If brands can measure and understand market data at speed, the results will be abundant, says Christopher Sparks. But first they must master technology
In theory it is a simple formula: right consumer + right message + right time = right result. Technology continues to inch us ever closer, making this formula a measurable reality. Engineers and data scientists are continuously coming up with new ways to cluster audiences autonomously and deliver a brand’s message through a dynamic mechanism at scale. This is amazing, considering that just a few years ago, targeting meant that you planned based on the affinity of an audience for a TV program.
What is troubling is that technological solutions have lagged behind in the most important part of this equation: the right result. There is an old saying: “If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” I find it interesting that in a time that marketing dollars are ever more scrutinised, we still rely upon a patchwork of methodologies to link investment to sale. Advertisers are most likely estimating their return through brand impact studies or different modelling exercises, neither of which keeps pace with the decision-making of the consumer. Today, consumers are highly connected and expect an experience that is more responsive and more relevant. Without the ability to understand real consumer behaviour, it limits the advertisers’ ability to provide the experience that a consumer desires.
In 2016, we as an industry should not continue to accept the current practices; rather we need to push ourselves beyond the norms to find solutions to the barriers that block us from a greater understanding of real consumer behaviour. I believe that there are three barriers we need to overcome in order to actually prove the value of our efforts back to various businesses across the region.
The first barrier is the overreliance on claimed data. There are a couple of challenges here. First is the consumption of the advertising itself. I have heard endless debates around how digital data is ‘real’ and offline data is a pure estimate. There is some validity to the discussion, but it misses the bigger challenge. Without understanding of real time – or even near time – consumption across all media is an estimation of the relative impact of each exposure by channel. This forces evaluation of each channel individually or the use of proxy metrics, which leads to the second challenge. Asking consumers questions about their media consumption, a brand, a campaign, their purchase intent, etc. allows for a significant amount of misattribution and can often conclude with no correlation to actual sales. If the goal is to understand behaviour, we must measure actual behaviour.
The second barrier is speed of understanding behaviour. Admittedly, the digital medium has upped our expectations when it comes to understanding and reacting to consumer behaviour. Advertisers want to know how consumers are reacting in order to adjust their decision-making and have success now and not later. However, today we have to wait to collect enough data points to do modelling, have proxy metrics or, even worse, wait for an annual survey that is out of date before you even receive it. Some will argue that consumption behaviours don’t change drastically over time and it would be difficult to optimise across all mediums. Some of that is true, but digital proves that consumers do react differently to different communications and even the slightest adjustments can have an impact on the campaign. Now imagine having a similar understanding and opportunity across media and it’s hard to imagine any advertiser turning down such an opportunity.
I believe that technology can solve these two problems. In fact, this is what technology does best. It provides feedback on behaviour and does so with speed. At Starcom, we are working hard with tech companies from around the globe to either develop or import solutions to our region. We have been encouraged by some of the initial thinking and the opportunities it provides to understand behaviour in near time. We have also been encouraged by the support of industry partners in the region and discouraged by the reluctance of others.
This brings me to the final barrier, namely industry action. When we talk to senior-level clients, other agency partners and media suppliers, one of the biggest frustrations is the lack of true actionable data. The reality is that it will remain a frustration until enough people are hungry enough to change the situation. In no way am I underestimating the difficulty of the solution. I realise that behavioural understanding is hard to begin with and it is even harder when you are trying to solve it across several countries with different regulations and agendas. Yet leaders of this industry should push behind the difficulties and develop a solution that will benefit all parties. Just imagine a scenario where agencies are able to provide better recommendations and be agile in optimisations. Suppliers would be able to understand their strengths and weaknesses compared with all other mediums. Clients would get a much clearer picture of their return on investment. And consumers… well, they would get the experience they desire from the brands. Unfortunately this is a barrier that technology cannot solve. The only solution is pure effort and willingness to invest in a better future.
Christopher Sparks is the Client managing director at Starcom