What you need to know about digital marketing attribution modeling
An attribution model is an important marketing tool that helps marketers and business leaders evaluate advertising channels’ and campaigns’ effectiveness and make the right decisions & scale advertising. To learn what it is, how it works, and how to apply it in your case, read the article by BuzzGuru.
Table of contents:
- What is attribution modelling in digital marketing?
- The benefits of marketing attribution
- Types of marketing attribution
- How to choose a marketing attribution model?
- Why do you need attribution with influencer marketing?
- What metrics are important in influencer marketing attribution?
- Services that help to keep track of your influencer marketing
What is attribution modelling in digital marketing?
Attribution in marketing is a set of rules that determine the contribution of each advertising channel to the final target conversion. Based on attribution, you can find out which channel played a crucial role in achieving the goal. You need to know it to evaluate the effectiveness of advertising, calculate the ROI of promotion channels and individual campaigns.
The benefits of marketing attribution
Marketing attribution modelling helps to understand which of the channels played a major role in transforming the user into a buyer — this is the main advantage of using this tool. It prevents further expenditure on inefficient advertising channels and helps you focus on the best performing ones.
Digital attribution models allow you to understand at what point of the customer journey the user goes to the website and makes a purchase. After that, you can strengthen these points and invest more money and creativity in them, to get more sales as a result. These points can be search engine advertising, targeted ads, influencer’s post, and so on.
Types of marketing attribution
Let's take as a starting spot that you know the customer journey of your potential clients. Or at least you have a chaotic set of contact points between the user and your brand since you are making targeted or contextual ads, using influencer marketing, etc. Now it’s time to determine which of these points affect the conversion the most. This is where marketing attribution modelling comes in handy.
These models are something like a "stencil" that you put on top of the customer journey. And depending on which "stencil" you have chosen, it will be determined which of the points influence the purchase decisions the most.
There are the most common attribution models:
- Last Interaction Attribution
In this model, all credits are given to the last point from which the user visited the site and became a buyer. It is considered the most important and where most of the monetary investments are applied. Choose this model if your potential buyers have a short cycle of interactions with the brand and almost immediately decide to buy.
- First Interaction Attribution
This model is similar to the previous one, however in this case all the glory goes to the first touch of a person with the brand. We recommend using it if your potential customers decide to buy almost immediately, or on the contrary, this model can be useful in cases with a long deal cycle. For example, in B2B, when the client takes a long time to make a purchase decision, and you need to know what channel you got these leads from.
- Last Non-Direct Click
Simply put, this is the penultimate user action on the journey from users to buyers. Supporters of this model think that a person makes a purchase decision at this step, and the last step simply "pulls the trigger." This model is considered the most versatile, so use it when you doubt which one to choose.
- Linear Attribution
In this attribution model, all points are given the same preference. The one who chooses this model believes that all stages of the user-to-customer evolution are important and invests equally in each of them. This strategy is more balanced than the previous models, but there is a risk of wasting money on weak advertising channels instead of investing more in strong ones.
- Time Decay Attribution
Here each subsequent step on the journey from users to buyers is more valuable. For example, if your potential buyers have four points of contact with the brand, then the first will be given 20% of the value, and each subsequent 24%, 26%, and 30%, respectively. The percentages can be changed at your discretion; the main thing is the increasing dynamics.
- Position-based Attribution
In this model, the brand’s first and last interaction points receive 40% of the value, the remaining 20% are distributed to the remaining points. This model is chosen by those who believe that the first and last touch with the product is the most important, and it is worth investing in them the most.
How to choose a marketing attribution model?
The choice of a marketing attribution model is never done once and for all. Usually, marketers test several options for their product and niche and then settle down with one of them. To understand which models you should choose from, answer whether your potential buyer has a long or short path from users to buyers?
- Long path. In this case, the potential buyer needs to know the brand better. Making a purchase decision takes a long time. There are many points of contact, so the value should be divided between them all. Here, Linear, Time Decay, or Position-based Attribution will fit. And as we previously mentioned, if you need to know what channel has made the customer’s first touchpoint with the brand, use First Interaction Attribution.
- Short path. If you are sure that the cycle of turning a user into a buyer is short, and the decision to buy your product is made almost instantly or in a couple of touches, then choose Last Interaction, First Interaction, or Last Non-Direct Click Attribution.
Why do you need attribution with influencer marketing?
If you use influencer marketing as one of the points of contact of the user with your brand, you need to use digital attribution models. When you see what percent of the value in your case is embedded in an ad from an opinion leader, you can reasonably decide whether it is worth investing more in it or not.
What metrics are important in influencer marketing attribution?
Surely you can evaluate the effectiveness of influencer marketing campaigns via attribution models afterwards. But to predict the performance of cooperation with a particular influencer in advance, you need to choose them correctly.
To find out whether it is worth investing in cooperation or not, you need to check the following metrics of the opinion leaders you have chosen:
- Number of subscribers
- Average views
- Average number of likes
- Engagement rate
- Likes to 1 dislike rate
- Number of comments
- Channel rating
Services that help to keep track of your influencer marketing
You can find these metrics out and make an informed decision about cooperation with an influencer on the BuzzGuru platform. With the help of our smart filters, you will find the right opinion leader from YouTube, Instagram, TikTok or Twitch, and you will be able to see the current statistics of the channel. Try the free demo version now!
Summary
Attribution models help marketers build effective advertising campaigns and invest money in those promotion channels that are most influential when a user makes a purchase decision. It is essential to apply marketing attribution modelling when you use influencer marketing. It allows you to understand whether you should invest money in this tool, or it does not carry significant value on the shopping journey.
If, with the help of digital attribution models, you have determined that influencer marketing is an important point of contact between users and your brand, choose opinion leaders carefully so that cooperation with them is effective and brings many sales. You can check the statistics and quality of the channel of any influencer on Twitch, Instagram, TikTok or YouTube on the BuzzGuru platform.
