MarketingProfs has a rather elementary look at “Five Marketing Trends” aimed at the brand-centric CMO in a post today.

However, one highlight that should raise eyebrows for the performance and affiliate marketing folks has to do with the “zig-zag experience through the online and offline worlds” on the way to a purchasing decision/action…

Strategy – Five Marketing Trends That Only a CMO Contemplating Career Suicide Would Ignore : MarketingProfs Article: “Get ready. You’re going to need to understand that each customer’s day is a zig-zag experience through the online and offline worlds. Customers no longer have simply offline or simply online experiences; they have integrated brand experiences.”

The affiliate world has been engaged with the question of who should be paid for a sale/referral on the path to purchase. There are very good points both pro and con for switching from the traditional last-referrer-paid model to a more holistic approach.

Nonetheless, this conversation will inevitably bubble up again as we draw closer to Affiliate Summit in January (I’ll see you there for the first time in a while, btw). My two cents… let’s innovate and move towards a model that actually encourages more growth in the affiliate model and moves us away from an ideology of referrals that is stuck in 2001.

It is no secret that the online marketing (and online world in gneral) webscape(s) have changed greatly since 2007-2008 when this conversation really raged on the affiliate forums. The technology of lead and sale delivery continues to improve and the technology of tracking those leads and sales also continues to improve with better pixel tracking, deeper analytics and richer understandings of traffic sources.

It’s time to leave the question behind and move towards a more accurate future in affiliate marketing.