Understanding Marketing Attribution in AskBiz

Marketing attribution is the process of deciding which marketing touchpoint (or touchpoints) gets credit for a conversion. When a customer sees a Facebook ad on Monday, clicks a Google search ad on Wednesday, and buys via an email link on Friday — which channel 'caused' the sale?

Different attribution models answer this differently:

• Last-click: 100% credit to email (the last touchpoint)
• First-click: 100% credit to Facebook (the first touchpoint)
• Linear: 33% credit to each of the three touchpoints
• Time decay: more credit to the touchpoints closest to the purchase
• Data-driven: credit distributed based on statistical analysis of what touchpoints actually influence conversion

The model you choose significantly changes how you evaluate channel performance — and therefore where you invest.

AskBiz uses last-click UTM attribution by default — the most recent marketing touchpoint before purchase (as identified by UTM parameters in the order URL) receives 100% credit.

This model is:

• Simple and consistent: easy to understand and explain to stakeholders
• Biased toward bottom-of-funnel channels: email, branded search, and retargeting tend to be the 'last click' and therefore get over-credited
• Unfair to top-of-funnel channels: paid social, display, and influencers who introduce customers early in the journey are under-credited

For most small businesses with limited multi-channel complexity, last-click is sufficient. As your marketing complexity grows, you may want to switch models.

Go to Marketing → Settings → Attribution Model to change how AskBiz attributes revenue to channels.

Options:

• Last-click (default): all credit to the last UTM-tagged touchpoint
• First-click: all credit to the first UTM-tagged touchpoint for that customer session
• Linear: equal credit split across all touchpoints in the 30-day window before purchase
• Position-based (U-shaped): 40% to first touch, 40% to last touch, 20% split across middle touches

Note: changing the attribution model recalculates all historical data in your Marketing dashboards. The underlying order data does not change — only how revenue is distributed across channels.

Short purchase cycle, single-touch journey (customer sees ad, buys immediately):

Last-click and linear produce the same result. Use last-click for simplicity.

Longer consideration, multi-touch journey (customer researches for days before buying):

Linear or position-based gives a fairer view. Top-of-funnel channels are under-valued by last-click.

Brand-building focus (you invest in awareness knowing it takes months to convert):

First-click or linear better captures the awareness channels' contribution.

Retargeting-heavy strategy (you spend heavily on retargeting existing visitors):

Be careful with last-click — retargeting will claim credit for customers who would have bought anyway. Compare retargeting ROAS with and without a holdout group (customers who were not retargeted) to measure true incrementality.

All attribution models share the same fundamental limitation: they only see touchpoints that are tracked. Word-of-mouth, offline advertising, PR, podcast mentions, and social media views (without a click) are invisible to UTM-based attribution.

For a more complete picture, supplement AskBiz attribution data with:

• Post-purchase surveys: ask customers 'How did you hear about us?' — the answers often reveal untracked channels that digital attribution misses
• Marketing Mix Modelling (MMM): a statistical approach that models the relationship between total marketing spend and total revenue, capturing the impact of untracked channels
• Geographic testing: run a channel on in some regions but not others, and compare revenue growth — a simple way to measure incrementality without full MMM

AskBiz displays post-purchase survey data (if collected) alongside attribution data in the Marketing Insights view — giving you both the algorithmic and human perspective on how customers found you.