Last Call for Last Click?
By Gavin Hudson, Technical Solutions Manager
Inspired by a post on Lee’s blog - Last Click Commissions - Still Relevant in 2007 / 2008? there has been a bit of chatter recently about the validity of last click as a tracking and de-duplication method. For those unfamiliar with the term “last click” we use it to mean the system of attributing the sale to the online channel that the user last clicked on.
In the eyes of many, this system has a number of flaws, and can reduce the affiliate incentive to be creative in order to drive that initial “first click” and incremental sale. The usual example given is where a customer finds an affiliate blog or review, decides that they are 99% sure want to purchase the product (perhaps convinced by a review or content on the affiliate site) but decide to think about it. With the proliferation of toolbars and integrated search boxes, it’s now more than likely that a customer will revisit the merchant site not by typing in even the simplest of URL’s or by looking at their history, but simply by searching for the brand term.
If the user then clicks a paid ad, then there is a strong chance that the affiliate cookie will be overwritten by the one assigned to a paid ad - whether that be a client PPC ad, or an affiliate one.
Is this fair? Well, I’m going to stick my neck out and say “Yes”. It’s frustrating, I agree, but I really feel it’s the only sensible and just way at the moment. In an ideal world, everyone who had contributed to that sale would be rewarded, but ultimately affiliates are paid for ‘finishing’ the transaction. The key reason as to why I believe this is the best way, is that it works both ways - for every affiliate that loses out on a sale to brand PPC, you would hope that there are some that win too.
I like the example of the customer walking into a high street electrical shop. Let’s call them “Kormas”. A customer is assisted to make a judgement by talking to sales assistant X for twenty minutes, but doesn’t purchase there and then. The customer goes off, phones their partner, and comes back into the shop to make their purchase, but sales assistant Y processes the transaction. It’s perhaps a bit unfair that Y gets the credit on his sales figures, where X did all the hard work but at least it’s the same for both parties and you’d hope that over the quarter, things even themselves out. The same holds true online as well as offline.
A perceived issue with last click referrers is that PPC affiliates are more likely to gain that precious last click, at the pureplay ‘content’ affiliate’s last click. This may be true, but I guess it again works both ways, and it goes back to the affiliate to ensure that their sales pitch is convincing enough to ensure that they gain the last click!
Overall, last click tracking is far from perfect, but it’s the best we can reasonably hope to use at the moment in online media, it works the same for everyone, and at least avoids the nightmare of duplicated orders and large scale over-reporting, which can lead to (whisper it) reversals of affiliate commissions by unscrupulous merchants.
Now, what was the domain for Amazon again? Ah, I’ll just search for it…
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