Allow me to repeat some key trends that describe the modern marketing evolutions. There is an abundance of communication channels, people have increasing opportunities to gather information in the buying cycle, we live in a cross-and multi-channel reality which makes it more difficult to determine exactly how people become customers and what steps they are taking and finally: there is a shift from selling to buying.

The purchasing process is complex for companies and advertisers. How do email messages, online advertisements, offline advertising, peer influence, online and offline word-of-mouth, social interactions, recommendations, sales efforts, visits to trade shows and all the other contact moments interact with one another?

Traditionally we have always looked at selling, buying and lead nurturing as a funnel. Furthermore, this image of a funnel was a very linear one. However, it has been an image to understand how things work but it doesn’t reflect reality, especially today.

There are many opportunities to follow the customer journey in lead nurturing and sales processes once a (potential) client enters your company’s (online) influence sphere and becomes “measurable” but even then you never really know everything. In a cross-channel world this is an additional plea to implement marketing ROI on campaign, macro and micro levels.

Flaws in the attribution of conversions to interactive marketing touch points

It is obvious that the purchasing process is everything but linear, as many marketers who specialize in a certain field still seem to believe. How often do you have an immediate conversion or direct road from a search engine ad to an online purchase for instance? Every company also has a different business model, go-to-market strategy and selling/buying cycle (from very short to very long).

For instance, you do not just purchase a strategic software application, which sometimes costs millions, in one click. But the same also applies for buying products with a short cycle online, even if they are immediately measurable. Here is an example that I have established today from my own buying behaviour. During the holidays I often try to get away for a few days. I just booked a short vacation online. Through my favourite travel agency. I did not type the URL of the travel agency; instead I typed the company’s name into Google. Why? No idea: the force of habit. The first thing that I saw as I typed the company name into Google was a text advert of the company, right at the top of the list. I clicked on it, was directed to the site and I booked my trip.

Now let’s look at it from the companies’ point of view: in their dashboards I appear as a customer who immediately purchased something after clicking on a Google ad (unless there are all kinds of cookies on my PC or they have a sophisticated tracking system). Or in other words: they attribute the turnover directly to their text ad activities. This happens thousands of times per day. Often it is much more complex. How many people search for something via Google after they have heard about it from a friend? If they then also click on a text ad, the lead or sale resulting from this should actually be attributed to “referrals” or “word-of-mouth” and not to search engine advertising. This is only one example of a pre-sales and information channel of the many hundreds that people of today have. I have not even included the impact of online branding effects.

The necessity of integrated online marketing

Conclusion: the funnel is everything but linear and was it ever linear to start with? Only when you can track someone you can draw some conclusions with the necessary reserves. This applies for both B2B and B2C, although there are some differences. It is however clear that the way to a purchase is ‘nonlinear’ and not a simple funnel.

Businesses apparently start to realise this. eMarketer recently wrote an article, titled “Shoppers Take a Nonlinear Path to Purchase”, wherein the results of a global retail study from Microsoft Advertising and Carat were summarised. The study, that was conducted in March, indicates that the recession (apparently also a factor) and the rapid adoption of digital tools and platforms has changed the purchasing behaviour in retail sectors. I believe that this has been happening for much longer.

Quite simply put, the report looked at the way in which different ‘media touch points’ influence the buying behaviour of the consumer and found the complexity of the ways in which people gather pre-sales, sales and post-sales information and discuss their purchases with others. Therefore, it concludes, the conventional funnel from awareness to sale has changed

Econsultancy provides similar examples to mine: the article explains how consumers can first learn of a product via a tweet or a link on a social network, then search for the product online or for example consult product reviews.  In the study the importance of offline word-of-mouth is further emphasized and it is pointed out that there is a “complex experience” on the road to a purchase.

What it comes down to is the following: there is nothing new under the sun, the reality of the consumer is multi-channel and therefore our marketing must also be so (a plea, again, to take part in “social media marketing” in the broadest sense) but maybe most of all: please look further to the direct lead and the attribution of a lead of sale to a specific medium. This does not only entail interactive marketing but also PR for example.

The non-linear buying behaviour and the limits of the funnel metaphor have existed for a long time; they are only becoming clearer and more pressing as we move further in the direction of a cross and multi-channel reality. What can you do about this as a company? Starting by integrating and looking further to what our dashboards say from the individual medium, channel and campaign perspective.