We looked at the attribution models used by 200 e-commerce brands and found that Multi-Touch Attribution was by far the most popular, with 181 out of 200 stores using it. 

Here’s the breakdown:

It’s no surprise most brands use Multi-Touch. This model spreads credit across every channel that influenced a conversion, from that first ad click to the final email nudge. It gives you the full story of how customers actually convert and helps marketers see the value of upper-funnel campaigns that don’t always get credit when looking at data using a last-touch model. In ThoughtMetric, the multi-touch model also includes data from the post-purchase survey.

Best for:
Brands scaling across multiple paid and organic channels who want the most complete view of the customer journey.

A small group still prefers First-Touch, which gives 100 percent of the credit to the very first channel that introduced a customer to your brand. It’s useful when you care most about brand discovery and top-of-funnel growth, for example if you’re investing heavily in awareness campaigns and want to measure which ones are bringing new people in.

Best for:
Measuring brand awareness efforts and identifying which channels are best at driving new visitors.

Also called the U-shaped model, this one gives more weight to the first and last interactions and less to the middle touchpoints. It’s great for balancing discovery and conversion influence while acknowledging that both the intro and final nudge matter most.

Best for:
Teams balancing awareness and conversion campaigns

This variant spreads credit evenly across paid touchpoints only. It’s often used by performance marketers who want to compare paid channels head-to-head without organic or referral data changing the view.

Best for:
Budget planning and testing paid channel efficiency

Last-Touch gives all the credit to the final touchpoint before a conversion. While not as widely used among ThoughtMetric users, it can still be valuable for teams focused on what directly drives purchases. It’s often used to evaluate the performance of bottom-funnel channels such as Email, Retargeting, and Organic Search.

Best for:
Understanding which channels close sales

Want to test different attribution models in your own data? Book a ThoughtMetric demo to learn more.

What is Multi-Touch Attribution?
Multi-Touch Attribution gives credit to every channel that influenced a conversion. Instead of assigning all the value to one touchpoint, it distributes credit across the entire customer journey, helping brands understand how each channel contributes to sales.

Why do most brands use Multi-Touch Attribution?
Because it provides the most complete view of marketing performance. Multi-Touch Attribution helps identify how upper-funnel campaigns, retargeting, and email all work together to drive conversions, rather than favoring a single channel.

Yes. ThoughtMetric lets you toggle between five different attribution models: Multi-Touch, First-Touch, Last-Touch, Position-Based, and Linear Paid. You can compare how each one affects your results and choose the model that best fits your goals.