Time decay attribution
Fast track (Summarised definition)
Time decay attribution assigns more credit to marketing touchpoints closer to conversions. Valuable for businesses with longer sales cycles to understand channel effectiveness and optimise budget allocation. Requires comprehensive cross-channel tracking and comparison with other attribution models for complete customer journey analysis and strategic insights.
Full lap (Full definition)
Time decay attribution is a marketing attribution model that assigns greater credit to customer touchpoints occurring closer to conversion events. For marketers managing multi-touch customer journeys, time decay attribution provides more nuanced understanding of marketing channel effectiveness compared to first-click or last-click attribution models.
The model operates on the principle that marketing interactions immediately before conversion have greater influence on purchase decisions than earlier touchpoints. Businesses with longer sales cycles, such as automotive, real estate, or B2B services, benefit from time decay attribution analysis to understand which marketing activities most effectively drive conversions.
Implementation requires comprehensive tracking across all marketing channels and customer touchpoints, including email marketing, social media, paid advertising, organic search, and direct visits. Businesses should ensure proper attribution setup across Google Analytics, advertising platforms, and customer relationship management systems to capture complete customer journey data.
Time decay attribution helps optimise marketing budget allocation by identifying which channels provide the most value at different stages of the customer journey. Marketers can adjust spending toward channels that effectively nurture prospects and drive final conversions while maintaining awareness-building activities that support overall marketing objectives.
Comparison with other attribution models provides comprehensive insights into channel performance and customer behaviour patterns. Businesses should analyse multiple attribution models to understand the full impact of integrated marketing strategies.
Advanced time decay models allow customisation of decay rates and time windows to match specific business sales cycles and customer behaviours. This flexibility enables more accurate attribution analysis that reflects actual customer decision-making processes and marketing impact across different industries and sales cycle lengths.