How to tell what’s good value?

GETTING GOOD VALUE

It’s an odd truism of the world of advertising that for years we’ve struggled to be certain about how much value campaigns are adding. Just as years ago marketers all agreed that 50% of their advertising was wasted, it’s fair to say that most of us still can’t be completely sure exactly which 50%.

You can blame the media if you like, what with their TV audience figures based on people filling out diaries or readership figures based on people who had “looked at” a magazine or newspaper. But any of us entrusted with our organisation or clients money really need to step up to the plate in establishing a robust process for testing value and effectiveness before we recommend the spend.

I’d like to think we have come a long, long way from the dark days of the DM boom, where scientific types could create a spreadsheet to show that a 3% response was all that was needed to produce a positive return on investment. Famously, one of the UK’s biggest banking institutions prided themselves on their 5-7% response to DM campaigns. Until someone from the mail house let on that about half the responses were from people asking the bank to “leave them alone” (or words to that effect)…

Fast forward 20 years and we’re in a world where someone with a feedback score of under 97% on EBay looks untrustworthy. Where people tweet their anger at an ATM not working and where a new product like “Ello” can build a fanbase in the millions  just by saying “Hi! We’re not Facebook”.

Marketers today have no excuse for not using robust and proven tools for assessing the value a promotion or campaign adds. Never has it been easier to benchmark and forecast against real value adding principles. and never has it been easier to follow that up with a well targeted piece of work that delivers value in spades, for consumers and the client.

I’m currently working on a few projects for Government departments helping them to work out how to measure value and how to benchmark investment in marketing. I’m looking at events like exhibitions and pop up stores and also establishing a model for assessing the value of sponsorship.

There’s no one size fits all solution, but if you want to know more, give us a call, pleased to help.

Oh and to confirm, I’m not Facebook either. Done. Should have a million followers by tomorrow…