Campaign Manager 360: defining your Multichannel Attribution Model

Accurately measuring the performance of our digital marketing campaigns is crucial for optimising return on investment. However, the landscape is rapidly changing due to the depreciation of third-party cookies: browsers like Safari and Firefox are already blocking cookies (Google Chrome plans to eliminate them in 2025), which have been traditionally used to track users across different websites. This will limit our ability to gain a complete view of the customer journey.

In this context, it is essential to have tools and strategies that allow us to continue attributing conversions effectively.

The Campaign Manager 360 tool from Google Marketing Platform can be a great ally in defining a multichannel attribution model, considering the current limitations of the industry. Let’s see how.

Campaign Manager 360 and Google Marketing Platform (GMP).

Campaign Manager 360, part of the Google Marketing Platform suite, is a tool that allows us to manage advertising campaigns and perform detailed tracking of their performance.

Additionally, the platform offers advanced solutions to address data loss caused by the depreciation of third-party cookies, including:

• Consent Mode
• Enhanced Attribution
• Enhanced Conversions
• Server-to-server tracking

Thanks to these features, we can access accurate and centralised data, facilitating the creation of robust attribution models. 

Attribution Models: An Overview.

Attribution models are essential for understanding how each touchpoint contributes to conversions. There are several types of attribution models, and choosing the most appropriate one will depend on multiple factors, including business objectives, the approach we want to take in reading our data, and current technological limitations.

Default Attribution Models:

1. Floodlight and/or Last Click: Attributes the entire conversion to the last touchpoint or impression. It’s easy to implement but often overly simplistic.
2. First Click: Attributes the entire conversion to the first touchpoint. Useful for understanding which channels or campaigns serve as discovery mediums for our brand.
3. Linear: Distributes attribution equally among all touchpoints. Provides a balanced view of all user touchpoints before a conversion.
4. Social: Follows the same approach as the linear model but can also weigh impressions with or without social media participation. Suitable for measuring the contribution of our social media campaigns.
5. Position-Based: Gives more weight to the first and last touchpoints. Useful for understanding the start and end points of the customer journey.
6. Time Decay: Gives more weight to touchpoints closer to the conversion.

Advanced Attribution Models:

1. Data-Driven: Uses machine learning to assign weights to each touchpoint before the conversion. While usually the most accurate, it requires large amounts of high-quality data to function properly.
2. Custom: Campaign Manager 360 (CM360) allows us to create advanced and fully customised attribution models by adjusting parameters such as the weight associated with certain interactions, position in the conversion path, type of impact, creatives, audience, etc.

Implementing a Multichannel Attribution Model in Campaign Manager 360.

• Step 1: Centralising Campaign Data. This includes data from display advertising, paid search, social media, and any other relevant channels through the trafficking of creatives and campaigns in Campaign Manager 360 and the integration of data from other GMP products like Search Ads 360 or Google Analytics 4. Centralisation facilitates comparison and analysis, allowing us to get a holistic view of our campaigns’ performance.
• Step 2: Configuring Attribution Rules. We can choose from predefined attribution models or create a custom one that suits our specific needs. The choice of model should be based on a detailed analysis of our customer journey and business objectives. This step is critical for making data-driven decisions.
• Step 3: Analysis and Optimisation. Once the attribution model is set up, the next step is to gather enough historical data to generate hypotheses and optimise our campaigns accordingly. Campaign Manager 360 offers advanced analysis tools like the “Attribution Modelling Tool,” which allow us to identify areas for improvement and adjust our strategies in real-time. Continuous analysis is key to ensuring our attribution model remains effective in a changing environment.

Duplicate Conversions: A Critical Approach.

One of the main challenges faced by marketing teams that base their user acquisition strategies on multiple channels is duplicate conversions across platforms.

Using tools like Campaign Manager 360 allows us to configure a centralised attribution model across channels and set custom rules that help us assign weights to the various touchpoints a user has with the brand before generating a conversion, ensuring that multiple conversions are not counted for the same user action, providing a more accurate view of our campaigns’ performance and the contribution of different channels. This is especially relevant when using multiple channels and devices, where the risk of duplicate conversions is higher.

Final and Future Considerations.

The depreciation of third-party cookies is just one of the challenges we are facing in digital marketing measurement. As technologies continue to evolve, it is crucial to stay updated and adapt our strategies accordingly.

Campaign Manager 360 and Google Marketing Platform offer robust solutions to meet these challenges, but it is our responsibility as marketing professionals to continue innovating and seeking new ways to measure and optimise our campaigns.