marginally subversive

Engagement Mapping...

Lifting this up from Clickz:

Microsoft's Young-Bean Song began a speech at the MIXX conference in New York yesterday with a beer analogy: Consider a scenario, he said, in which Corona determined to put its whole ad spend toward whatever consumer contact point immediately preceded most of its sales. Its obvious move, according to Song, would be to "put all its marketing budget into neon signs at pubs."

Ridiculous idea, but Song, who is VP of analytics in Microsoft's Advertiser and Publisher Solutions group, argues most digital marketers assign credit in just that fashion -- with search, affiliate marketing, and other sources of lower-funnel clicks grabbing more recognition than they rightly should.

Microsoft wants them to think more holistically. A new study based on advertisers' use of the company's Engagement Mapping product argues for a model where more credit goes to high-funnel channels like special interest sites and ad networks. The data, drawn from 500 advertisers that are using the fledgling tool, do indeed show that marketers given the choice to assign greater value to those channels do so.

Broken down by channel, Microsoft found that under its attribution regime, vertical content sites and ad networks gain credit for conversions. Meanwhile, the median search buy loses 7 percent credit for conversions among those using Engagement Mapping.

Furthermore, Microsoft research indicates navigational search is responsible for a large portion of click behavior. Sixty percent of total sponsored search clicks specify the precise name of a brand advertiser, or even an exact URL. And search clickers exposed to display advertising were 22 percent more likely to produce a sale than those who weren't exposed.

Engagement is one of those words that somehow get me going.  Not in a good way.  Really.

For some reason, the "word" just rubs me the wrong way.  It is so fuzzy a concept - and because the concept is fuzzy, it cannot be measured.  Not yet, at least.

I have seen presentations from clients directing their creative and media company-partners to "engage" the consumers, or create ads and plans that "engage" consumers.  But what does that really mean?  Does that mean "surprise" consumers?  "Delight" consumers?  "Amuse" consumers?  "Entertain" consumers?  "Transform" consumers into brand recallers - or brand ambassadors?

I have also seen presentations from media companies - both from the planning and the ad-space side - defining "engagement" in various ways.  Some see it as "time-spent" with a medium.  Some define it as "compo" - i.e., % rating against a target group divided by the % rating against the entire population (that's affinity to some).

Some have come up with more complicated ways. 

(Well, I did try coming up with one for magazines in Singapore a few years ago, when I included several variables - AIRs, time-spent per issue, average % of the issue read, average number of times re-read, response indication, and magazine-brand image associations - and rolled it into one score using some *secret sauce* I learned from IRT and psych-testing in the university; I was told that it was too complex.  But I am not giving up hope.  Was I measuring "engagement"?  Not sure.  The goal was to come up with a new currency - tick that box.  But did it get accepted?  Hmm.  Leave that tickbox blank.  Haha.)

So is Microsoft finally on to something with Engagement Mapping?  Its methodology is unclear to me just yet - here's what the article said about the Microsoft methodology:

It assigns more or less weight to different ad impressions based on factors like frequency, recency, and ad size. Larger ad units get more credit, as do video and rich media. More frequently and recently delivered ads are also given greater influence. Advertisers can also tweak the dials on Atlas's interface to assign greater influence to those Web publishers and ad formats it deems most powerful.

I think they may be on the right path - but if it is indeed Engagement, then there should be a component of a response, right?  It may be circular, I know - using 'behavior' as part of the engagement construct in order to predict behavior.  But that just might work.

Perhaps, if they added more variables: frequency, recency, ad quality (not just ad-size), ad version (say, is it more creative than the rest?), context and environment synergies, and historical response - it just might work.

But then again, the question remains: Exactly what is Engagement?  And as a media planner, or an advertiser, or a brand manager, what do I do with it?  Can I buy it and plan it?  Can I relate it with sales and put a dollar value on it?

Hmm.

I think Engagement will remain to be one of my most favorite, fuzzy words.

 

A Flickr Photo from Rubyran

Enough with the purchase funnel!

I have had it with the Purchase Funnel.  I don't want to see any Purchase Funnel ever again.

OK.  That's stretching it a bit.  But seriously, do people still use the purchase funnel?  I know it's one of the key metrics in CRM/DM.  But there must be a better way of presenting data - or a concept, for that matter - beyond the usual funnels and conversion rates.

There must be a better way.

It's all about the experience...

I stumbled upon this interesting slide show on content marketing - at least that's how it was labeled on SlideShow.Com.  However, I think that it does cover more than just content marketing as a discipline.  It covers a far bigger, far richer view of the consumers' experience-sphere - and how brands can make/unmake their positions within this circle.

It's all about enhancing consumers' experiences of brands - that's the raison d'etre of media, channel, and messaging experts.  It's not about buying a TV ad or a print ad or a banner ad in some number 1 portal somewhere.  It's not about buying search keywords and optimizing them to the hilt.

It's about enhancing consumers' experiences of brands.

And I honestly think that content marketing - what used to be called (or is it still called?) "branded content and sponsorships" (though I think it's far more than that) - is one pillar that is currently underutilized in the media planning industry.

A lot of clients that I have spoken to about this have just one reply: "We are not a publishing company".  To which I say, "... but the mere fact that you are creating ads, buying media to send those messages into the market, and getting PR people and CRM writers to create campaigns - contents, essentially - don't these make you a publishing company?"

 

Content Marketing = Brand New Marketing?

View SlideShare presentation or Upload your own. (tags: media interactive)

Wanted: Digital Planners who can think brand- and media-planning - and vice versa...

Having been re-immersed back into the world of communications planning and advisory, a realization - or a "re-realization" struck me.

Whilst we are in a world that is increasingly becoming more "digitized" and where certain media vehicles are becoming more and more a "concierge service" - i.e., a centralized service to stay in touch with all things - we are still lacking in real integrators.

Digital planners - who can think of the brand beyond the digital medium and its intricacies - I think, are still lacking.  Don't get me wrong: digital planners are a great bunch of people.  And by the innate nature of the web as being very measurable and accountable, digital planners hold a very critical role in any communications plan.

However, I have the belief that digital planners - who are specialists in their own right and could command great respect from the rest of the marketing planning community - needs to take into consideration that brands are not created overnight.

Just because click-through rates or CPCs or CPAs or keywords or widgets or RFIs are high relative to eyeballs doesn't necessarily mean a successful campaign.  These - IMHO - are measures of "efficiencies" rather than effectiveness:  How much dollars is a campaign generating versus the investments that are being poured into it.

There is still a need to look at brands - and these metrics that measure how consumers interact, experience, relate, and animate a brand cannot be captured by merely looking at CPCs and CPAs and other conversion measures.

True:  all businesses ought to be measured in terms of their revenue-generation capabilities.  And therefore all campaigns that support this businesses need to generate sales.  HOWEVER, a brand isn't built overnight - and the impact of so-called "branding campaigns" are not necessarily immediately felt or measurable.  Heck, if we can measure overnight the impact of a "branding campaign", I think that would be the ideal scenario.  However, sticking to our CPCs and CPAs and SEMs and SEOs and other measures an tactics as "mere campaign measures that matter because they are closer to the company's bottomline" could well be a myopic viewpoint.

Media planning as an industry has evolved - strategic planners from mainstream creative and agency-companies are now welcome in the world of "noughts and crosses" and are changing the way media planning is bein done.  These strategic planners do not necessarily use numbers - but they "adapt" their knowledge of how brands are created and how consumers encounter/experience brands not just through messaging strategies but also through the message's interaction/synergy with the medium that carries that message - regardless of what that medium is.

The same is true for digital specialists - they have to "adapt" their technical knowledge and expertise to include a deep understanding of how brands are created - online and offline.

This is not to say that the digital medium ought to be an after-thought, after all the traditional, offline media have been fulfilled and their budgets optimized.  What I am trying to say is digital specialists should also be able to talk about brands and brand-building - in the immediate and in the long-term - within their specialised field - and at the same time, outside the digital realm.

At the end of the day, we are aiming to provide better brand-consumer experiences that would transform target audiences into brand users (and revenue-sources) and into brand ambassadors.  Clicking an ad - in Google, in MSN Search, in Yahoo.Com, or in some other vertical - is one aspect of that experience.

But it is not the only aspect of brand-building.

Brands are created over time, across multiple experience-opportunities, with the end-user reinforcing her relationship with the brand at her own time, at her own choosing.  Revenues in the short-term are good and they are good for the bottomline of the company for this quarter or this month.  But businesses - the last time I checked - are in it for the long-haul.

Media and Ad Agencies, Technology Companies, Marketeers, and Audiences

In another life, I delivered a vision for a business division that I was working on and the bigger company that owned that division.  My vision was predicated on something: 

What we were offering now (it was 2005 then) will become commoditized.  It will remain
to be  significant part of our business - for business won't change overnight.  But it will be one that will see lower profits because it will demand a lot of human resources.

What we need is to look into the future.  And the future is in the realm of providing accountable advice - frameworks and solutions whose results can be measured against an  agreed-upon set of standards prior to us coming into the picture.

Such businesses will not merely be won by the discounts and savings - though these will remain to be a part of the criteria, perhaps - as old habits are hard to change.  But we can go beyond that.

One pillar is the integration of due diligence and rigor into our business - acting as objective consultants bordering on being academic and theoreticians, yet delivering real, measurable results.

The second pillar is the integration of technology into every aspect of our operations:  to streamline repetitive mundane tasks and reduce overhead costs, to reduce "communication costs" by capitalizing on new technologies, to automate processes and "thinking processes" into databases of expert systems and algorithms.

More importantly, the integration of technology in the analysis of audiences and markets, and in the delivery of message to audiences and markets - both in the back-end and in the store-front.

Essentially, Marketing departments have to embrace technologies - and we - as their partners, their vendors, their suppliers, their contracts, and whatever way they want to see us - need to embrace it too.  And we need to embrace it much earlier than they do.

Decision-making processes need to be aided by technology.  Predictive techniques need to be grounded on technology and theory.  Real-time data and accountability are needed - and these too will be driven by technology.  Simulations - pricing and demand and communications and worst-case scenario planning and most-likely scenario planning - all these will be driven by technology.

Should this be driven by "digital planners"?  No.  They should be driven by "traditional planners with a keen sense of business".  Should it be driven by one business unit?  For now - yes.  But it will need to cascade - the sooner the better - to the rest of the organization.

This is the only way we can avoid being a commodity - and being relegated into the background as mere vendors, as mere contractors, as mere suppliers.  This is the only way we can escape the never-ending discussion on "discounts-value-adds-freebies".

I guess I didn't do enough to make these thoughts clear (and I doubt if the above is any clearer!)

But think about it:  If technology is so pervasive in the lives of our audiences, then why shouldn't agencies and marketing companies embrace technology as part of their systems, processes, and well, communications with consumers and with other stakeholders?

The Opportunities in Social Media

Social media is here - and that's probably the understatement of the year (and it's only February 2008).  But in my discussions with customers and with partners, the talk - regardless of whether it's about digital marketing communications or search or media planning - always leads to the topic of social media.

The questions - expressed differently by different people - were all centered on one thing:  What do we do with it?

To be honest, I have no idea.

I have learned things about social media - about what works and what doesn't, what 'endears' and what 'pisses' audiences off.  I think that social media and the technologies that are powering these media are changing a lot of things in our lives - privacy, for example, seemed to have taken a backseat in the priorities of consumers - until Facebook falls flat on its face in the late-2007.

Anyway, so what do we do with it?

I still have no idea.

And the truth is, I don't think a lot of people do.

There is one blog though that I have been following - Jeremy Owyang's blog.  He has a lot of things to say - and he does make sense.

His latest entry tries to define what we can do with social media - and how social media goes beyond the metrics of search.  I think the statement that best sums up his position on this is:

The greatest opportunities lie where companies (become) a part of (the) communities where ads may not even be present.

And I couldn't agree more.

While some vendors and ad companies see social networks as another additional medium to air/advertise and deliver messages, I believe otherwise.

Social media are conversational media.  It is where audiences get to talk with one another directly.  Audiences are using social media in addition to - or in lieu of - email, instant messsaging, and other 'traditional' forms of communications.

Advertisers rudely interrupt the conversations.

(Think of it this way:  You're talking to your friend about your new shirt - and suddenly, out of the blue, an advertiser - say, GAP - butts its head in and starts advertising.  How do you feel?)

I think clients, marketeers, and agencies should start thinking about beyond "interrupting conversations" - and actually joining in the conversations that are already happening.  (Remember the ClueTrain Manifesto?)

Advertisers would be forgiven if they asked "... But how do I advertise?"  That's their 'essence' as advertisers - they advertise.  But the challenge is for advertisers to become more than just advertisers - they need to become real marketeers.  They need to become "Real Conversationalists".  They need to be "story-tellers", not just sellers.  They need to be listeners - not just talkers.

But hey, isn't that what Cluetrain was all about? 

Well.

Social media have always been around - it's only now that it has taken on the internet by storm powered by new technologies and digital connectivity.  But social media have always been around - rumors, blind items, neighbors talking "over the fence", people gathering in the town-center to discuss things...

And it is part of human nature.

What should advertisers do?

Nothing.

What makes a social networking campaign effective...

Interesting starting thoughts on what makes a successful marketing campaign on social networks.  This is from Jeremiah Owyang of Forrester Research.

What's really interesting is how the conversation is going on after Jeremiah started it.  I found the original article interesting - and to my 'social-tech-newbie' mind, comprehensive.

Until I got to the comments and realized that there are more that needs to be considered.

Look at how the conversations between the author and the commenters are evolving - and clarifying the main theme.

I would call this a successful - hmm - campaign.

Questions and Answers

I have a conversation with an ex colleague of mine about the future of the media planning and communications planning industry.  And here are some excerpts of what we talked about:

Him:  So do you think that advertising is going to decline this year and in the next few years?

Me:  Well, in terms of adspends that are being monitored, yes - it is very likely.  TV is already showing signs of slowing down at least in Singapore and in Thailand.  In the Philippines, FTA-TV is getting to be more and more challenged by alternative forms of entertainment.  And in Malaysia, the growing strength of Cable versus FTA is already something worth mentioning.

What should media agencies do?

They are in a very good position, in fact.  They hold all the data and information that can transform the media industry into something beyond the media planning of the old.

What kinds of data do they have?

Do you believe in the maxim "You are what you read or watch or listen to"?  That however you interact with different kinds of media channels define who you are - say, if you want to watch a lot of serials on TV - it says something about you.  And that if you are addicted to lifestyle magazines or say, the sports section of a newspaper - it says something about you?

Well, the data that media agencies have are all these.  And I just don't mean "data as percentages".  I think media agencies need to dive more deeply into these and uncover more stories.

But they've always worked - we've always worked - on the levels of ratings and percentages?

Which I believe is insufficient.  We should have dove a little deeper.  I know that some companies have tried getting elemental data for optimization purposes - "individual level data" apparently is good for optimization.

But it's more than that.  Imagine being able to cluster people based on the likely-TV behaviors.  Imagine being able to cluster people not just in terms of their psychographics - based on answers to surveys with a battery of attitudinal statements - but based on their actual behavior on TV: when they switch, how often do they switch channels, what kinds of programs make them switch, what kinds of ads make them switch, what programs make them  loyal, what artistes make them loyal to a program. 

All these are in the usual TAM data that Nielsen Media Research, TNS, and other research providers give out regularly.

It's just that we've never dove deeply.

Is it because we lack the intellectual capacity?

Of course not - and I take offense at that!  (A bit of a chuckle)  It's because we are content with percentages - with measurements of the old - GRPs, reach, frequency, CPMs, frequency distribtuions, demographic and affinity definitions.

We have just become complacent - we have just become contented with what we have.  We need more metrics.  We need more curious and disciplined people.  We need people who are willing to experiment with numbers - and with the combinations of numbers.  We need people who will say to their Western counterparts that "Look, guys, these are some ideas that we have because we think that our media landscape is far different from yours.  We need to measure this and that, beyond ratings and GRPs."

Is it then a matter of will?

And curiosity and the boldness to dream big.  The funny thing about being bold is that it lifts you up above the rest and you become more of a target.  But that's the price of being bold.

So what are you proposing?

The past several years have seen some strides in the maths and statistical theory world.  There's this thing called "Hierarchical Bayes" methodology, stemming from Bayesian theory.

There's also the field of computer simulations, and good old econometric modeling and similar regression techniques - but done on an individual, respondent level basis and on a cumulative basis.

All these are pointing to richer, far more powerful usage of already-available data.

What of content?

What did Marshall MacLuhan say?  "The medium is the message."  A lot of people think of that as a "goal" - some think that that is all about "integrating the medium and the message".

I think differently.

I think it is not the goal - "the medium is the message" is a declarative statement, a factual statement.  It is essentially suggestive of the reality that we cannot separate the medium from the message - nor the message from the medium.  The medium is the message - and vice versa.

What drives people to watch TV is not TV per se - it is the TV + the content that it contains - the messages that are contained within TV.  What drives people to go online is not just because online is online - but because within online, there is a content - a message - that if it were not available, people would look for elsewhere.

The medium is the message - and the message is the medium - are facts, not goals.  It is not something that we work towards.  It is a given.

So where does that leave the divide between creative and media planning?

Who has the data?  Media planning departments.  Who can best explain the needs of the consumers and uncover these needs?  Media planners.  Who can best describe the underlying thoughts, wants, needs and "motivations" of consumers?  Media planners.

But it is the creative - the messaging department - that puts flesh to these.

But isn't advertising all about selling?

True.  But like all seasoned sales people would know:  you cannot sell unless you have somehow made an argument - emotional or logical, rational or irrational - to consumers.  If you have not connected, you can't.

Where does information management, Bayesian theory, simulations, Hierarchical Bayes, and multiple-level regression analyses come into the picture?

Richness in understanding who the consumers/audiences are - based on what they actually do, not just on what they say or claim to say - and not just on demographics.  But real behavior.  Real-time, real observable individual-level behavior.

Will it be a panacea?

No such thing exists.  It is a first step - a significant step away from percentages (which treat all consumers as equals and as "mere statistics").  It is a first step towards real understanding of consumers and audiences.

Doesn't it already exist in the digital world?

To a certain extent it does.  But the digital world is also battling issues in privacy - it is so "close" to personally identifiable information that it is quite scary.  At least in TAMs, in PeopleMeters(R), there is still some sense of anonymity.

So what should media companies do?

Be brave.  That's the first step.  Be more than just order- and brief-takers.  Be more than just mere "OK, we'll book it by tomorrow" sayers.  Think through each and every media plan - and go beyond the percentages.

================================

 

How do you teach someone to think strategically?

I have been asked by a friend from Vietnam to mentor someone who wants to be a strategic planner.  I am not mastered the art and science of strategic communications planning.  And sometimes, the strategic directions that I come up with are first glimpsed whilst showering or lounging by the pool or swimming (and drowning) with Excel-tables and PowerPoint reports.

When I got offered a job by a start-up company, I was first asked "How do you create strategies?"  My answer - which I felt was simple, but not simplistic (at least I felt it wasn't simplistic) - was "You don't create strategies; they reveal themselves to you as you tease stories out of the data and information that you have".

I remember talking about an "integrative mind" - a mind that freely moves from left- (the rational side) to the right-side of the brain (the creative side).  I also recall talking about how phenomenology (remember that from philosophy?) and metaphysics actually help - how you break things down to pieces and examine them in abstraction from the whole, and then bringing them all together again into one bigger, more holistic whole.

But all these are things that may be innate.

I have toyed around with strategic frameworks in the past - and boy, I love 2x2 matrices.  I loved the frameworks of Kenichi Ohmae and of Micheal Porter - as well as the book "Thinking Strategically" by Dixit and Avinash.  I enjoyed talking about Game Theory, the book "A Beautiful Mind" (which discussed in some detail the Nash Equilibrium), and a whole lot of other things.

Did they help in crafting strategic thinking?

Perhaps.  But Mintzberg (from Strategy Bites Back, another book) says that strategic thinking goes beyond all these frameworks.  Strategic thinking comes when you've considered all the things that you need and have to consider - and take a calculated risk and leap into the unknown.

I would be honest and say that some of the strategies that I have come up with were what I would call generic - because the questions and the issues were generic.  But there were solutions that demanded more than just a generic response - it required the amalgam of different models, different thought patterns, different truths.

So how do you teach someone to think strategically?

I think it is akin to teaching philosophy:  My Philosophy professor from University said that "Ang pilosopiya ay ginagawa" - which means "You do philosophy, you don't lean philosophy".  From him, I learned the value of questioning the questions and the assumptions that lie behind the questions.

And it has served me well.

Perhaps that's the starting point:  learn to question the questions and the human motivation behind such issues and questions.

After all, the questions posed by humans are tainted by our own humanity.

Does that answer the question - on how to teach strategic thinking?

I am, for once, at a loss.

Reach- versus Rich-based Media and Communications Planning: That's the REAL Issue

If I were to summarize the most critical dilemma facing media and communications planners these days, it would be making the choice between "REACH- versus RICH-" media and communications planning planning philosophies.

 

REACH media/communications planning is perhaps the easier way out.  One comes up with numbers, measurements, and cost-per-thousand impressions to rationalize why certain combinations of media channels and programs are best.  Numbers don't lie - at least not in the media planners' presentation. 

REACH-based media planning is relatively easier to justify:  Just show that a lot of eyeballs get to see the ad, awareness picks up after a few weeks of airing, and voila - another successful campaign.

For clients, it is a less-risky move:  REACH-based planning will always churn out the same things over and over and over again.  TV and newspapers - top titles, mind you - will always be there, with a spattering of radio spots and the minimal investments in online banners ("Oh make that an expanding ad!").  To round it all up, clients would also want some outdoor - which some creative executives would probably lift out of their print and poster layouts ("Just blow it all up!")

 

RICH-focused media/communications planning, on the other hand, demands a lot from media and communications planners, their clients, and other stakeholders - including creative agencies, digital companies, content providers, and media space vendors.

Because its focus on generating RICH audience experiences, metrics such as GRPs, reach, frequency, and CPMs, suddenly become incomplete.  Planning theories such as "recency planning" versus "effective frequency planning" become insufficient in determining what constitutes an effective media and communications plan.

What used to be a simple decision for clients becomes more complicated:  "How do you measure - or worse, predict - consumers' experiences?  How sure are you that that is the desired effect?  How sure are you that it is rich-enough?"

 

REACH- versus RICH-based media planning - which one will you choose?

 

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