Posts filed under 'ROI & Effectivness'
October 14th, 2008
An often overlooked aspect of marketing is tracking the results of a media campaign. Too often companies skip this step all together. There are many reasons, but one we hear most often is: There haven’t been many ways to measure an ad campaign across all of these media at once. The reason for this is because traditionally, marketers measured the reach of ads one medium at a time. For TV, it generally was Nielsen; for radio, Arbitron; newspapers and magazines report circulation figures; while the Internet shows hits and page views and other traffic data.
Good news… A small media research company called Integrated Media Measurement released a new technology that measures consumers’ exposure to the audio in ads on television, radio, computers, mobile phones, DVDs and inside a movie theatre — using a consumer’s cellphone.
October 14th, 2008
The state of Michigan had great success this summer with its award-winning “Pure Michigan” advertising campaign. Last weekend I traveled to Frankenmuth, MI, “Michigan’s Little Bavaria,” for the Fall Leadership Conference of the American Advertising Federation District 6 and heard a keynote presentation about the campaign from Mark Canavan, Senior VP, Group Creative Director, McCann-Worldgroup, Detroit, who let us in on some of the creative secrets behind the campaign.
The “Pure Michigan” campaign features stunning photography and videography, strong script writing with narration by Michigan native, Tim Allen, reading with an emotional delivery completely unlike Buzz Lightyear, that evokes memories of happy vacations past, whether they took place in Michigan or not. Each spot tells a story and concludes by telling the consumer, “Your trip begins at Michigan.org.” Here are some examples:
Click here for an overview of the whole campaign.
Shallow Messages for Shallow Media…Deep Messages for Deep Media
Too often I see local ads that try to cram all of an advertiser’s products and services into a :30 or :60 second commercial. The strength of the “Pure Michigan” campaign lies in the focus on a single story. The spots do not rattle off a bullet list of unique selling propositions, but instead pique consumer interest with a captivating story, then drive customers to the web site where they can learn all they need to know.
A colleague of mine advises his clients, “shallow messages for shallow media, deep messages for deep media.” His point is, media is space, whether columns in a newspaper, or time on radio. The smaller the space the shallower the media. Shallow media require shorter messages.
Billboards are perhaps the shallowest media, because space is limited and the message must be fully understood by a consumer within a second or two at 70 miles per hour.
Newspaper ads, radio and TV spots are somewhat deeper.
Your company website is the deepest medium available for advertising today. Space for ad copy, photos and video is virtually unlimited. Customers can download documents, sign up for more marketing info and purchase your products online. And all visits can be tracked with all sorts of visitor data.
The ability to leverage your traditional radio, TV or newspaper ad with your company website results in a less cluttered, more engaging, and more entertaining production with more direct sales and better understanding of the effectiveness of your campaign. Use shallow media, billboard, newspaper, TV, radio, to capture attention with one single story, then drive the consumer to your web site for all the details.
October 7th, 2008
Supporting a cause - breast cancer research in October, Breast Cancer Awareness Month, for example - gives everyone the warm fuzzies. Cause-related marketing will not only make you & your employees feel good about making a difference but it also should increase your sales.
Nationally, consumers (particularly “Millenials,” those aged 18 to 24) are much more likely to recall ads that support a cause. And the data suggests that the benefits transcend mere recall rates - consumers are also much more likely actually buy those products and brands that support a good cause. Up to 78% of people said they would switch brands if that company supported a cause they believed in, which is a pretty stunning number.
Consumers tend to be very brand loyal; I bet you still use the same toothpaste brand that you used when you were a kid. The fact that more than three-quarters of people said they’d switch - and did switch, according to a secret shopper type survey conducted by Duke University - is huge. And it doesn’t matter where the purchase is made. These same types of results were replicated both in person at mock convenience stores and at online outlets by survey participants.
There is a caveat, however. The majority of people said they want more information about how the money is used by companies by demanding more transparency.
So pick a cause, any cause. Ideally, it would be something you personally believe in and is related to your business. For example, a tire store could donate part of its profits to Mothers Against Drunk Driving or a florist could donate to a local environmental group. But make sure you’re clear on how the money is used and follow-through on your promise. My guess is you, your employees, your customers and the group you choose to support will all be happy you did.
September 17th, 2008
Print ads get the short end of the stick. They’re not hip and flashy. They don’t have commenting available or mash-up possibilities without a lot of cutting and glue sticking. Plus, they’re in magazines which are, like, so old-school. But in study after study, magazines are shown to have remarkable staying power. So despite the doom and gloom, print ads are here to stay.
Below are some of the best print ads from this past summer as judged by MRI Starch Communications, which specializes in print advertising research. Divided into 12 categories, 694 one- and two-page print ads were researched and scored based on how many people remembered the ad and how many read at least half of it. MRI Starch calls this their “engagement score.”
Here are the top performers in 4 of the 12 categories (click here to see them all on the Ad Age site). You don’t have to be a national advertiser with a two-page Sports Illustrated spread to capitalize on some of these design ideas in your next campaign, either. Take a look and see what you can co-opt for your next masterpiece.
Category: Dairy, Produce, Meat and Bakery Goods
Why it works: Good-looking people, strong imagery with the flag and white uniforms, and the models are looking right at the reader (try and move around the room while looking at them - do their eyes follow you too??).
Category: Cosmetics and Beauty Ads
Why It Works: Celebs looking pretty.
Category: Medicines & Proprietary Remedies
Why It Works: Color. Blazing, bold color.
Category: Retail
Why It Works: Um, hello? Coupon? Everyone likes to save money, plus a single, slightly tweaked, image provides a focal point with minimal copy.
(This was the ad with the highest “engagement score” in the survey)
Category: Automotive, Automotive Accessories and Equipment
Why It Works: Can’t miss the headline, eh? Bold font choice, aggressive setting of the SUV picture.
August 25th, 2008
At the end of a multi-billion dollar feeding frenzy of hyperbole, nobility, triumph and agony, the Advertising Games that propped up the Beijing Olympics are closed. Was it worth it? The majority say no.
If you believe some polling data, the only 3 advertisers who actually reaped any sort of return on their investment were Visa, Coca-Cola and McDonald’s. TNS Media reports:
“Unaided brand awareness for ads seemed surprisingly low with over 52% of Olympic viewers surveyed unable to recall any brands advertised during Olympic programming.”
People were much more likely to recall the advertisers if they were “very interested” in the Olympics…the less interested viewers were in the Games, the less they recalled the advertisers…which only makes sense. Read more about advertisers’ ROI here.
There were some notably GOOD ads, including these from Chevy and GE:
There were some pretty BAD ads too, including this one from Exxon Mobil, a company that tried to re-brand itself as a benevolent force fighting malaria in the Third World, but I don’t think anyone changed their minds about high gas prices and record oil profits through this ad:
Here is the critique from the New York Times’ advertising columnist, who opines about which ads were good, bad or ugly.
Which were your favorites?
August 11th, 2008
Wow. The Opening Ceremonies were unbelievable, weren’t they? NBC Universal thinks so too - seeing the highest rated Opening Ceremonies ever for a non-American Summer Games. It had 19% more viewers than Athens four years ago and 16% more than Sydney eight years ago - and averaged 34.2 million viewers.
With what it paid for the Games ($894 million) NBC Universal is counting on a huge number of eyeballs via myriad platforms…and so are their advertisers, who are financing the games with an estimated $1 billion ad buy. I’m wondering if any local advertisers that signed on for the Olympics will see much return on their investment - ADWire will attempt to check in with them in the coming days and report back.
As far as the ads themselves: Meh. Some were good; others just OK. The Budweiser spot was kind of heavy-handed in its “I Am America” theme - perhaps to blunt the effect of their recent buyout by a Belgium brewery?? My 3-year-old son particularly liked this one from Coca-Cola (Cartoon Birds = toddler fascination):
August 6th, 2008
Hard to believe that Back to School is here. For “Tweens” (kids 10 to 14), that means online search. If you’re advertising your back-to-school products, your ads must be online and your site must be optimized.
Tweens are most vocal in purchases of apparel, electronics, telecommunication services and products and other consumer packaged goods according to Performics, a market research firm (see their survey results here). More than half reported using the Internet to compare products and prices before suggesting back-to-school purchases to their parents.
In addition to online advertising, you would be well-served (regardless of your industry) to get your website optimized via process called “search engine optimization” or SEO. This process uses key words and other programming tactics to ensure a better ranking on the search engines.
Pet Loader, a client and local company that manufactures and sells portable dog stairs, told me last week they saw TRIPLE the traffic they did prior to doing SEO on their site.
I let our web gurus worry about how to actually do this; all I know is that it’s effective, essential in today’s marketplace and our clients swear by it. Here are two sites to get you started:
A prior ADWire post about how search engines work.
Google Ranking’s “Basics of SEO”
July 30th, 2008
Web-based TV is shoving traditional TV aside quite rudely. A new study on media habits reported in today’s Ad Age is the first that gives real evidence to the theory that people are migrating from traditional TV to Web-based streaming video for entertainment. The study indicates audiences are not “supplementing” but rather replacing the new media for the old. Whoa! That’s huge.
The alarms have been sounding in media shops about the Web, VOD (video on demand) and streaming video for a while now and, the reality is we can no longer count on 3 networks to provide a common American experience or, more to the point, a tremendously huge audience for the product or service your advertising.
And while fragments are bad when it comes to grammar, a fragmented advertising audience means good and bad things.
The good thing about fragmenting an audience is that you can target your message to those people who are really into your message, versus the old-time “Spray and Pray” advertising that only had to promote their products on the 3 networks, on the radio and in newspapers and in magazines.
Example - You’re more likely to see a high ROI for an ad promoting San Diego’s Comic Con if you placed it prior to an exclusive Battlestar Galactica podcast (and as an aside, BSG was seriously robbed by those Emmy people) than you would if you ran it on the evening news or during an episode of “America’s Got Talent.”
The bad thing is that we ad professionals need to work harder. It takes more time, more research and more creativity to reach an audience these days. The other negative with a fragmented audience is there is little chance you or your advertising agency can keep up with all the different niches. You will, be definition, be missing some. The web and its real-time communications also means that a chat board that LOVES your product at 10 am may be in full revolt by 11:35 am because a few negative posts by unsatisfied (or just malicious) customers.
It’s a whole new frontier, one where herding the audience will make or break your ad campaign as much as your message and your creative.
Giddyup!
July 2nd, 2008
Few things have given advertisers the willies more than DVRs (digital video recorders), TiVo and the reality that consumers can now fast-forward through the commercial breaks with ease and aplomb. But data released Monday by TiVo seems to indicate that well-made, engaging TV commercials will continue to be seen by consumers.
In May, the top 4 most-seen commercials by TiVO viewers watching “timeshifted” broadcast TV (meaning they hit “play” on their TiVo instead of “fast forward” and actually watched them) were presented by:
Other marketing segments that saw good viewership of their commercials by TiVo users were Nasonex (my guess is that cute bee voiced by Antonio Banderas drew them in), SC Johnson & Son Inc., American Express, Thompson’s Water Seal (which reminds me it’s time for me to seal my deck too), Macy’s (Usher, Martha Stewart and Donald Trump making fun of his own hair), and Honda Trucks/Pilot SUV.
The results show that good commercials will get seen…but also shows that the more mundane commercials timed just right (allergy nose spray is a huge seller in May, as is deck sealant) will capture viewers’ attention.
The study also showed that simply placing your commercial within a popular program doesn’t mean it’ll get seen by a larger audience. Grey’s Anatomy, for example, is a huge ratings hit…but it also is one of the top “timeshifted” shows and viewers hit fast-forward on the vast majority of the commercials within those episodes.
So, despite the Chicken Little fears of the DVR and TiVo among advertising types (full disclosure - I love, love, love, love my TiVo and will watch commercials if they’re interesting), it all comes down to good content and consumers’ desire to hear your message - if you have both of those, you’re golden.
June 2nd, 2008
Today’s Advertising Age published a story that shows conclusively that when it comes to advertising, a good media mix of online, television, radio and print will produce a better return than using one vehicle exclusively.
In a survey of 25,000 consumers done by national media-tracking firm Advertising Perceptions, results showed consumers were more inclined to buy products when they saw a particular brand across media channels. So effective is a mix of media that most product categories studied showed at least a 20% increase in consumers who said they “intend to buy” the products that they had seen in multiple media channels.
For example:
- online and TV viewers were 27% more likely to intend to buy beer than those who viewed TV alone
- 22% more likely to intend to buy apparel than TV viewers alone and
- 21% more likely to intend to buy consumer electronics than TV viewers alone.
Here’s a visual that is pretty convincing:
It seems clear that online advertising must be part of any marketing plan these days, along with a good mix of other vehicles. Each type of advertising channel - TV, radio, print, online - have their advantages and drawbacks, but each makes multiple contact points with your customers.
I could write on this topic exclusively every day for the next year and not cover all the nuances of media buying and placement. Long story short, mix it up in your marketing plan. And don’t just rely on one channel to carry your company’s message.
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