1. The Trinity

   • The three building blocks of next-gen measurement are:

     • Attribution: The process of giving credit to a marketing source that has driven a conversion (installs, purchases). There are multiple forms of attribution used by advertisers; last click, multi-touch, time-delay etc.
     • Incrementality: The process of understanding the effectiveness of tactical marketing initiatives by comparing the aggregated outcome of conversions vs. the baseline.
     • Media Mix Modeling (MMM): Statistical analysis leveraging a large amount of aggregated data to determine how all internal marketing efforts & external factors impact a company’s desired outcome (often ROI)

     The reason why leveraging all three pillars of measurement is necessary to future proof your marketing efforts is because each one has its blind spots:

      

     • Attribution

       Attribution is useful for short term optimization decisions as it provides a low-lift solution to real time, granular insights (creative, geo, channel) on what is and isn’t working however in a privacy-first world a lot of this data is missing. Not only is it missing but it’s not the complete picture – if you are using last-click attribution for example, should the full credit of the conversion be given to the last touchpoint? Would that user have converted even without seeing the ad? This is where incrementality comes in.

      

     • Incrementality

       Incrementality can be a useful mid-term methodology to determine whether marketing campaigns are actually driving value above your base line. If measured properly you will be able to add color to your attribution conclusions and determine whether a specific campaign is truly driving an increased conversion rate allowing you to allocate your marketing dollars away from low incrementality channels to high ones. The blind spot with incrementality is its limited scope. As it’s tactical by nature it is difficult to gauge the effectiveness of the marketing mix; enter MMM.

      

     • Media Mix Modeling (MMM)

       MMM is the most complex out of all the methodologies given the statistical requirement that relies on as much aggregated data as possible. If done right however, will give a marketer a holistic view for long-term strategic planning, taking into account all marketing channels inclusive of external factors like seasonality & economic conditions. Having said that, utilizing MMM alone would make it difficult to make actionable short term, granular optimization decisions – which brings us full circle.

      

Conclusion

Whilst the above highlights each methodology’s blind spots it also brings into focus their strengths. Unfortunately, there is no panacea when it comes to measurement however when using the mobile trinity together you have a future-proof measurement solution that enables mobile marketers to make accurate short, mid & long-term decisions – a foundation for success and continued ROI.