Most of the conversation around commerce and mobile wallets has been centered on the distribution of coupons and offers.  

Undoubtedly, coupons and offers will play a key role in the future development of mobile wallets.  Distributing coupons and offers can be quite lucrative; Groupon, for example, boasts over $3 billion in revenues. Coupons and offers are also important elements in driving consumer usage; our experience at Softcard was that our most active users – by far – were those who used merchant offers. But this focus on coupons and offers neglects another hidden, and perhaps more lucrative, commerce model: Attribution.

Attribution is defined as the practice of determining the role that each marketing channel plays in informing and influencing the customer journey. There is an old saying in marketing – “I know half of my advertising budget is wasted, I just don’t know which half!”  In the online world, attribution is relatively straight forward, usually measured based on ad exposures and click-through rates on campaigns.