Page 8 - Communicate

Q1 2018 | ADVERTISING

whole to understand how digital is contributing to
the entire media ecosystem; however, agencies and
advertisers will increasingly face multiple challenges
when trying to achieve this holistic measurement.”
The challenges are obvious. For this cross-channel
measurement to occur, cookies will fade away as
investment in mobile – currently 50 percent of digital
spend – will increase exponentially. However, the
report predicts that more mobile investment will
lead to more “walled gardens” of data and different
systems that agencies and advertisers will have to
navigate, which also means agencies, media owners,
and publishers will have to work together.
In fact, Kantar Millward Brown’s Getting Media
Right report shows that 77 percent of marketers
would increase their investment if they could better
measure cross-channel ROI. In case anyone needed
more motivation.

8. MEDIA ROI WILL BE ABOUT THE JOURNEY.
Isn’t it already? To be fair, media ROI – especially
digital ROI – has moved beyond a tick in the box.
Still, as the report puts it, “it needs to go beyond
simply demonstrating a lift in sales attributed to
consumer exposure to an ad campaign. Relying on
short-term sales lift is too myopic to unleash real,
sustainable, increasing media ROI.”
The report predicts that in 2018, real media
ROI will become a fast-paced iterative journey,
which combines creative (content, not just ads)
more closely with media (partnerships, not just
the moves of currency TV ratings players Nielsen insertion orders and exchanges), with the express
and comScore to incorporate large-scale “census” goal of achieving continuous improvement in sales
set-top-box datasets into their panel-based national and brand outcomes.
and local TV audience ratings estimates, scale While this sounds over ambitious, the report
is the new imperative for measuring consumer highlights the predicted steps to fulfilling this
behavior and ad delivery/effectiveness in the ambition:
modern consumer media ecosystem,” says the 1. Marketers adjust their approaches. Marketers
report. Although these solutions aren’t completely will shift their efforts from designing the perfect
bullet-proof, they are a step in the right direction. cross-platform ROI measurement system to execut-
As stated, “Taking measurement over-the-top is ing content and media tactics that prove to increase
arguably the only viable path toward the grand sales and brand outcomes (aka MTA).
finale – an ideal world of perfect information 2. Media companies share more data. The topic
gathered across all screens and touchpoints, de- of the big walled media gardens is well understood,
livered in real-time.” but the full impact of mobile apps with closed-data
To sum it up, “scale and technology will enable approaches is not. Facebook and Google are ahead
and hasten it – the inexorable tide of consumer of the pack on providing access to data that are
behavior will demand it,” the report states. essential to measure and optimize. The next tier
of mobile apps will follow suit, connecting device
7. CROSS MEDIA – THE $100 MILLION DILEMMA. and ad IDs for more universal measurement.
Indeed. 2017 has been a big year for digital with 3. Agencies crack the code for their brand cli-
big advertisers reconsidering their media pie, ques- ents. Bold planning, breakthrough content, con-
tioning the walled gardens and placing higher ac- tinuously optimized across platforms to achieve
countability on their agencies. With P&G setting ever-increasing levels of sales and brand outcomes.
a strong example, marketers are now relooking This will become table stakes for agencies look-
at their understanding of their digital investment ing to win and retain client relationships. As the
with digital accounting for more than 30 percent linchpins between brands and media companies,
of global share of investment. This is only exacer- agencies are the critical connector to increasing
bated by digital’s omnipresence as more traditional real media ROI.
media, such as print, TV and outdoor, integrate “This is the year where we put our resources
with digital to form new hybrid media channels. where our ROI mouths are, so to speak,” concludes
“Digital is no longer a channel, it is the layer the report. “Unless we’re happy continuing to check
that connects all marketing activities and should separate brand safety, viewability, CTR, brand lift
therefore not be treated as a silo,” states the re- and sales lift boxes. We can (and should) aim to
port. Furthermore, “In 2018 marketers will focus do better and realistically. this shift is necessary
on measuring online and offline advertising as a for the future of the industry.”

8 I Communicate