Wondering which touchpoint actually drives conversions? You're not alone. Most customer journeys aren’t as simple as “click ad → purchase.” People bounce between channels, ads, emails, blogs, referrals, and attribution models help you make sense of that mess.
So what is an attribution model?
Attribution models determine how credit for a conversion is assigned across the marketing touchpoints that influenced a customer’s decision. They're essential for understanding what’s working (and what’s not) so you can allocate your budget strategically.
Here are the 7 most common attribution models, and when to use each:
1. First-Touch Attribution
What it is: Gives 100% of the credit to the first interaction.
Example: If someone first clicks a Google ad, then an email, and buys — the ad gets all the credit.
Best for: Brand awareness. Use this if you're focused on what brings people in the door.
2. Last-Touch Attribution
What it is: Assigns all the credit to the final step before conversion.
Example: If someone goes ad → blog → email → purchase, the email gets all the credit.
Best for: Measuring what closed the deal — but beware, it ignores the earlier steps.
3. Linear Attribution
What it is: Splits credit evenly across all touchpoints.
Example: Ad → blog → email = ⅓ credit to each.
Best for: Long buying cycles where each touchpoint plays a role.
4. Time Decay Attribution
What it is: Gives more credit to recent touchpoints.
Example: Email just before purchase gets more weight than the YouTube ad from two weeks ago.
Best for: Sales cycles where recency drives urgency.
5. Position-Based (U-Shaped) Attribution
What it is: Gives most credit to the first and last interactions, with the rest split in the middle.
Example: Ad → blog → email = bulk credit to the ad and email.
Best for: Marketers who care about entry and exit points, but less about mid-funnel.
6. Linear Paid Attribution
What it is: Like linear, but only includes paid touchpoints.
Example: Google ad → Meta ad → retargeting ad = equal credit across all three. Organic traffic is ignored.
Best for: Teams focused on optimizing paid media performance.
7. ThoughtMetric Data-Driven Attribution
What it is: A hybrid model that combines multi-touch tracking with customer-reported data.
Example: Tracks clicks and includes survey responses like “I heard about you from TikTok.”
Best for: Anyone who wants both quantitative and qualitative insights. It's more complete, more accurate, and smarter.
Q: What is the best attribution model for e-commerce?
A: It depends on your goals. If you want a balanced view, the ThoughtMetric data-driven model or position-based model works well.
Q: How does multi-touch attribution work?
A: It gives partial credit to all the touchpoints a customer interacts with before converting, helping you see the full journey instead of just the first or last click.
Why Attribution Models Matter
Attribution isn’t just for your media buyer or your data team. It affects every part of your marketing strategy, from where you spend ad dollars to which campaigns you scale.
Using the wrong model? You might double down on a channel that looks good on the surface but isn’t actually pulling its weight.
