Well-known retailer and advertiser John Wanamaker is quoted as saying, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted… the trouble is, I don't know which half.” If all marketers could pinpoint that technique that would land customers with a perfectly crafted message, there'd be no need for one of todays most talked-about marketing disciplines—Marketing Attribution. Marketing attribution is defined as the science of using advanced analytics to allocate proportional credit to each marketing touchpoint across all channels (online and offline) that lead to the purchase of a specific good or service. In essence, marketing attribution boils down to “giving credit where credit is due”. The end objective is to help marketers track their marketing and media efforts and determine the impact on their overall business.

Recent research suggests that the interest in cross-channel measurement and attribution is increasing in 2017. This technique is currently edging ahead of former go-to tactics like general audience analytics and programmatic media buying. In January 2017, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) and Winterberry Group polled over 100 digital marketing and media practitioners in the United States. Almost 60% of these respondents expected to be engaged in cross-channel measurement and attribution this year. This is up significantly from the past two years, when just over a third of respondents considered this to be an area of focus. 

Table 1: Which of the following tactics occupied/will occupy your time and resources?