Mobile Fix: Does digital marketing actually work?

This week, Simon Andrews, founder of Addictive! looks at a disturbing infographic and argues that brands and their agencies are missing the opportunity to make ads work so much harder…

Does digital/social/mobile marketing actually work? Our friends at Infectious have produced a disturbing infographic summing up the data showing that – despite the millions spent on adtech – most digital ads are never seen. So the old saying half my advertising is wasted but I don’t know which half applies to modern marketing too.

And the clever people at Forrester had a pop at Facebook, saying Facebook is failing marketers.

Now of course we all know that smart brands are making money by investing in modern marketing; there are lots of new businesses who know the ROI they get from digital. And we also know the problem of unseen impressions is not confined to new media;

“The bottom 40% of commercial impact on TV consists of channels that don’t receive a BARB rating, so one of the unspoken difficulties of the TV industry is that 40% of its inventory doesn’t make any money,” says Nigel Walley, managing director of Decipher speaking at the New Video Frontiers conference. “The clever people in TV know that better automation and better data measurement which can prove that the advertising is working.”

The medieval measurement techniques of traditional media – 5,000 people telling their BARB box when they enter or leave the room and NRS knocking on doors to ask 3,000 people a month if they have read or looked at any print publications for two minutes or more in the last 12 months – are going to be improved as all media goes digital.

But to get the big switch of money from traditional and digital to match the big switch in attention we probably need more examples of the profound effect of digital and more transparency on how digital works.

The Forrester open letter to Mark Zuckerberg is a good example of the problem.

Based on data from a survey of 395 marketers Forrester point out brands are less satisfied with the business value achieved through Facebook than any other digital channel. Remarkably, this sample is seeing more success using LinkedIn and Google+ than Facebook.

But the points they make show the issue isn’t really with Facebook at all;

“Fewer than 15% of those ads leverage your ever-growing cache of social data to target relevant audiences. And your site’s static-image ad units offer marketers less impact per impression than they could achieve with the ad units other sites offer.”

It’s the brands and their agencies that are missing the opportunity to make these ads work so much harder. Why wouldn’t you use all that fantastic profile info to target your ads? And static images hasn’t really held back print advertising or outdoor.

New research from Adobe shows that cost per clicks are declining (down 40%) as click-throughs rise (up 275%) and ROI is up by 58%, but increased demand means the CPMs are rising. So some brands are seeing success.

Facebook is a huge opportunity and those brands that get it right will reap the benefits. And that’s the case with pretty much all modem marketing – mobile, social and content. Take the time and make the effort to do it right. Learn and adapt and it can give you real competitive advantage. Under invest or treat it as an add-on though, and you risk ceding an enormous market to your competition.

New iPads

Apple sold almost 34 million iPhones in the last quarter – ahead of expectations – and 14 million iPads. And just 4.6 million Macs.

And it was no surprise that Apple revamped their tablet range in preparation for the Christmas season. Going on sale today, the new products are impressive and their lead in tablets remains more significant than in smartphones. Whilst Samsung and others make Android smartphones that are arguably as good as the iPhone, no tablets get close – yet. And the new Nokia tablet isn’t going to trouble them either – especially when it’s a similar price to some of the iPads.

The latest Nexus phone is probably going to launch today as well – it’s been widely leaked and looks impressive. One question is whether Google can better manage the retail experience on this device – last year the Nexus 4 was in and out of stock on Google Play and they upset a few people by taking orders then going quiet on when it would ship. In the end all was well, but Apple and Amazon get retail really well – Google need to show they are getting there too.

Mobile money

For all the innovation from Square, Stripe, Paypal and the rest, the basic construct of money hasn’t changed – yet.

Bitcoin is moving from the edge of the web to the centre and it’s starting to be seen as viable alternative to traditional currency.

Charmath Palihapitya is amongst the smartest thinkers in digital and he is very excited about Bitcoin – pointing out that the Chinese show Bitcoin information films on TV. Why is that significant? China holds a huge amount of US currency and are starting to think about alternative reserve currencies.

A good demonstration of how Bitcoin is changing? A Norwegian bought $27 worth in 2009 and forgot about them. They are now worth $886,000.

Our only slight reservation is that the Winklevoss brothers (of Social Network fame) are major players in Bitcoin – or trying to be.

More good background here from the NYTimes. And if you are still unconvinced, read this fascinating look at how a digital currency could transform Africa.

There is a lot more to mobile money than paying for your Latte with your phone – even though Starbucks currently accounts for around 90% of all mobile payments in the US.