Reach and Frequency Still Matter
Reach and Frequency Still Matter… even in B2B.
Digital ad buying today is made up of more measurements and metrics than my fantasy baseball spreadsheets. CPC, CPL, CPM, impressions, reach, device, time viewed — Facebook alone has over 500 different metrics that measure some degree of marketing success.
The scale and depth of data available to today’s marketers is impressive. And there is no doubt this degree of data is a wonderful thing. But it can be overwhelming in many instances where you need to answer a simple question: Was my content successful?
I am frequently asked what the most important metrics are in measuring a campaign’s success, and there are plenty of blogs out there claiming to have a magic measurement bullet. But the real answer is… It depends.
Campaigns are different. They have different goals, different budgets, different creative, and different copy. And sometime’s a lucky RT from a D-list celebrity will throw off all your measurements.
If each campaign has separate goals, how are they compared?
During my 6 years with Coca-Cola’s global marketing arm, comparing results from numerous campaigns was a constant problem. Agencies would pick and choose metrics that showed their work in a positive light. Very little of the cross-market data could be easily compared. This lack of uniformity made it difficult to identify the real winners in both content and campaigns.
It took a large upgrade to our data management services, and a lot of API connections, to bring real insight to the organization. Some marketers may try to avoid such drastic changes by opting for a simpler solution by picking a single metric to represent ROI.
Operations managers who use only a single metric to determine success are selling your ad campaigns short. Ads that generate awareness deserve more credit than we give them. Reach and frequency are not as sexy as CPC or CPL. They are often overlooked in B2B settings. But they still matter…. Take a look at the case study below for one reason why.
Last month we ran a social marketing campaign for a client targeted toward 9,000 individuals who were not responding to traditional email campaigns.
Through Mariana’s machine learning disambiguation we were able to match 6,900 of these individuals to Facebook and Twitter accounts and serve them targeted messaging. After running targeted social messaging for 2 weeks at a cost of only $250 we reached 6,400 of our audience an average of 20 times. These ads resulted in 150 clicks to the website and 12 lead form completions. Not too shabby…
But, in addition to these ‘hard’ action metrics, we found that viewing our social ad content made targeted individuals more likely to engage with the client through other channels. The next drip email that went out was tested against a segment of individuals who had not received the social ads. Those that received the ads were 150% more likely to open the email and 300% more likely to click on an email link.
Articles by Wes Finley, and other great content marketing posts, appear on MarianaIQ.com
Head of Strategic Solutions | Reputation and Risk Intelligence, AI, Data Analytics
8yBuilding cross media reach measurement tools and frameworks is paramount, yet most efforts are rather going towards measuring "engagement" in its various forms. We're becoming short term conversion junkies, and it's costing our brands.
Award Winning Impact Film Producer, distributor, digital media strategist, Type 1 diabetes advocate, sailor.
8yInteresting. I think the trick with these cross platform connects, which are not the same as someone who opted into your email list, and as you stated is clearly 'not responding' to that medium, is to be careful in terms of frequency in particular, to try and serialize the ad content. i.e. no one wants 20 times the same ad in their feed over a short period of time. This can be done with tracking pixels. But you I think you can blow them away with a progressive ad series...From a numbers perspective your 20$+ plus cost per lead is great if you are selling insurance or some other high value per customer segment, but that places a lower dollar value product out of this game completely, assuming leads must at some point drive sales. We alot in online film transactions, and must play a might tighter game
Head of Community @ Polyhedra Network
8yI'll have to follow up with the client to see if their CRM system has continued to track increased activity over the past month. The email list was to inactive folks so their main focus was to reengage.
Platform Product
8yThis is interesting. You were basically able to 'prime' the initial target group with social ads, which in turn led to greater interaction through other channels (like email). Has email, in turn, continued to generate activity beyond just opens and clicks (like form fills)?