Marketers and CI professionals frequently tell us that they want a better measurement technique to accurately determine the true performance of channels and customers. I am pleased to announce that today we published The Forrester Wave™: Cross-Channel Attribution Providers, Q2 2012.  This vendor review is a result of countless hours of vendor reviews and assessments, in-person briefing reviews, customer calls, fact checking, and countless hours of intensive research work.

After long days and countless Starbuck lattes, I crawled out of this very intense research process, and a few key takeaways emerged:
 
  • Companies are investing in attribution. Marketers are seeking expert advice for the best ways to measure their channels with more precision. Attribution approach can provide a more concise way of measuring true channel and customer performance. And that’s something organizations are hungry for. To do this, they need help developing attribution models and making sense of all their data.
  • Cross- channel attribution is a relatively immature market. Vendors have fairly immature cross-channel attribution offerings. Most continue to emphasize digital attribution but are rapidly expanding to include additional channels, while also developing future marketing scenario-planning capabilities.
  • Marketers want real-time, accurate results that will drive their marketing strategies. Because marketers struggle with understanding the true performance of channels, they lack visibility into where to make the proper marketing investments. By employing an attribution approach, organizations can better understand how their offline and online channels are really affecting the bottom line. Once they understand what's driving revenue, firms can provide recommendations on where brands should invest their dollars.

 For even more research on attribution, my colleague Ari Osur, who serves the Interactive Marketing role, has also published The Forrester Wave™: Interactive Attribution Vendors, Q2 2012, which reviews the state of providers that handle attribution across digital specific channels. Ari and I collaborated throughout the process, and while there is some overlap in the vendors taking part, the two reports are evaluated and written for different roles. The cross-channel report is written for CI professionals and puts a premium on customer-centric insights. Like all Forrester Wave™ reports, readers of either report can download vendor scorecards and customize the weightings to reflect their own needs. 

Clients should note that this space is changing at a fast pace. Vendors are quickly enhancing their attribution offerings to include scenario planning, media buying recommendations, and growing their offline capabilities. Additionally, more and more players are entering this landscape, each with its own unique approach to cross-channel attribution. In the next 12 to 18 months, we expect to see an even more robust attribution measurement landscape, with dashboard and predictive modeling enhancements, and full integration with other marketing technologies. Cross-channel attribution measurement will be essential in the marketer's tool kit. I am excited to see the anticipated growth in the marketing measurement services landscape and the role that cross-channel attribution will play.
 
And to my research team — thank you for your support throughout this process!