Accenture: Multichannel Attribution Dec 2012
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The document discusses the challenges of multichannel attribution in measuring marketing ROI in the digital era, emphasizing the need for marketers to understand consumer interactions across multiple devices and platforms. It critiques traditional single-channel attribution methods, advocating for integrated approaches that provide a more accurate assessment of marketing effectiveness. The document highlights techniques such as neural networks and clustering for capturing consumer behavior and optimizing marketing strategies based on comprehensive data analysis.
Accenture: Multichannel Attribution Dec 2012
- 1. Accenture Interactive | Point of View Series Multichannel Attribution Measuring Marketing ROI in the Digital Era
- 2. Multichannel Attribution Measuring Marketing ROI in the Digital Era Digital technologies have A typical consumer journey is anything but • How did a particular sale happen? linear, single channel or reliant upon one empowered today’s consumers to • Who should get the credit for it? device. It may start in front of the TV and get what they want, when they progress toward a tablet, then switch to a • ow much credit should be attributed to H want and where they want. So smart phone, make pit stops at a product each consumer interaction across channels, while consumers may have few website followed by a social network site, and on what basis? problems moving from one media for sharing news about the product, and end with a purchase at a store. See consumer • ow should the investment be apportioned H channel to another and from journey scenario. across channels? one device to another, business is having a hard time keeping up In order to serve this channel-savvy, highly with them. mobile, multidevice-happy consumer, chief These questions Anticipating the next move in a marketing officers (CMOs) have their work cut out for them. These CMOs need to have have become the consumer’s journey to conversion, an accurate understanding of consumers— their intentions, impressions of products subject of some and measuring every interaction across channels, is a significant and services and their behavior; to pinpoint exactly which marketing channels—online or lively discussions challenge. Pervasive methods offline—are yielding maximum MROI. on direct, last in use today for associating consumer behavior with marketing For example, knowing the impact of paid search engine marketing (SEM), online action or last click investment fall short of capturing display media, natural search marketing based on search engine optimization (SEO) or versus multichannel the contributions from multiple channels on a specific path to affiliate partners, on both online and offline attribution. customer behavior. Or understanding how purchase. As marketing leaders email, mobile-optimized websites, online shift budgets from channel to video ads, social media, mobile display ads and the like, work together with offline channel, new approaches are media. For that, CMOs must have accurate required that provide better insight answers to questions such as: and ultimately drive smarter budget allocation and improved marketing return on investment (MROI).
- 3. A typical consumer journey scenario Dave is sitting with a tablet watching a show on Dave does a Google Search on his tablet, which pops up a 1 TV. During one of the ad breaks he sees a discount 2 paid search ad. He clicks on the ad and goes to the phone commercial for mobile phones. manufacturers website, which lists not only additional discounts and insurance plans, but also has links to reviews. Dave sends the link to his email address for access later. On his way to work Dave opens the email on his smart Later, Sarah logs into Facebook on her new phone and 3 phone and forwards the link to his friend, Sarah, who is 4 shares her news about the purchase with her friends. looking for a good deal on a mobile phone. Sarah goes Some friends search for the phone retailer and make a web to the phone manufacturers website on her laptop, reads purchase. Some put the item in the cart then abandon the reviews, then drives to the nearest store to purchase the digital journey – preferring to drive to their nearest store to smart phone. try the phone and complete the purchase.
- 4. Last action dilemma Lately, however, it is being widely One of the biggest problems today is that, acknowledged within the industry that while consumers operate in a multichannel attributing the cause of a conversion world, the metrics of their interactions primarily to the last action often leads are still siloed. That is, we have metrics to overattribution of consumer response for measuring consumer activity in to that action, ignoring other influences, each channel but not for measuring the such as a TV advertisement or online paid entire consumer journey in an integrated search campaign. This is resulting in the manner. The need to capture and analyze emergence of econometric MROI analyses this journey as it takes place across both which focus on, measure, and analyze offline and online channels has led to the historical data of all known interactions emergence of various attribution models over a specific period of time to in order to and approaches. derive multichannel attribution. For the most part, direct attribution has Regardless of which approach one been a popular approach for analyzing embraces, it is absolutely clear that unless consumer data. Not only because consumer data is captured in real-time, alternative approaches are just beginning across channels and devices, any exercise to emerge, but also because direct that gives credit to consumer action per attribution is simple to implement. It calls specific channel or device may lead to an for attributing conversion (or purchase) to inaccurate interpretation of results and the “last action,” such as a mouse click or thereby to undesirable business decisions. direct mail response.
- 5. Multichannel attribution Dynamic tools and capability • eural Networks: Leverage machine N Analyzing consumer behavior is getting There is no “one-size-fits-all” approach learning algorithms that use complex, more complex, not only because of the sheer to successful multichannel attribution. nonlinear mapping functions for volume of data, but also because that data The consumer data landscape and business estimation and classification. Neural comes from multiple sources, including environment are highly complex and ever- networks prove their worth in consumer touchpoints, data providers, and changing. Therefore, high performance, multichannel attribution where there advertisers. So how to accurately measure dynamic tools and capability are vital is often a lack of consistent historical and interpret consumer data? to success. The techniques required information or an absence of a may include: theoretical framework around causal Though one reliable approach for measuring relationships among variables. consumer data that is good for all situations • Clustering: Group customers with similar has yet to emerge, there are a number of traits and profiles, and use clustering Integrated analytics multichannel attribution approaches that to identify homogeneous patterns. While multichannel attribution can yield are yielding positive results. There are Each attribute within each cluster is hitherto unobtainable levels of granularity, three fundamental aspects to successful allocated a specific weight to identify it is not a panacea. It should be aligned multichannel attribution. its relative importance to the cluster, to, and integrated with, other analytics and across clusters. This is not a once- techniques as and when needed. For Big data mindset and-done exercise, but a technique that example, if analytic processes are already Data needs to be gathered and analyzed helps dynamically identify trends and in place focusing on both media and from across consumer touchpoints. To similarities in customer behavior. marketing mix, as well as investment achieve that goal, analytics engines that optimization, then adopting an integrated can process a huge volume of data and drill • Logistic Regression: Isolate and measure analytics approach is a powerful down to various levels of data granularity the impact of the multitude of media, combination. This type of approach will are required—a must for understanding marketing and service influences on allow companies to apply marketing mix both individual behavior and the behavior customer behavior. Through scenario modelling to understand the marketing of a segment of consumers across channels. planning, optimize future activities to effectiveness at a regional level, and This requires robust data architectures drive sales, reduce churn and improve conduct multichannel attribution analysis for enabling systematic consumer data customer satisfaction. to dive deeper into the data for insights acquisition, processing, population, and surrounding media, customer experience reporting, as well as data analytics. and customer behavior.
- 6. Comparison of Direct and Multichannel Attribution – an example To demonstrate the difference between direct and multichannel Taking a direct attribution approach, the Google paid search attribution, consider for a moment the following example. A ad will be identified as the activity that influenced the sale. consumer sees a TV ad that results in him wanting to purchase The multichannel attribution approach however, considers a specific product. He goes online to make the purchase and the influence of both the TV and the Google paid search ads. decides to use his Google search engine to find the product URL. See table below. His Google search returns a paid link promoting the product which the consumer clicks on to take him to the site where he makes a purchase. Direct attribution Multichannel attribution Summary of Uses the information provided at point of Recognizes that multiple inputs drive a purchase approach purchase, whereby a click or entry of a code and quantifies, or attributes, value to each input. indicates where to attribute the purchase or connection. Scenario results The purchase or connection is attributed to The purchase or connection would likely be google keyword search. attributed to both the tv and google paid search advertisements, and in a way which allows the diminishing return on increasing investment in each activity to be captured—much more reflective of true customer behavior. The direct attribution approach has the activities drive base consumer behavior decision to cut TV advertising and direct advantage of being simple to calculate, in a statistical sample, while others drive more funds to paid search, which could be providing top line metrics for marketers incremental consumer behavior. the result of the direct attribution approach, to justify investment and manage costs. the value of TV advertising is recognized However, direct attribution also leads The multichannel attribution approach when considering future investment and to linear thinking—the assumption that provides greater insight into the data funds are not redirected in such a “black and everything has a fixed cost per connection or influencing the purchase or connection. In white” response. Multichannel attribution click, and if marketing investment is doubled, this example, attributing the influence to enables optimization of forward looking the consumer response rate will also double. the TV ad on the purchase will impact MROI budgets, identification of cost savings and In practice, there is significant variation calculations of both the TV and Google improved MROI. in effective cost per response, as certain paid search activities. Instead of taking the
- 7. Driving Consumer Relevance consumers or to a specific segment of 1 A phenomenon, we call “the R Factor” or “consumer relevance at scale.” For a full discussion on the R The channel-savvy, highly mobile, consumers at scale. Companies will be Factor, see Baiju Shah and Nandini Nayak, “Got multidevice-happy consumer has able to “test the water” for new products the R Factor: Driving breakthrough performance in the Era of Relevance,” http://www.accenture.com/ created a new playing field for marketing and services, learn from early consumer SiteCollectionDocuments/PDF/Accenture-Relevance- organizations. Today, the effectiveness of responses, and make the necessary changes At-Scale-POV-WEB-5April.pdf accessed June 28, 2012. marketing strategy is increasingly measured before launching them to a wider audience. in terms of its relevance to the intent and As more attention is focused on the changing preferences of consumers across last-action dilemma, we are likely to see channels and touchpoints—at both macro multichannel attribution becoming a key and micro levels of granularity.1 component of not just marketing strategy, but of a company’s overall business strategy. As the practice of multichannel attribution gains popularity and attains a certain level of maturity, companies will be able to deliver To learn more about developing the right message, via the right channel, a multichannel attribution at the right time to a larger audience, as approach, contact: well as make accurate investment decisions across channels and touchpoints. The Conor McGovern way companies run marketing campaigns conor.mcgovern@accenture.com should change for the better—with data granularity and new analytics techniques, marketing organizations can access micro- segmentation data and deliver targeted marketing campaigns to individual
- 8. About Accenture Interactive Accenture Interactive’s 1,500 professionals help the world’s leading brands drive superior marketing performance across the full multichannel customer experience. Leveraging the full scale of more than 257,000 Accenture employees serving clients in more than 120 countries, Accenture Interactive offers integrated, industrialized and industry-driven marketing solutions and services across consulting, technology and outsourcing powered by analytics. Follow @AccentureSocial or visit www.accenture.com/interactive. About Accenture Accenture is a global management consulting, technology services and outsourcing company, with 257,000 people serving clients in more than 120 countries. Combining unparalleled experience, comprehensive capabilities across all industries and business functions, and extensive research on the world’s most successful companies, Accenture collaborates with clients to help them become high-performance businesses and governments. The company generated net revenues of US$27.9 billion for the fiscal year ended Aug. 31, 2012. Its home page is www.accenture.com. Copyright © 2012 Accenture All rights reserved. Accenture, its Signature, and High Performance Delivered are trademarks of Accenture. This document makes descriptive reference to trademarks that may be owned by others. The use of such trademarks herein is not an assertion of ownership of such trademarks by Accenture and is not intended to represent or imply the existence of an association between Accenture and the lawful owners of such trademarks. Information regarding third-party products, services and organizations was obtained from publicly available sources, and Accenture cannot confirm the accuracy or reliability of such sources or information. Its inclusion does not imply an endorsement by or of any third party. The views and opinions in this article should not be viewed as professional advice with respect to your business.