Lesson 6: Last-Touch Attribution

Welcome to Lesson 6 of our instructable on Understanding Marketing Attribution, Best Ad Practices, and Technology to Drive Online Marketing. In this lesson, we'll delve into the concept of Last-Touch Attribution, a type of Single-Touch Attribution Model.

What is Last-Touch Attribution?

Last-Touch Attribution is an attribution model that assigns 100% of the credit for a conversion to the last touchpoint or interaction that a customer had before making a purchase. This model is straightforward and commonly used in marketing analytics.

First Touch > Middle Touch > Last Touch

Example of Last-Touch Attribution

Consider the following customer journey:

Email Campaign > Social Media Ad > Google Search Ad

In this scenario, the Google Search Ad would receive 100% of the credit for the conversion.

Visualizing Last-Touch Attribution

graph LR A["Email Campaign"] --> B["Social Media Ad"] --> C["Google Search Ad (Last Touch)"] --> D["Conversion"]

Advantages and Disadvantages

Like all attribution models, Last-Touch Attribution has its pros and cons:

Advantages

  • Easy to implement and understand.
  • Clearly identifies the final touchpoint that led to a conversion.
  • Useful for optimizing last-touch channels.

Disadvantages

  • Ignores the influence of earlier touchpoints.
  • Can lead to an overemphasis on last-touch channels.
  • Does not provide a holistic view of the customer journey.

For a deeper understanding of how different attribution models compare, check out our lesson on Pros and Cons of Single-Touch Models.

Implementing Last-Touch Attribution

To implement Last-Touch Attribution, you can use JavaScript to track the last interaction before a conversion. Here's a simple example:

For a comprehensive guide on JavaScript, consider reading JavaScript: The Good Parts by Douglas Crockford.

document.querySelector('.conversion-button').addEventListener('click', function() {
    var lastTouch = localStorage.getItem('lastTouch');
    console.log('Last touchpoint before conversion:', lastTouch);
});

document.querySelectorAll('.touchpoint').forEach(function(element) {
    element.addEventListener('click', function() {
        localStorage.setItem('lastTouch', element.textContent);
    });
});

Conclusion

Last-Touch Attribution is a simple yet powerful model for understanding the final steps in a customer's journey. While it has its limitations, it can provide valuable insights for optimizing your last-touch channels. Stay tuned for our next lesson on Linear Attribution.

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