What Is Multi-Touch Attribution?
Multi-touch attribution splits the credit for a lead or sale across every ad, search and visit that led to it, instead of giving all the credit to the first or the last one. It shows how your channels work together, so you don't cut a channel that starts customers on the way to buying.
Why first-click and last-click get it wrong
Many customers visit more than once before they call or fill in a form. Last-click gives all the credit to the final visit, often a search for your business name, and hides the ad or post that first brought them in. First-click does the opposite and ignores what closed the deal.
Common ways to split the credit
| Model | How credit is split |
|---|---|
| Linear | Equal credit to every touch |
| Position-based | More credit to the first and last touch, the rest shared across the middle |
| Time decay | More credit to the touches closest to the sale |
A worked example
A customer clicks a Google ad, comes back later from a Google search, opens an email, then clicks a Facebook ad and calls. The job is worth $4,000. Under a linear model each of the four touches gets $1,000. Under last-click, the Facebook ad gets all $4,000 and the other three get nothing.
What it changes for your budget
With every channel measured this way, you can see which ones start customers, which ones close them, and what each earns against what it costs.
How Ad Intel Lab helps
Ad Intel Lab traces your leads, booked jobs and revenue to each source, with a monthly report and recommendations from a 25 year digital marketing and paid ads veteran.