Archive for Web Analytics & ROI
March 14, 2007 at 10:57 am · Filed under Interactive Advertising News, Campaign Review, Blogging and Viral Marketing, Web Analytics & ROI
Avenue A | Razorfish released their 2007 Digital Outlook analyzing trends in online advertising spending, media consumption, and user behavior. There are lots of great insights here (disclaimer: I work at AA|RF) that is worthwhile reading for any online marketing professional.
Some Interesting Trends:
- Search spending as % of total budget decreased attributed mainly to boosts in brand advertising (display banners, sponsorships, etc.) - Could Search be hitting a peak in spend? Have advertisers already exhausted their keyword lists and has search engine usage plateaued?
- Yahoo! and AOL are firing on all cylinders for display advertising (heavy revamp of Yahoo! properties has helped) but also reflects a continued decline in billings for Search (Panama is helping a bit)
- The Digital Class Key Findings:
- Human-computer interaction is about to get intense
- The network is ubiquitous
- There’s no middle
- The Internet is where general interest goes to die
- Information seeking equals entertainment
- Transparency is king
- Social networking ascends to utilitarian status
- Let’s stay friends
- Giving back is good
- Dust is settling on the music library
- Blogs have yet to achieve media brand status
- More mobile phones, less talking
Of particular note that I’ve touched upon several times on this blog about the causality of view-based conversions.
From the 2007 Outlook:
View Based Conversions Study
February 28, 2007 at 12:30 pm · Filed under Around the Blogosphere, Web Analytics & ROI
Scott Maxwell has posted a list of 10 ways to lie with metrics on his blog which Juice Analytics summarized:
1. Only present metrics that are positive. That’s why you collect all those metrics.
2. Only present metrics that are easy to manage.
3. Use many metrics.
4. Be extremely precise with your numbers.
5. Present quickly, drown ‘em with data.
6. Say “you don’t break down metrics” if they aren’t flattering to you.
7. Put lipstick on that pig–apply lots of gloss to your charts. Hello, Crystal XCelsius!
8. Show off your bona fides by sharing some metrics “off the cuff”.
9. Prep your team by feeding them lines.
10.Your job isn’t to educate your audience about your metrics. If people don’t know what you’re talking about, it’s because they’re stupid.
I work with data every day and I’m probably guilty of some of these points myself. However, I don’t necessarily think that all of them are “lies” — some are really a matter of client/personal preference. The biggest challenge is to get people to think about measurement and ROI — in fact, most recent surveys reveal that most managers and executives have no idea what their return on advertising is even though the tools are available to help do that.
I personally do tend to use many metrics (#2) to provide insight into performance and behavior from multiple angles. You don’t just look at sales, you look at average order value, margins, sales categories, sales conversion rates, shopping cart abandonment, etc. in order to get a complete picture of what’s happening. Multiple metrics are needed to go beyond the “what” and get to the “whys” and “hows”.
Fortunately, our agency culture is about accountability and we are very open about how we measure with our clients. We also make sure we take the time to educate and understand what are the measurements that they care about in order to tailor our reports accordingly. At the same time, we do pride ourselves in being precise (#4) and prepared (#9) but not to cover up any deficiencies but because our clients expect us to know the data intimately and to be ready to present it clearly.
My personal advice to those who are victims to #1, #5, and #7 are as follows:
- Don’t be afraid to share negative metrics. There’s a story there that needs to be told. In my experience, clients are much more interested in the learnings and insights than they are about the actual number. Never give a negative metric without having a plan to turn that around.
- Use data to support your ideas and insights. Don’t throw up charts into a presentation without preparing the audience for it. Never assume that everyone can read a chart the same way you can — even when it’s extremely obvious to you
- Please, no more driver’s dashboard themes and pressure gauges on reports from anyone. I stick to clean Excel charts when possible utilizing easy-to-read color themes. Yes, it’s sort of dressing the charts up, but it’s primariliy for visual clarity and to bring Excel’s fashion sensibility up-to-speed. (This doesn’t apply to Excel 2007 which has a modernized palette). We also use a data visualization tool called Tableau which helps us build more interesting data visual aids and allows us to add additional data dimensions through variable line widths and color gradiations based on data set values.
Rebuttals, Agreements, Discussions in the Comments Section Please.
February 25, 2007 at 9:49 pm · Filed under Web Analytics & ROI
AdAge Digital published an article “How Google Has Helped Build Brand Advertising Online” this past Thursday and I wanted to address some of the 3rd party ad serving issues called out by Tim Armstrong, Google’s VP of Advertising Sales.
Here’s the part about 3rd party ad serving:
A Bank of America analyst asked Mr. Armstrong about Google’s ad-serving philosophy and whether that was hindering marketer use of its display network. While most major online agencies serve their ads through Doubleclick or Atlas to simplify delivery and reporting, Google hasn’t yet opened up its network to third-party ad serving. That means an agency that uses Doubleclick for virtually all of its ad placement would have to use a separate ad server, Google’s, for buying display ads across AdSense.
Mr. Armstrong said Google faced the same issue in 2000 and 2001 with search — people had asked whether Google would use a third-party ad server for search. Third-party ad servers, he said, “assume they can figure out how to target more effectively than you can.” He said Google has been happy not to use third party ad servers to deliver its search ads and that it’s “working diligently” in the branded ad space to continue to serve ads effectively.
In terms of search text ads, there’s really no reason to use a 3rd party ad server to deliver the actual creative since most advertisers do not consider a “view” of a text-link to have a significant impact. Google already allows 3rd party click tracking through AdWords, advertisers just use Atlas/DART redirects in the Destination URL fields.
The Google display network, on the other hand, would greatly benefit from allowing 3rd party ad serving, but not for the reason the article outlined — “Third-party ad servers, he said, “assume they can figure out how to target more effectively than you can.”
Here are 3 benefits from 3rd party ad serving that would allow advertisers to derive more value and in turn spend more branding dollars with Google’s display network if 3rd party ad serving was allowed:
- View-Conversion Tracking - Google still takes the “click tracking” approach to display as it has done with text even though advertisers are increasingly looking for brand metrics beyond the CTR including brand engagement and view-based ROI. Without 3rd party ad serving, advertisers are not able to measure whether or not people who see the branded ad are in turn visiting the site, even when they haven’t clicked. Experiments to measure “non-click” activity can also be controlled through testing on 3rd party ad servers which allow for test/control group setups of users who are exposed to branded ads and those who are not. Atlas Institute has already conducted a study into the effects of banner impressions (http://www.atlassolutions.com/pdf/BrandingEffect.pdf)
- Behavioral Targeting - Contextual relevance is a great first step. When you can overlay behavioral targeting, it gets even better. 3rd party ad serving has nothing to do with where the ad gets served (Google still controls that), it has to do with what message is served for which audience. Using simple targeting on 3rd party ad servers, one can target messages based on past user behavior on an advetiser’s website. For example, if you’re a car manufacturer, having your “Visit AcmeCars.com” is a great message for those customers who are not in-market. What about a user who has already visited your site and browsed for, let’s say, the Acme Destroyer. With 3rd party ad serving on Google’s display network, the ad server can serve up “Test Drive the Destroyer at your local Acme Dealer” and that may improve ROI and response rates.
- Unified Platform - Agencies and Advertisers hate having to go into multiple interfaces to run and track their marketing programs. Swapping creative and changing landing pages can become part of the existing production/execution process flow once ad serving is consolidated into a 3rd party ad server.
In short, everyone wins.
Related Articles:
Jay Sears at ContextWeb has a write-up on this as well on the ContextWeb Blog.
Disclaimer: I work for Avenue A | Razorfish, a division of Aquantive, which also owns Atlas, a 3rd party ad server. My comments in this post are my opinions and are offered out there as my 2-cents.
February 20, 2006 at 4:18 pm · Filed under Web Analytics & ROI
As digital marketers, we are charged with the task of figuring out what is the most creative and effective way to achieve our client’s goals online. In my experience, all companies have the same end goals: generate more customers, increase sales, increase margin and retain existing customers. They may tell you that they are a DR client (read: ROI) or a Brand client but it’s really different means to the same end. When you doing direct response advertising, you’re aiming to capture the user when they’re looking to buy or you’re enticing them to take immediate action through a promotion or sale or what not. When you’re doing brand advertising, you’re building mental equity in the consumer’s mind and driving a message you hope they will associate your brand with. At the end of the day, when that consumer does make a purchase, you hope that your branding efforts had something to do with it.
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