Archive for the ‘Marketing Measurement’ Category

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TV Matters, Or Does It

Youtube’s most recent upfront reignited the debate around the relevance of TV and the much-maligned 30-second spot. Ritson counterbalanced the hyperbole with:

“I think most marketers these days agree that the reports of the death of linear TV have been wildly exaggerated. But nonetheless, we have to accept that a lot of people are watching a lot less linear TV than perhaps they once did,” said Ritson.

“That’s a major problem, especially for big brands who have for decades depended on linear TV to build their brands at the top of the funnel through its enormous reach. And that’s exactly where YouTube plays a wonderful role. As a supplement to linear TV, especially on connected televisions, YouTube provides a brilliant way to restore that reach, particularly among the younger demographics that have proven so difficult in recent years to reach out to.”

While Ritson is right, there are two problems with this.

First, the idea of a “top of the funnel” is antiquated. We are in need of the continuous creation of mental, physical and digital availability for our brands across all stages of the funnel. All buyers buy infrequently. The funnel is a broken metaphor. More to come on that.

Digital mediums – Youtube – plays a critical role in generating that availability. The issue is efficiency, effectiveness and reach. That is where the debate starts. So even if we are watching TV less – much less in my case – does that smaller viewing audience more efficiently and effectively create availability? I can’t recall a single ad or brand I’ve seen on Youtube but can recall brands I’ve seen on TV. Samples of one make for terrible evidence.

Second, drawing two mediums into a compare and delete debate is futile. The reality is all marketers of any quality will be working the media mix for outcomes. It’s not either, or – but rather where to allocate the spend across a mix. As more of us consume formats that move – TV, video, social the real losers will be static media. Not just in terms of the reach and efficiency of that media but also the complexity and cost in making that media work.

What is true is that we must adjust all marketing to reflect the attention span of audiences – short formats for intercepting the “feed” and much longer formats for engagement.

“Six second bumpers and 15-second spots. A smart mix can build a great story … languishing behind is the 30 and its cousin, the 45-second spot, which generate the lowest ROI across all screens … 30-seconds is too complex to automate, too simple to convince. It’s too short if I’ve chosen to engage with it, and it’s far too long if I’m forced to watch it. Consumers tend to skip the platform if they’re faced with the forced 30-second spot. Hence skippable format and the burst of the six second bumper. It’s long enough to grab my attention and over before I have the chance to object.”

The best performing ads, created by only 15 per cent of advertisers, were longer than three minutes, per Hunt.

So, go long, go short – but don’t get trapped in the middle.

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The 10 biggest brands on Facebook

Just look at this list. Personal brands – or people as brands – beat businesses as brands in terms of Facebook. The question here is what makes them “biggest”.

I’m not sure followers or likes are the best of metrics. Sure, they are metrics but should we be really looking at engagement at a deeper level – or revenue? Does their success on Facebook afford them more margin or customer loyalty? I like Joe Tripodi’s ideas for measuring Expressions.

So, in addition to “consumer impressions,” we are increasingly tracking “consumer expressions.” To us, an expression is any level of engagement with our brand content by a consumer or constituent. It could be a comment, a “like,” uploading a photo or video or passing content onto their networks.

It is stunning to me that 33,764,986 like Coke on Facebook… (including me). We’re on our way with some 55,370 people liking CBA.

For more, read… The 10 biggest brands on Facebook- what’s hot and what’s not – TNW Facebook.

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Tracking News In Cyberspace

Interesting read from the NY Times on tracking news in Cyberspace. And more here.

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measuring the big story…

Cleaning out my inbox and came across an email from one of our team on measuring strategic media coverage… In short, based on studying the impact of certain news articles on business results and in stock price you standardize on a definition of stories that have the most impact — call them “Top Stories”.  The performance of these stories then flow into core business metrics… A definition of a Top Story might include that it is proactively driven media coverage — in a strategic outlet — designed to change perception with target audience.  And they might contain the elements below:

  • Proactive
  • On Theme
  • On Target 
  • On Message
  • Third-Party Validated
  • Company spokesperson
  • OTS reach
  • Images

Having a simple but powerful metric in an executive scorecard enforces PR as a key component in the business success mix.  I really like the idea of this particular metric.

Are you working or using anything similar?

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Why 47% of Campaigns Fail and How to Make Sure Yours Succeeds

Jon Beattie of Marker is up at the Future of Online Advertising Conference – he’s put together a great summary of a keynote on why 47% of campaigns fail – a summary of the presentation by Greg Stuart at the Future of Online Advertising conference today in New York. Greg is the former CEO, IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) and co-author of “What Sticks“.

He claims: Over US$112 billion ad spend is wasted out of a total of $295bn – Advertisers and agencies use the excuse of “publicity” to justify a failed campaign.

Here are the three highlights I liked:

  1. Did the campaign message get through? 31% of campaigns failed
  2. Out of 5 advertisers (P&G, J&J, Kraft, Nestle, McDonald’s) that did creative research of online campaigns: 1 was okay; 2 found half didn’t work; 2 all ads failed and had to start again
  3. McDonald’s took 20 per cent from TV put 13.4% into online kept the rest and increased awareness by 5 per cent when it had previously leveled out using traditional media.