Oldest Engagement Wins

Oldest Engagement Wins is a program group structure that decides which program in the group runs when a customer converts. Only one program in a group runs per conversion, and this structure picks the program whose collaborators had the earliest engagement with the customer.

This operates at the group selection level, not inside an individual program. Once Siren picks the winning program, that program’s own structure takes over to determine which collaborators get paid and how much.

How it works

Suppose a group contains a lead-generation affiliate program and a sales-closer program. A customer clicks a lead-gen affiliate’s link in January and lands on a blog post. Months later in April, a sales rep in the closer program walks the same customer through a demo and the customer converts. When the conversion fires, Siren looks at the oldest engagement across both programs. The January click is older than the April demo, so the lead-gen program runs and the closer program sits out for this sale.

If the customer had converted with no prior engagement, only the closer program’s engagement would exist and that program would run instead.

Where this works

This structure is the right choice when you want to credit the program whose collaborators originated the lead, not the one that closed the sale. It’s useful for paying affiliates who bring in top-of-funnel traffic even when a separate sales or closer program eventually seals the deal.

The first-touch referral program recipe is built around this selection model. Pair it with a closer program in the same group and the referral program wins any conversion where the referral came first, while the closer program only runs on customers with no prior referral.

When to avoid this

If the most recent touchpoint is the one driving the purchase decision (coupons, last-click ads, closers), use Newest Engagement Wins instead.

This structure also isn’t a fit if you want both programs in the group to pay out on the same sale. Program groups force mutual exclusivity by design, so if lead-gen and closers should both be compensated for every conversion, run them as separate ungrouped programs.