Prove Your Worth with Multi-Touch Attribution

Prove your worth with
multi-touch attribution
Mark Sullivan
Director, Demand Generation at CallRail
April 11, 2019 | CallRail | mark@callrail.com | @barksullivan

The End.
April 11, 2019 | Prove your worth with multi-touch attribution CallRail | Mark Sullivan | mark@callrail.com | @barksullivan

The Middle.
CallRail | Mark Sullivan | mark@callrail.com | @barksullivanApril 11, 2019 | Prove your worth with multi-touch attribution

The Beginning.
?But how did you meet her?

But how did you meet her?
(What can I do to find a great mate?)

How I met my wife:
1. Moved to Nicaragua after university
2. Joined a Nicaraguan softball league with some friends
3. Partied night before our 2nd game and was hangry
4. Went to a sandwich shop to get food before game
5. Decided to talk to a pretty girl I didn’t know

Q: What is an attribution
model?

Q: What is an attribution model?
A: Set of rules to determine which
preceding events get credit for a
particular outcome.

Attribution Models:
Outcome
Last
Interaction
XXX
CallRail | Mark Sullivan | mark@callrail.com | @barksullivan
First
Interaction
April 11, 2019 | Prove your worth with multi-touch attribution

First Touch Attribution:

First Touch: Move to Nicaragua
image source: pinterest.es

Last Touch Attribution:

Last Touch: Talk to girls
image source: whattosaytogirls.com

Which Marketer Gets Paid More?
● One who says: “Move to Nicaragua”
● One who says: “Talk to girls you don’t know”
● One who says:
“We need to capture more data and move to multi-
touch attribution, but go ahead and talk to girls you
don’t know.”

Attribution Modeling is
never perfect.
(but it’s incredibly useful for exposing your buyer’s journey)

Exercise: Analyze Sample Report

Metric Definitions:
● Lead: a known person interacting with your brand
● Channel: source of lead interaction
● CPL: cost per lead (spend / leads)
● MAC: marketing acquisition cost (spend / customers)
● ROAS: return on ad spend ((cust. X avg. cust. rev.) /
spend)

Exercise: Questions to Answer
1. Which channels are performing the best? Why so?
2. What does First Touch tell us vs. Last Touch?
3. What decisions would you make based on this report?

First Touch: Give Google more $
 Paid Search has highest return.
 Paid Web Referral isn’t producing.
 Organic channel revenue ~= Paid channel
revenue.
 Organic Email isn’t producing.

Last Touch: Go all in on Organic
image source: whattosaytogirls.com
 Paid Search has negative return.
 Paid Web Referral has an 80X return.
 Organic channels account for 82% of revenue.
 Organic Email is producing.

Multi-touch: Align effort to journey
 Paid channels produce awareness.
 Organic channels produce lower funnel
activity.
 Paid Web Referral and Organic Email accelerate
customer acquisition.

image source: dailyrecord.co.uk
We started at the finish line.

Meaningful attribution
reporting takes work.
(now let’s talk about how the best attribution marketers
think about multi-touch)

4 Things Attribution Marketers
Do Differently
1. They understand identity resolution.
2. They collect the right data.
3. They define their channels.
4. They factor money in their reporting.

4 Things Attribution Marketers
Do Differently
1. Understand identity resolution.
2. Collect the right data.
3. Define their channels.
4. Factor money in their reporting.

Identity Resolution
The challenge:
1. Anonymous web visit
2. Lead acquisition
3. Customer acquisition

Identity Resolution
Each stage has a unique identifier:
1. COOKIE - Anonymous web visit
2. EMAIL/PHONE - Lead acquisition
3. TRANSACTION - Customer acquisition

Identity is the narrative glue for
marketing attribution.

Good news:
● Most analytics tools take care of
anonymous stage identity resolution.
Bad news:
● Most analytics tools don’t have access to
lead, customer data.
(some even forbid it)
Identity Resolution

Don’t freak out, do this instead:
Store cookies on all lead capture events
• Form submissions: set up hidden fields
• Phone calls: use custom cookie capture
• Live Chat: integrate with analytics tool
Identity Resolution

The Marketing Touchpoint
foundational concept of attribution

Q: What is a marketing touchpoint?
A: Any interaction with your brand.
(that we as marketers can reasonably track)

source: windsor.ai
Collect the Right Data (for your funnel)

Minimum data points needed:
● Timestamp (datetime)
● Referring URL
● Landing Page URL (full string)
● Bonus: CTA/Offer type
● Bonus: Form Page URL

• Anonymous first touches: use javascript to set
cookie values with first touch data
• Lead capture touches: retrieve first touch
values from cookie you set up; pass in hidden
fields
• Other touches: decide how much data you
need for your attribution model, then set up to
collect, retrieve, and pass as needed

Define Channels
Channel = How eyeballs get on your brand
● Channel (broad)
● Sub-Channel (more specific)
● Sub-Channel Detail (most specific)
● Maximum of 3 levels
● e.g. Paid Search>Google AdWords
e.g. Paid Event>Tradeshow>SMX

● Use touchpoint data you captured to
define how to categorize each
touchpoint’s channel.
● e.g. If referring URL contains “facebook”
& landing page has “paid” in UTMs, then
touchpoint channel might be
Paid Social>Facebook.
Define Channels

● Analytics tools have decent pre-defined
channels—use them if they work.
● Your business likely has unique channels—
define them carefully.
● Don’t forget offline & unpaid channels.
● Don’t have too many—it gets too hard to
maintain the definitions.
Define Channels

Factor the Money
● Track spend by Channel
● Aggregate spend monthly
● Don’t forget offline channels
● Determine Avg. Cust. Revenue
● Use to calculate CPL, MAC, Projected
Revenue

Factor the Money: Example Spend Tracker

Factor the Money
TOOLS TO USE:
● Google Sheets (free)
● Wordpress plugins (free & paid)
● Supermetrics ($60/mo)
● CallRail ($30/mo)
● Bizible (~$1,500/mo)

4 Things You Should Do To Get Paid More
1. Understand identity resolution.
2. Collect the right data.
3. Define your channels.
4. Factor money in your reporting.

Meaningful attribution
reporting takes work.
(and putting in that work will transform your career)

?If you can explain how one goes
from this...

To this...

To this.

With the understanding that no attribution model is perfect
(especially one that says move to Nicaragua and
join a softball league to find an ideal mate)

You will become an extremely
valuable marketer.

● Paid Spend Tracker
● Attribution Report
● Channel Template
Thank you,
From all of us at CallRail.
Email me if you’d like
any of these templates:

Prove Your Worth with Multi-Touch Attribution

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