Understanding Attribution in Usermaven

Introduction

Attribution is an essential metric in digital analytics for understanding user journeys and evaluating the success of marketing efforts. It tracks and gives credit to various interactions—like ads, clicks, and social media posts—that lead to a user's desired action, such as a sign-up or purchase.

Usermaven's Attribution feature helps businesses analyze and understand the customer journey by accurately giving credit to different touch points leading to conversions. This is essential for improving existing marketing analytics.

Imagine a user interacts with a Google ad, a Facebook post, and a TikTok video before signing up. Usermaven’s Attribution feature precisely credits each touchpoint, helping you see which channels bring the most value and how to improve your marketing efforts.

Key Attribution features in Usermaven

• Customizable Attribution models: Provides different models to assign credit based on the importance or order of touchpoints in the customer journey.

• Adjustable Attribution windows: Lets you set time frames (e.g., 30 days or 60 days) to match your sales cycles, making sure the analysis fits your customer journeys.

• Detailed channel analysis: Offers insights into which channels and campaigns are most effective in driving conversions and revenue, helping you make informed decisions.

• Optimized marketing spend: Helps you allocate budgets wisely by identifying the most impactful channels.

• Complete conversion funnel analysis: Allows product and marketing teams to work together by offering a clear view of the entire conversion process to optimize user acquisition and retention strategies.

Accessing Attribution in Usermaven

To access the attribution dashboard in Usermaven, follow these steps:

1. Log in to your Usermaven account.

2. On the Usermaven Web Analytics dashboard, click on ‘Attribution’ on the left panel.

You will then be directed to the attribution analysis page, where you can explore and evaluate various attribution models.

Creating a new Attribution report

When it comes to creating a new attribution report, users typically fall into two categories. First-time users, who will create a conversion goal to view it as an Attribution report and existing users transitioning from our older Attribution reports feature to Attribution 2.0.

Since the attribution feature uses conversion goals, to view any report in attribution - we will make a conversion goal for it. If you are a new user and haven’t yet created a conversion goal and set up the Attribution dashboard, you will first be prompted to create a conversion goal in Usermaven. To do so,

1. Click on the ‘Create Conversion Goal’ button.

2. Give your conversion goal a name, making it easily identifiable. For example, you could create a conversion goal for all the users visiting the pricing page on your platform.

3. Choose your event for the conversion goal. e.g visitors who visited the pricing page.

4. In the next step, specify a value for your conversion goal. You can choose between setting a static or a dynamic value.
   However, the dynamic conversion goal value is only available for custom events. Moreover, please ensure that you've set your default currency in "Workspace settings > Miscellaneous" since the conversion rate calculation depends on this value.
   The formula applied is (Conversion Count / User Count) * 100.

5. At the very end, you have the option to track the conversion rate and value based on unique conversions. If you wish to enable this, check the provided box. If not, there's no need to check the box. The "Value" will be calculated based on your choice:

• If "Track Conv." is marked true, it will be calculated as Visits Count * Conversion Value.

• If "Track Conv." is marked false, it will be calculated as Total Conversions * Conversion Value.

6. Once done, click on the ‘Create’ button.

You will then be directed to the Attribution dashboard.

With these steps, you can create and configure your conversion goal within Usermaven. Once done, you will be directed to the main Attribution dashboard.

FYI: This goal will also be visible on the Web Analytics dashboard.

In case you are a new user and haven’t yet set up the Attribution dashboard but you do have existing conversion goals, all of them will be used for insights on the Attribution dashboard.

How to transition from our old Attribution tool to Attribution 2.0?

If you are a seasoned Usermaven user and have been using our old Attribution feature, follow these steps to transition to the new Attribution module:

1. On the Usermaven Web Analytics dashboard, click on ‘Attribution’ on the left panel.

2. Once there, Usermaven will automatically detect your existing Attribution reports from the old tool. A prompt will appear, asking you to select the old Attribution reports you want to convert into new conversion goals. You will have the option to select specific reports or to start fresh by not selecting any.

3. Carefully review your old Attribution reports and select the reports you wish to convert into new conversion goals. Any reports not selected will be permanently deleted.

4. Once you have made your selections, click on the “Yes, Proceed” button. This action will convert your selected Attribution reports into conversion goals. After the conversion, you will be redirected to the Attribution dashboard. Here, you will find your selected Attribution reports now listed as conversion goals.

Attribution analysis

Once you are on the Attribution dashboard in Usermaven, you will come across detailed Attribution insights.

• Select conversion goal

On the top left corner of your screen, you will come across a drop down menu with all your conversion goals listed. You can select from the drop-down menu the conversion goal you want to view your attribution insights for.

• Attribution models in Usermaven

Usermaven offers a variety of attribution models. These include:

1. First touch Attribution model

The First touch attribution model gives full credit to the customer's first interaction with your brand. In this model, the initial touchpoint gets 100% of the credit for a conversion. For example, if you're looking for project management software and see an ad for a product, that ad is your first impression. In the First touch model, this ad would receive all the credit for your eventual purchase.

This model is ideal for businesses with shorter sales cycles, Product-Led Growth (PLG) strategies, or when measuring the impact of branding and top-of-the-funnel content. However, for longer B2B sales processes that take weeks or months, giving full credit to the first touchpoint may not be the best approach.

2. Last touch Attribution model

The Last touch attribution model gives full credit to the final touchpoint before a customer makes a conversion. This means the last interaction a customer has before deciding to convert is considered the most influential.

For example, if you're looking at project management software and read a blog article just before scheduling a demo, the blog article is the last touchpoint. In this model, all the credit for your sign-up goes to that blog article.

3. Linear Attribution model

The Linear attribution model evenly distributes credit among all touchpoints in a customer’s journey. This provides a balanced view compared to models that only focus on one touchpoint.

For instance, if a customer interacts with an ad, a blog, a review, and a retargeting campaign, each touchpoint gets 25% of the credit. This model ensures that all touchpoints are recognized, even though in real-world scenarios the number of interactions can be higher.

4. U shaped Attribution model

The U-shaped attribution model gives 40% of the credit to the first touchpoint and 40% to the last touchpoint before conversion. The remaining 20% is distributed among any interactions in between.

For example, if a customer finds your website through a Google search, then visits your Facebook page, and finally signs up via email, the Google search and email sign-up each get 40% of the credit, while the Facebook visit gets the remaining 20%. This model balances the initial interest and the final action leading to conversion.

5. Time decay Attribution model

The Time Decay attribution model assigns more credit to touchpoints that are closer to the conversion event. Touchpoints that happened earlier in the customer journey receive less credit.

For example, let's say a customer interacts with your brand through a social media ad, then visits your website a few days later, and finally makes a purchase a week after that. In the Time Decay model, the purchase would receive the most credit, the website visit would receive less credit, and the social media ad would receive the least credit, even though it was the first touchpoint.

6. First touch non-direct Attribution model

The First touch Non-Direct model is similar to the First touch model, but it excludes direct traffic. Instead, it attributes the conversion to the first non-direct channel the customer interacted with.

For example, if a customer first finds your website by typing your URL directly into their browser, this direct traffic would not receive any attribution credit. However, if the customer's first non-direct interaction was through a search engine ad, that ad would receive full credit for the eventual conversion.

7. Last touch non-direct Attribution model

The Last touch Non-Direct model is similar to the Last touch model, but it excludes direct traffic. Instead, it attributes the conversion to the last non-direct channel the customer interacted with before converting.

For instance, if a customer's journey includes a direct visit to your website, followed by an email campaign, and finally a social media ad before making a purchase, the social media ad would receive full credit in the Last Touch Non-Direct model. The direct website visit would be excluded from the attribution.

• Lookback window

The lookback window is a user-specific time period before a conversion that determines which marketing touchpoints are considered for attribution. It's not fixed but moves with each user's conversion date. In Usermaven, you can set this window from 30 to 180 days.

For example, if a user converts on July 14 with a 30-day lookback:

• Window: June 15 to July 14
• Only touch points within this period are considered for attribution

This dynamic approach ensures that recent, relevant interactions are properly credited in the attribution model, providing a more accurate view of what led to the conversion.

• Conversion time period

The conversion time period refers to the specific date range that you want to analyze for conversions. This filter on the Attribution dashboard allows you to select the time frame during which you want to track and attribute conversions to your marketing efforts.

For example, if you set the conversion time period to be the last 30 days, Usermaven will only consider the conversions that occurred within that 30-day window and attribute them to the relevant marketing touchpoints and channels. This helps you understand the impact of your recent marketing activities and make more informed decisions about your strategies.

The conversion time period is different from the lookback window, which is the timeframe prior to the conversion during which Usermaven will consider touchpoints that may have influenced the conversion. The conversion time period is the overall date range you want to analyze, while the lookback window is the specific window used for attribution within that overall time period.

• Custom channel mapping

Clicking the Custom Channel Mappings button navigates you to the Custom Channel Mappings (opens in a new tab) dashboard. This feature in Usermaven allows you to create custom channel groupings, enhancing your analytics to meet your specific needs. By defining your own channels and setting conditions, you can obtain deeper insights into your traffic sources and make more informed decisions.

Any channels you create or define here will be reflected in the graph and table on the Attribution dashboard, providing you with a comprehensive view of your customized data.

• Conversions by channel and Attribution model

The conversions by channel and Attribution model graph visually represents the impact of various marketing channels on conversions under different attribution models. By examining the bars in the graph, you can discern the number of conversions attributed to each channel according to the chosen attribution model.

For example, in the video below, "First touch" attribution model has been selected. This model assigns the entire conversion credit to the first interaction a user has with a marketing channel before converting.

Let's consider a scenario where a user first encounters a social media ad about a product through Organic Search. Intrigued by the ad, the user clicks on it, explores the website, but does not convert immediately. Despite this, the user retained interest. Over the next few weeks, the user receives targeted emails and retargeting ads on other platforms. Finally, the user makes a purchase after clicking a Google Ad.

Based on the First touch attribution model:

• The conversion credit, based on this model, would be solely attributed to Organic Search since it was the first touchpoint that initiated the user's interaction with the product.

• The Conversions by Channel and Attribution Model graph would visually represent this by showing the number of conversions attributed to Organic Search at 3,012, as seen in the video below.

Followed by the graph is a detailed table that shows the number of conversions influenced by different channels at any point in the customer journey, whether as the first touch point, last touch, or somewhere in between. In the provided table:

• Channels/Source

The channels/sources column gives you a list of all the channels and sources that are there in Usermaven by default and the ones that you have created in Usermaven using the custom channel mappings feature (opens in a new tab). The drop down icon linked with each channel/ source will give you a list of all the channels and sources. For example, in the case of ‘Organic Search’, you will see the traffic coming from all the relevant platforms whether it's google, bing or any other related platform.

• Visitors

This is the number of unique visitors counted in the conversion period time frame. For example, if you select the last 30 days from the conversion period dropdown menu, it will give you the number of unique visitors from the last 30 days.

• Conversions

This is the number of total unique conversions that happened within the selected conversion period time frame, irrespective of the model. For example, in the first row, you will see all the conversions within the conversion period time frame, by users who came from organic search, whether it was their first touch point, middle or last.

• Value

This is the amount of value generated for your conversion goal. This depends on the amount you specified when creating your conversion goal. You can choose between setting a static or a dynamic value. However, the dynamic conversion goal value is only available for custom events. Moreover, please ensure that you've set your default currency in "Workspace settings > Miscellaneous" since the conversion rate calculation depends on this value. The formula applied is (Conversion Count / User Count) * 100.

The next three columns in the table are based on the Attribution model selected.

• Conversions

This column in the table shows the total number of conversions attributed to each marketing channel or source based on the selected attribution model, which in this case is the First touch model.

For example, under the First touch model, the Organic Search channel had 3,012 conversions. This means that 3,012 conversions were attributed to the Organic Search channel as the first touchpoint in the customer's journey.

The percentage shown next to the number of conversions is calculated by dividing the conversions for that channel by the total number of conversions across all channels, and then multiplying by 100 to get the percentage.

So, for Organic Search, the percentage of 44.5% is calculated as:

Organic Search Conversions 3,012/ Total Conversions (3,012 + 3,312 + 271 + 85 + 43 + 19 + 17 + 7 + 6) * 100 = 44.5%

This percentage shows the relative contribution of each channel to the overall conversions, according to the First touch attribution model. It allows you to understand the importance and impact of each marketing channel in driving conversions for your business.

• Conversion rate

This measures the percentage of visitors who take a desired action, such as making a purchase or signing up for a service. It is calculated by dividing the number of conversions by the number of visitors or influenced users, and then multiplying by 100 to get the percentage.

Let's use the Linear attribution model as an example to explain conversion rate:

In the Linear attribution model, the "conversions_linear_of_that_channel" refers to the number of conversions attributed to that specific marketing channel or touchpoint using the Linear attribution model.

The "influenced_visitors_of_that_channel" refers to the number of visitors who were influenced by that channel, meaning they interacted with that touchpoint at some point during their customer journey.

The conversion rate formula for the Linear attribution model would be:

Conversion Rate (Linear) = (conversions_linear_of_that_channel * 100) / influenced_visitors_of_that_channel

This gives you the percentage of visitors who converted after being influenced by that particular marketing channel or touchpoint, according to the Linear attribution model.

The conversion rate can be calculated for each individual channel or touchpoint, allowing you to compare the performance and effectiveness of your different marketing efforts.

• Conversion value

Conversion value is calculated by multiplying the number of conversions attributed to a specific channel or source, based on the selected attribution model, with the value assigned to that conversion goal.

For example, if the Organic Search channel had 3,012 conversions attributed to it under the First touch model, and the conversion value for that goal was set at $2, then the Conversion Value for Organic Search would be:

Conversion Value = 3,012 conversions x $2 per conversion = $$6,024

This calculation is done for each marketing channel or source, using the number of conversions attributed to that channel based on the selected attribution model and the fixed conversion value. The resulting Conversion value provides insights into the total monetary impact of the conversions driven by each marketing touchpoint.

By analyzing the Conversion alue metric, businesses can understand the relative contribution of different channels and optimize their marketing strategies accordingly to drive the highest overall revenue and return on investment.