Amazon Attribution Timeframes: What you need to know

If you have been running Amazon PPC for a while, you have probably noticed one thing: you check the ACoS from three days ago in your Ads console. The next day, you check again, but suddenly the ACoS for the same day has changed and a sale has been added. But how is it possible that it still changes after such a long time?

What you have just experienced is the so-called Conversion Delay on Amazon. This means that Amazon attributes a supposedly organic purchase that occurs today to an advertising campaign in the past.

What you must urgently consider in your optimization routine is that you should never optimize your campaigns in real-time. What you see as an unprofitable day today could look completely different a week later.

Responsible for this are the so-called Amazon attribution windows and the resulting conversion delay. In short: a purchase today can be attributed to a campaign from three days ago. But let's go into detail.

The Attribution Model of Amazon

Before we take a closer look at the Amazon attribution windows, you need to understand Amazon's attribution model. Amazon uses the last-click model.

In detail, this means that a purchase will be attributed to the campaign on the day when the last click occurred. There is a very specific reason for this.

Because especially on Amazon, the phenomenon is very common that customers add an item to the shopping cart and essentially "park" it there, only completing the purchase later. There are many reasons for this. Maybe there is currently no room in the budget for the expense, one wants to wait until the salary is in the account, or one does not have Prime and is collecting items for a free shipping order.

The result is that the customer may click on your ad today, but completes the purchase tomorrow or three days later. You must not evaluate your performance on a daily basis.

Example:

A customer clicks on a PPC ad on Monday and adds the product to the shopping cart, where it remains for the time being. On Friday, the customer completes the purchase. Therefore, the purchase takes place on Friday but is attributed to the PPC campaign for Monday.

Last-click also means that the campaign that was last clicked is attributed to the purchase. So if the customer clicks on multiple campaigns in a row, the purchase will be attributed to the campaign with the last click.

Now that you know that the data of your ads in the advertising console does not appear in real-time, we can focus on the core of Amazon attribution windows.

What are the Amazon attribution windows?

Basically, the attribution window describes the time period during which a purchase can be attributed to a campaign click.

Example:

Attribution window of 7 days means: If the customer clicks today and makes a purchase anytime within the next 7 days, the purchase will be attributed to today's click. If the purchase occurs on the 10th day, it will no longer be attributed.

With an attribution window of 30 days, the purchase would be attributed to the 10th day instead.

So you see: The longer the attribution period chosen, the more sales can be attributed to the campaign.

At Amazon, there are different attribution windows for different advertising formats:

• Sponsored Products: 1 Day, 7 Days, 14 Days, 30 Days

• Sponsored Display: 1 day, 7 days, 14 days, 30 days

• Sponsored Brands / Sponsored Brands Video: 14 days

In the Ads console, however, only the following attribution windows are displayed:

• Sponsored Products: 7 Days

• Sponsored Display: 7 Days

• Sponsored Brands / Sponsored Brands Video: 14 days

But here too there are differences.

In Sponsored Products and Sponsored Display, the campaign purchase is attributed to the day the click occurred. In Sponsored Brands, however, the campaign purchase is attributed to the day of the purchase.

How you can use different attribution windows for your analysis

From the performance of different Amazon attribution windows, you can see how your customers' purchasing behavior is.

For example, if the assigned purchases for 1D, 7D, 14D, and 30D are approximately equal, this means that almost all customers buy directly within the first 24 hours.

However, if you see that more purchases are attributed to 7D than to 1D, it indicates that many customers make their purchases between the 2nd and 7th day after clicking.

This is especially important for products where the customer does not buy directly, but takes longer to make their purchasing decision.

Are there differences between sellers and vendors?

In short: yes. There are different Amazon attribution windows to consider for sellers and vendors. The ones we mentioned above apply to sellers.

If you are a Vendor, the 7-day window does not apply to Sponsored Product Ads. In this case, you will have an attribution window of 14 days. This means you can only assess your performance accurately after two weeks.

What you need to consider when optimizing

Now you know the different Amazon attribution windows and the conversion delay they cause. You also understand why Amazon uses attribution. But what are the specific implications for your work now?

Your most important learning should be that you must not consider your performance data as real-time data. If you filter the last seven days of your data in your Ads console, then this data is only of limited significance. Not all conversions are correctly assigned, nor have all possible purchases even occurred.

So you should consider the Amazon attribution timeframes in your optimization workflows. Either choose a longer time period, such as the last 30 days, or completely hide the attribution windows accordingly. This way, your data will not be distorted by the conversion delay.

So never adjust your bids based on the latest data, but always on the basis of data that is not affected by the conversion delay. This way, you work effectively and can achieve significantly better results.

Which attribution window should I use?

Utilize the attribution window, which covers approximately 80-90% of the generated revenue, for optimization.

Example 1:

Revenue by attribution periods:

• 1D ... 1,000€

• 7 days ... 1,100€

• 14 days ... 1,150 euros

• 30 days ... 1,200 euros

Here it can be clearly seen that 80% of the revenue is generated in the first 24 hours. You should use the 1D attribution window for optimization in this case.

Example 2:

Revenue by attribution windows:

• 1D ... 300€

• 7 days ... 1,900€

• 14 days ... 2,000€

• 30 days ... 2,000€

Here it can be seen that only about 15% of the revenue is generated in the first 24 hours after the click. 95% of the revenue occurs by the end of the 7th day. Only 5% of the revenue is generated after the 7th day. You should use the 7D attribution window for optimization in this case.

Faster PPC optimization through attribution time period analysis

The shorter your chosen attribution window is, the earlier you can optimize your PPC bids.

If you choose, for example, the 1-day attribution window, you can already optimize the results of a campaign the day after tomorrow.

However, you can also optimize earlier with longer Amazon attribution windows. For this, you simply need to estimate the remaining sales and calculate the correct ACoS from that.

Example:

You know from past data that 80% of revenue is generated within the first 24 hours, so you choose the 1-day attribution window.

Now you would be missing 20% of the revenue and the ACoS would also be correspondingly worse.

Therefore, you now need to increase the revenue by these missing 20% and then you will get the "correct" ACoS, based on which you can optimize your bids.

This approach is already a kind of "predictive bidding" strategy and requires a lot of expertise. Of course, it is always associated with the risk that the assumed revenue may ultimately not be correct, leading to incorrect bid optimization. But with this example, we simply want to show you what is possible.

By the way, you can easily analyze the different attribution windows in Sellerfox.

Conclusion

Today you learned about the Amazon attribution windows and their importance for optimizing your campaigns. If you do not consider them, you will make decisions based on the wrong foundation. A mistake that could cost you important revenue.

If you are looking for effective support for analyzing your performance data on Amazon, you should definitely check out Sellerfox! Here you will get all the important data you need to effectively measure your performance in one place. Both at the marketplace, product, and keyword level. Just take a look into it. Open Beta Pure and convince yourself!