The Media Playground Interview: Guy Phillipson
Speaking at yesterday’s MediaTel Group Media Playground event, Guy Phillipson, CEO of the Internet Advertising Bureau, said that in five years 35% of all media could be on the IP platform.
In a brief but wide ranging interview with BBC media correspondent Torin Douglas, Phillipson also spoke about the direct response benefits of online, particularly in today’s uncertain economic climate.
He said: “The direct response credentials of online should not be underestimated and I’m sure there are still advertisers out there in the direct space not capitalising on that.
“It’s perhaps going to be a difficult year for advertising in this country across the board, it could be stagnant or go down, but you know marketing directors want results, they want to sell the product, and I would urge all of them – if the financial director comes knocking on the door saying ‘I’m sorry, you’ve got to lose 20% of your budget’ – to revisit direct and the strength of direct online because that’s bread and butter which will produce results.”
Phillipson also spoke about the difficulty of measuring brand advertising online: “I think where people have questions is in the area of measuring brand advertising online. When I launch a new FMCG product and I’ve got a ‘what if?’ scenario, eg how the internet is going to stack up against television… it’s been harder for them to measure.
“That’s very big on our agenda – in particular FMCG advertisers have been used to – over the decades – using single industry currencies like BARB, NRS, to get their figures, and frankly there are a number of different measuring systems they can go to online.
“In fact, probably every media agency in town has got their own black box to show their advertisers what kind of reach and frequency and performance they get online – and frankly, if you’re a top advertiser, you could quite rightly question that and say ‘Well I’m really not quite sure what I’m getting.’ Sometimes, online falls off the schedule because of that uncertainty.”
Talking about how advertisers can avoid intruding on users’ private space in online social networks such as Facebook, he said: “How do you approach an audience that’s basically on there to chat to friends? I think there are some good strategies for this, essentially, if you can make advertising which becomes social currency, that people want to share and talk about, that’s phase one.”
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