One of the biggest benefits of Odyssey Attribution is that we are able to extract the raw data from Google Analytics. Meaning you don’t need to install any additional tracking to your website, Odyssey can collect the raw data from your Google Analytics and have your account ready in 24 hours. How, you are asking? Let us explain:
What data does Odyssey need?
Odyssey is a multi-touch attribution tool that analyses customer journeys. Therefore, the first step is to collect data on those customer journeys. To start, we look at every transactionID, as that can be seen as the end of the customer journey and its unique per customer journey. Next, we look at every session that is prior to that transactionID. The source of the sessions provides us with the information on the touchpoint (i.e. Google Paid Search, Facebook or an affiliate). In order to connect these datapoints, we use the field visitorID as the unique identifier.
How does Odyssey get that data from Google Analytics?
Google Analytics 360
When using Google Analytics 360, Odyssey can collect the data from BigQuery. All the data needed is exported by Google to BigQuery and therefore Odyssey can use your current BigQuery dataset. No data or settings in your current Google Analytics or BigQuery setup will be changed, all we need is access.
Google Analytics
When using the free version of Google Analytics, Odyssey is able to collect the required data using the API of your Google Analytics. This means the installation is extremely simple, as all we need is Read & Analyze access to your Google Analytics property. We won’t make any changes to your Google Analytics account, we’ll just use the API of Google to collect the datapoints described above.
What happens with my data?
After collecting the data, Odyssey runs an analysis of the collected data on a daily basis. Then, we only store the daily averages. The raw data stays in your BigQuery (when using GA360), or gets deleted (when you aren’t using GA360).
Historical and granular data
Because of this integration with your Google Analytics, Odyssey is also able to collect historical data from your account. On top of that, Odyssey uses the UTM parameters. Therefore, we can show data as granular as utm_content.
What if we could re-start affiliate marketing?
The lack of a proper attribution model within the industry is actually more or less how we got to the first version of Odyssey. However, there are more topics in which I believe the affiliate industry is completely missing the point.
How to include costs and revenue in your attribution model?
It's important to see which marketing channels drive most of the value, but if these channels cost you a fortune, you don't want to spend all your marketing budget there. Therefore, including both costs and revenue in your MTA model is essential.
How to start with marketing attribution?
The most important reasons for the slow adaptation of marketing attribution among marketers are complexity, a misunderstanding about what AI could do and Google's domination of the digital marketing industry in general.
