What to do with all that advertising data

So with newspapers dying and even banner ads becoming problematic, it's astounding that most marketers still don't measure. Sure, you may have metrics in silos -- CTRs on the web, GRPs in broadcast, CPMs in print -- but typically each marketing silo is tweaked independently for performance.

Could you be missing the big picture?


The table above shows just this -- a $1 million advertising schedule that is kicking off about 80% in return. What's that, you say? The return seems to vary in each line? Well, of course. If you grouped your advertising media into 10 equal buckets (called "Media Groups" above) based on their performance in generating sales, you almost always find a 20-to-1 range in what works. Media Group 1 above performs horribly, losing money. Media Group 10 is rocking.

If this were an investment, you'd call your broker and say buddy, move my money around to what works. Kind of like this ...


Much better. We're still investing $1 million in advertising, but now the total return has jumped from 80% to 204%. We're making more than $2 million in return instead of just $795,000.

We didn't spend a dime more. We just made measurement meaningful.

So here's a question for your marketing team. Are you caught looking at CTRs and conversion rates and CPMs and GRPs and reach and frequency, and not doing a damn thing about it? In this economy, it may be time to rebalance your entire investment portfolio.

Find more thoughts on ad measurement in our whitepaper here.