Highlights
- 63% of healthcare marketers say attribution models fail to capture ROI due to data fragmentation (Deloitte).
- Nonlinear patient journeys and privacy restrictions make single-touch models misleading.
- Boards lose confidence when attribution dashboards can’t connect to contribution margin.
- Shifting from attribution to contribution reframes marketing as a growth driver.
- As Patrick Soto notes: “Attribution in healthcare isn’t broken—it’s just asking the wrong question.”
The Mirage of Perfect Attribution
For more than a decade, healthcare marketers have been promised the holy grail of attribution: a single, elegant model that ties every media dollar to a new patient, a referral, or a procedure. The idea is seductive—especially in a sector under relentless financial pressure. If retailers can follow the clicks, why can’t health systems?
Because healthcare isn’t retail.
Attribution models were built for short consumer cycles with closed data loops. A patient’s decision to seek care is rarely linear. McKinsey research shows that 70% of healthcare decisions involve multiple touchpoints across weeks or months—and yet most models still try to assign the win to a single channel.
Why Attribution Keeps Letting CMOs Down
The failures are consistent, and they’re systemic. Data lives in silos—CRM, EHR, call centers, referral portals—rarely stitched together cleanly. Regulations like HIPAA make cookie-level tracking nearly impossible. Decision cycles stretch weeks or months, with families, physicians, and insurers influencing the choice. Yet many systems still rely on last-click models that disproportionately reward search and undervalue brand-building.
The result? Dashboards that look polished but collapse under executive scrutiny. According to Gartner, 52% of healthcare executives report low confidence in marketing ROI data—a credibility gap that erodes trust at the board level.
Patrick Soto, ab+a’s Managing Partner, frames it this way:
“Attribution in healthcare isn’t broken—it’s just asking the wrong question. Instead of ‘what channel gets credit,’ the question should be ‘what system of brand, access, and referral signals moved the margin?’”
From Attribution to Contribution
The path forward isn’t to perfect attribution—it’s to abandon the illusion of precision. Instead, CMOs must pivot to a contribution mindset. The question shifts from “Which channel gets the credit?” to “How is marketing, as a system, moving outcomes the enterprise cares about?”
Contribution reframes the narrative: a brand campaign may not “own” a conversion, but it can be tied to measurable lifts in search demand, referral inquiries, or patient portal activations. Suddenly, marketing is no longer chasing channel credit—it’s demonstrating enterprise impact.
Building a Better Measurement Playbook
KPI ladders create that clarity. Campaign activity flows to engagement signals, then to patient actions, and ultimately to contribution margin or lifetime value.
Triangulation strengthens the case. A single data point can be debated; multiple sources pointing in the same direction build confidence. Surveys, digital analytics, call volume, and EMR trends layered together paint a picture attribution models can’t capture.
And for more advanced systems, econometric modeling adds heft. According to Bain & Company, organizations that adopt mix modeling see up to 15% stronger ROI on marketing spend—precisely because the models capture long-term and multi-touch effects.
Resetting Expectations with the C-Suite
Perhaps the most important move is expectation-setting. CMOs must be clear: healthcare will never deliver the click-to-conversion precision of e-commerce. The journey is too complex, the data too fragmented, the regulations too strict. But that doesn’t mean marketing impact can’t be proven. It just requires different tools—and a different conversation.
By repositioning marketing measurement around contribution, triangulation, and structured testing, CMOs can walk into boardrooms with confidence.
They’re not defending flawed dashboards. They’re showing how marketing drives patient acquisition, improves retention, reduces leakage, and strengthens the bottom line.
Case in Point
Consider a regional health system under pressure from its board to prove ROI on a $10M media investment. Their attribution dashboard showed 80% of conversions credited to search, making brand campaigns look dispensable.
Instead of defending the flawed model, the CMO reframed. She mapped brand campaigns to measurable lifts in search demand (+30%), referral inquiries (+15%), and patient portal activations (+22%). Then she layered in econometric modeling to show brand’s contribution to margin growth.
This mirrors broader findings:
- Bain & Company reports organizations using econometric modeling achieve 10–15% stronger ROI on marketing spend.
- Deloitte found 63% of healthcare marketers struggle with attribution because fragmented data undermines accuracy.
The lesson is clear. Attribution models may mislead, but contribution-based approaches—anchored in triangulation and financial alignment—restore credibility and protect investment.
Why This Matters Now
Healthcare’s economics are brutal: payer squeeze, workforce costs, and escalating competition. In this environment, “marketing as expense” is an easy target. The only way out is proof. Not attribution fantasies, but contribution models that show how marketing delivers growth and margin.
That’s how CMOs move from cost center to growth steward.
What CMOs Can Do to Strengthen Attribution
- Redefine the Goal: Stop chasing perfect attribution—set the expectation that marketing will prove contribution to growth, not pinpoint credit.
- Build KPI Ladders: Map activity → engagement → patient actions → contribution margin. This gives CEOs/CFOs a line of sight they trust.
- Triangulate Data Sources: Blend surveys, digital analytics, call-center volume, and EMR data. When multiple signals align, confidence increases.
- Pilot and Scale: Use A/B tests or geo-splits to measure impact of specific tactics. Scale only when contribution is validated.
- Educate the C-Suite: Reset expectations with CEOs and CFOs—healthcare isn’t retail. Be transparent about limitations while proving enterprise impact.
