attribution.
- Use Full funnel tracking for leads and customers.
- Link the sales and marketing channels.
- Utilize automation as and when possible.
- Ensure that each and every marketing action gets linked to a business goal!
- Share your marketing attribution results with the stakeholders.
Now let us also share the best practices for drafting marketing attribution reports,
- Fix a Time period for analysis.
- Utilize the right tools for data curation.
- Analyze the buyer journey and customer habits.
- Select the best Attribution model for your business.
- Analyze the data populated by the attribution model.
- Ensure that the marketing attribution reports are easy to review.
- Act proactively on the insights gathered.
With these steps and practices, you will not face the aforementioned challenges in Attribution in Marketing!
Attribution in Marketing: Best Tools & Factors to Choose Them
Here are the factors that can help you choose the best possible marketing attribution tools:
- Speed
- Cross channel marketing
- Accuracy
- Linking between Branding & Performance
When you categorize the below mentioned tools as per these factors, you can easily go ahead with the right selection of a marketing attribution tool!
Amazon Attribution
It is an Attribution in Marketing tool from Amazon that benefits marketing attribution by catering measurement solutions to marketers.
It’s best for Amazon-related Ecommerce digital marketing services!
HubSpot
With HubSpot’s Dashboard and Reporting software, you can pull up a single report containing service, sales and marketing data.
It supports 1000+ apps!
Google Analytics
Google also caters attribution reports via Google Analytics.
It is best suited for top-of-the funnel marketing attribution!
With these tools, you will be able to do marketing attribution easily!
Attribution in Marketing: Role of Gen AI
Generative AI plays a vital role in marketing attribution!
With Gen AI, it gets easier to analyze a lot of data, spot consumer behaviours & patterns, and then predict future user personalization improvements.
Various marketing attribution tools use open source and proprietary AI models to better their analysis & reporting!
Attribution in Marketing: GDPR Considerations
As per the GDPR, or General Data Privacy Regulation, followed in Europe and the UK before collecting personal data, explicit consent is required from the users.
Personal data is quite valuable for marketing because it helps create ideal user personas, apt content & creatives, and best ad targeting!
While users don’t want companies to share their data, they need user-personalized experiences.
Attribution in marketing is a great way to garner user insights while not infringing on their privacy rights.
Conclusion: The Future of Marketing is powered by Attribution
The digital world is expanding and evolving at an infinitesimal rate.
The marketing, especially digital marketing, is growing exponentially as well!
Keeping track of all the marketing campaigns across various channels using niche digital marketing services is going to get more difficult every day!
While Attribution in Marketing offers an easier choice and various marketing attribution models to achieve your business & marketing goals in time.
Wildnet Technologies is a leading Digital Transformation Agency in India that caters the best possible digital marketing services with apt technology & trend infusion, be it Attribution in Marketing or more!
If you would like to know more,
- Dark Social Marketing Campaigns: Tracking & Optimizing for 2024
- Omnichannel Marketing: Optimizing your SEO, PPC and SMM Efforts
- Wildnet’s Digital Yum (our thought leadership’s weekly POV on the latest tech & trend update)
Connect with us at info@wildnettechnologies.com and get Attribution in Marketing for your Brand!
FAQs
FAQ 1. What is an example of marketing attribution?
Ans: The Google Analytics dashboard is a great tool and example of marketing attribution.
FAQ 2. What is attribution theory in marketing?
Ans: To be able to see through the piles of marketing data from various marketing channels and craft valuable insights is quite helpful in marketing.
Via attribution theory, one gets to have all their marketing efforts assimilated together and then analyzed easily!
FAQ 3. What is brand attribution?
Ans: Brand attribution is a sum total of the overall customer experience via all the touchpoints a customer has to go through while making a purchase.
FAQ 4. What is consumer attribution?
Ans: Consumer attribution helps in highlighting those marketing channels and customer touchpoints that lead to a successful lead conversion.
FAQ 5. What is marketing attribution?
Ans: Marketing attribution helps in bringing a crystal clear picture of your marketing campaigns and how to optimize them for more leads!
