Interesting news from Microsoft...

"The 'last ad clicked' is an outdated and flawed approach because it essentially ignores all prior interactions the consumer has with a marketer's message," said Brian McAndrews, senior vice president of the Advertiser & Publisher Solutions (APS) Division at Microsoft.

"Our Engagement Mapping approach conveys how each ad exposure -- whether display, rich media or search, seen multiple times on multiple sites and across many channels -- influenced an eventual purchase. We believe it represents a quantum leap for advertisers and publishers who are seeking to maximise their online spends."

This is an interesting move as it will see Microsoft's newly purchased Atlas start looking at which ads have been exposed to the consumer along the purchase trail before the conversion took place and reward them accordingly.

"Engagement ROI evaluates and assigns measurable value to a consumer's interaction with ads, giving advertisers and publishers a more complete picture of online behavior."

Part of me is thinking this is just an avenue to help agenices maximise spend through Microsoft (see the bold quote above) will advertisers really care who gets rewarded? surely it will be based on the pure ROI and how that sits against other channels such as ours truly.

At present in my mind with SMEs and some larger brands the 'last click' is often the 'Brand' term in either search or affiliate marketing activity. One would think that anything that helps to reward previous interaction, pre-sell or the initial prompt for the conversion must be a step forward.

Though the main factor for me is how you can 'measure' engagement with an ad? is it the size, position, format or recency, more likely a combination. Additionally how it can be attributed to each channel fairly?

Interestingly there could there be positive or negative consequences for the Affiliate sector depending on individual strategies and how this evolves going forward.

We should be watching the beta and the results which become available before the end of the second quarter very closely.

Thankfully for us Affiliate Marketers we are all about the ROI, and as a channel we should always measure up very well against others.