When it comes to figuring out which marketing campaigns performed best, it’s common to focus on the final campaign a lead engaged with before becoming a customer. This is called last-touch attribution.

It’s tempting to lean heavily on this approach — after all, the last touch clearly played an important role in a buyer’s journey, and the data is easy to see. But marketing and sales teams can’t expect to meet (or exceed) their goals by simply repeating high-performing last-touch campaigns over and over.

I think of that approach like trying to improve a chocolate chip cookie recipe by just… adding more chocolate chips. Sure, it works for a while (who doesn’t love extra chocolate?), but eventually we'll lose all the leads who were shopping for cookies while we're offering a melty mess of chocolatey goo.

Enter multi-touch attribution.
A multi-touch approach assumes that every interaction a lead has with your brand plays a role in nudging them closer to becoming a customer. Instead of focusing on the last crumb, we start looking at the full story of a buyer’s journey as a set of clues to help create the perfect cookie for your audience.

By tracking more of the buyer's journey we can better understand not just what content converts, but how much engagement it takes to build readiness and trust. Let's look at an example:

In the last-touch view we see the final step — the discount code on social media — and might assume that was the secret ingredient. But in reality, it was the whole series of touchpoints over a two month period that warmed up this lead and paved the way for that final conversion. The multi-touch view gives us insight into all of the best ingredients for our audience — not just the last chocolate chip on top.

Every brand has its own pantry full of secret ingredients, and every audience has its own taste. When you take the time to discover what your buyers actually need at each step, you can tailor a recipe that’s just right for them. Mix thoughtfully, adjust with care, and your marketing efforts will be too good to resist.

Are you ready to join me in the test kitchen? I'll save you a spot at the counter!