Last-click attribution is being phased out in favor of a machine learning-based strategy at Google.

Google has stated that it is upgrading its ad attribution approach to provide marketers with more accurate, precise, and privacy-centric measurements. Instead of relying solely on a customer's most recent contact, Google Ads will use machine learning to evaluate data from all stages of the conversion funnel. The move marks a departure from what is known as "last-click" attribution models, and it demonstrates the tech giant's commitment to user data privacy. Google has revealed that its attribution methodology for advertisers is being updated.

Google Ads' vice president and general manager of buying, analytics, and measurement, Vidhya Srinivasan, says the company would abandon last-click attribution in favor of "data-driven attribution."

While last-click attribution reveals which touchpoint a client interacted with most recently before making a purchase, Google's new framework employs machine learning to evaluate anything from conversion rates to ways to improve automated bidding in the advertising buying process.

Even though Google's advertising team already offers this data-driven attribution model, it was previously unavailable to all advertisers due to minimum data requirements and conversion type restrictions. According to Google's statement today, minimum data limits will be removed, and data-driven attribution will be available to all marketers in Google Ads starting in October.

As he explained in today's article, the changing privacy environment impacted Srinivasan's choice to switch to data-driven attribution. Consumers increasingly demand that large internet corporations protect their data, pushing companies like Google and Apple to implement new policies and tools that give them more control over how their information is used.

Unfortunately, many enhancements, such as Google's Federated Learning of Cohorts (FLoC) and Apple's AppTrackingTransparency (ATT), make it more difficult for marketers to understand user-level behavioral patterns, engage audiences in targeted ways, and track ROI.

Google argues that its new data-driven attribution protects users' privacy while giving marketers the tools they need to analyze their campaigns. On the other hand, Google claims that on both fronts, last-click attribution is getting increasingly inefficient.

What is data-driven attribution, and how does it work?

According to Google, data-driven attribution analyses signals across the whole customer journey — not just the last touchpoint — and delivers a more masked picture of user-level data, resulting in more privacy. Simultaneously, the company says that the new model can improve ad performance by assessing all "relevant data" about interactions that result in a conversion. The new machine learning-powered methodology evaluates everything from the time between interactions to conversion to ad forms. Furthermore, Srinivasan claims that Google Ads evaluates holdback test results to increase the accuracy of its algorithms.

When combined with automated bidding strategies, the model's ability to "better predict the incremental impact a specific ad will have on driving conversions, and adjust bids accordingly to maximize...ROI," "data-driven attribution can drive additional conversions at the same cost-per-acquisition," according to today's announcement.

Google's data-driven attribution resulted in "an 18 percent cut in the cost of sales over last-click," according to Lara Harter, head of online marketing at DocMorris, as stated in today's post.

The new attribution approach will be expanded to incorporate more interactions, such as offline and in-app conversions, which is already in place for Google Search, Shopping, Display, and YouTube commercials. Starting next month, the new attribution model will be the default in Google Ads; however, users will still have the option of choosing from five different attribution models.

In addition, the company aims to integrate data-driven attribution into Google Analytics 4 in the coming weeks and give other privacy-focused admeasuring tools and products, according to a statement shared with The Drum.

These changes will be expanded across to Google Ads', enhanced conversions, and engaged-view conversions, which allow advertisers to track conversions that occur within days after viewing a specific advertisement for 10 seconds or more.

Google declined to respond to a request for comment on the subject.