Are we selecting the right ROI Awards winners?
Escaping yet another pile of awards entries for a few moments, John Billett suggests a new criteria for judging the real worth of “return on advertising investment”.
I can’t get rid of the feelings and lingering doubts that surround the validity of advertising and media agencies self written submissions to advertising effectiveness awards. For those who share my concerns, there is a simple solution.
My sample is not extensive but seems significant. I have just completed my fifth stint as a judge of advertising and marketing effectiveness awards, with three in the UK and the most recent elsewhere in Europe.
That amounts to a mouth watering consumption of over 300 papers and supporting material, plus insights from fellow judges on a similar number of papers they assessed, plus shared experiences deciding on the winners. And that’s not forgetting experiences drawn from the most excellent series of IPA and ANA volumes of successful marketing effectiveness cases.
The sum of that experience is delight, frustration, fascination, exasperation, stimulation and learning in virtually equal measure.
So many submissions are beautifully written and persuasively presented epistles of self-fulfilment. For sure awards entrants are a biased sample. If the campaign had been a letdown the perpetrators wouldn’t enter it.
Even allowing for the skew in favour of success, the sum of the entrants prowess reaches high levels of claimed excellence that go beyond the boundaries of credibility. Even grade inflation in school exams cannot match what the judges are invited to review.
Hyperbole and self-aggrandisement are alive and well in submissions to advertising effectiveness awards.
Simple common sense makes it impossible to believe that so many business success stories owe everything just to an advertising campaign?
It’s hard to accept the remarkably high claims for business return on investment when the claims are made by the proponents.
It’s equally hard to accept results at face value when the supporting mathematical econometric modelling is carried out by a subsidiary company of the entrant and where, for obvious reasons of commercial confidentiality, the judges are denied access to key information.
The common element in all entries, especially in recent years where pressure has grown for returns on marketing investment to be validated, is the claim from the entry to have produced superb returns from advertising. That raises an interesting question.
If all the claims are correct, how many of the campaigns entered for the awards, continue as on-going activity subsequent to the period covered by the entry?
For some very effective campaigns there will be legitimate business reasons for the campaign not to continue. Top of that list would be one-off campaigns for store promotions, short term events and seasonal specialities. For longer term branded activity a change in consumer behaviour, different competitive pressure and revised legislation could in part feature as justification for abandoning a successful award winning campaign.
But for most campaigns, especially those for well established brands and successful operators where direct returns can be most easily measured, no such reasons could apply
My lingering doubts would be assuaged by our business adopting more of an Olympic health check on the entries to make sure the winners are legitimate gold medal contenders.
Expecting companies to expand the material provided to judges would be an additional and unacceptable burden on all parties. Conflicts of interest and complications over confidentiality would be significant.
There is a much simpler and easy to apply approach for all entries. This would be a standard question along these lines
“Is the advertising campaign for the submitted entry continuing in the following period?” If not please give reasons” Your answers will not be shared nor be part of any publication of winning entries.
The simple answer “Yes” or “No” + brief explanation, would be a worthwhile way to establish the real winners and ensure that advertising and marketing effectiveness awards maintain the high standards of efficacy and integrity the communication business requires.