You Can Play to the Method in the Ratings Game and the Branding Game, but Not in the ROI Game -- Bill Harvey

Decades ago a broadcaster mentor said to me amp8220Reality What do I care about reality All I care about is affecting the Nielsen panelamp8221In the amp821680s I was using automated celebrityvoice interactive phone calls to raise ratings One of the large broadcast stations in New York was skeptical that 250000 completes in New York would be enough to affect the Nielsen panel amp8212 theoretically they could all fall outside the Nielsen panel and lift ratings there but not in the Nielsen panel The station decided to try it for a new show that was falling short of expectations saying it was worth it to try anything to save the show We did the 250000 automated calls The ratings in Nielsen and Arbitron went from 40 to 85 during the promotion then afterward settled back over time to a sustained 60Just the other day I heard a similar remark from a digital network seller saying all she cares about is affecting the comScore numbers The ratings game is still the dominant mindset in the seller and agency worldsFor many recent years two other games have become important to advertisers one being the IAGtype Branding Game or Millward Brown or any of a number of other tracking study suppliers The other is the Marketing Mix Modeling MMM Game Agencies over time came to realize that MMM was their new report card and very recently the TV and digital sellers became sensitized to the importance of the MMM Game as the new order of thingsMMM could still be gamed of course One could play to the method by maximizing GRPs at the expense of real sales impact by simply buying the lowest CPMs regardless of targeting or environment considerations Some in fact did act this wayLed by TiVo Research formerly known as TRA along came the singlesource ROI Game reaching broad advertiser awareness over the last six years Because singlesource provided faster ROI feedback and correlated with MMM one was able to get these ROI metrics back while the memory of the period was still fresh If the singlesource said there were sales lifts but in fact the marketer looking at the latter results was sufficiently crosssiloseeing he or she could run these results up against factory shipment data andor financial records and potentially could see that there were no sales lifts I gave this the name amp8220Bank Account Validationamp8221Fortunately TiVo Research was quickly bankaccountvalidated by major advertisers willing to cowrite papers about it for ARF conferences Singlesource conducted by the TiVo Research amp8220Naturally Occurring Data NODamp8221 method massive samples invisiblepassive data collection amp8212 with no fusion amp8212 and with weighting to the US Census is highly aligned with bank account changes This was the first evaluator framework that could not be gamed There was no longer any amp8220methodamp8221 to amp8220play toamp8221 amp8212 NOD is in essence the same type of monetary data as in the bank account recordsAs the media and agencies catch up to the full implications of this revolution amp8212 the advertisers having already shifted most of the weight of their marketing decisions to MMM and putting more and more tentative secondary weight on NOD all the time amp8212 all advertising will become more and more like direct response in terms of its evaluative frameworkOne radical difference is that sellers will more fully recognize that they have a vested interest in the advertiseramp8217s sales success No longer is it amp8220not their jobamp8221 to be concerned that the creative is going to work They are not there just to deliver an audience Over time if they deliver an audience that does not buy this advertiseramp8217s product that media channel is going to be dropped from the advertiseramp8217s schedulesToday we are still a few years away from that situation being the widespread state of the art in TV Even some of the most assiduous users of NOD in TV are scratching the surface with changes in brand allocations of upfront packages cautious buying changes reconsiderations of the target audience plans to soon investigate frequency and creative but they are hardly thinking of vehiclebyvehicle or even networkbynetwork final determinations of sales effectMeanwhile in digital the revolution is further along with conversion having long since occluded the phantom clickthrough yardstick and realtime reoptimization down to the vehicle and cookie level being materialized by the bestofbreed playersThe 201415 broadcast season could be the watershed year when addressable TV commercials finally grow up with sufficient avails in the tipping point 30 of US homes This means that perspective has to be in everyoneamp8217s strategic thinking during this next upfrontWith addressability across four screens at the tipping point to saturation penetration the ROI Model of Effectiveness with Bank Account Validation will swiftly become the way of the worldData validated by Bank Account will have a measurable value in the ROI equation If people at the verge of buying a new car can be directly matched to a buyable addressable impression amp8212 with delay to airing under 24 hours from decision click on the buying platform amp8212 those data could be worth an incremental 100000 on the CPM ie 100 per impression just for the dataThe more a research data supplier is confident of its Bank Account Validation the more interested it should be in pricing based on being packaged into the media cost reducing the decision about its price to a ROI analysis with vs without said data This is something that can be tested very quickly in the addressable fasttoair fourscreen future we are moving swiftly into in the next 18 monthsThis new era will not be kind to methods that worked well during the era of amp8220Games That Could Be Gamedamp8221 such as the Ratings Game and the Branding Game We predict that the use of fusion will be strongly moderated in the coming era because it will be shown to have lower Bank Account Validation and therefore be paid a lesser hike on the CPMPS amp8212 Top copywriter and genius Ed Ney of YampampR fame has moved on to the next classroom Read his speeches and yours will be even better than theyamp8217ve been Like Erwin Ephron Ed used short pithy memorable sentences packed with meaning and impact condensed intelligence and insight Much to unpack Rhythmic to the mind Ed had been a reader of this blog Treasured like all of you So long Ed see ya Somewhere somewhen down the long and winding Bill Harvey is a wellknown media researcher and inventor who cofounded TRA Inc and is its Strategic Advisor His nonprofit Human Effectiveness Institute runs his weekly blog on consciousness optimization Bill can be contacted at billbillharveyconsultingcomRead all Billamp8217s MediaBizBloggers commentaries at In Terms of ROICheck us out on Facebook at MediaBizBloggerscomFollow our Twitter updates at MediaBizBlogger The opinions and points of view expressed in this commentary are exclusively the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of MediaBizBloggerscom management or associated bloggers MediaBizBloggers is an open thought leadership platform and readers may share their comments and opinions in response to all commentaries amp160

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You Can Play to the Method in the Ratings Game and the Branding Game, but Not in the ROI Game -- Bill Harvey

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You Can Play to the Method in the Ratings Game and the Branding Game, but Not in the ROI Game -- Bill Harvey

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