Month: April 2022

Roku already provides impression-level data for marketing mix models that break down campaigns at the impression level by designated market areas, i.e. groupings of U.S. cities and ZIP codes like New York, Honolulu and Montgomery-Selma that TV and radio advertisers historically refer to when measuring campaigns. Now the company is expanding that data set.

“What we’re trying to provide is a little bit more information on creative type, daypart, more granular view of DMA so that you can get even down to the ZIP code to provide a little bit more granularity into those models for each one of those measurement partners,” said Asaf Davidov, head of ad measurement at Roku.

The data will be limited to ads sold by Roku, such as The Roku Channel and the portion of inventory in other companies’ Roku apps that the CTV platform owner is able to sell, including inventory bought through Roku’s OneView buying platform.

Roku expanding the data provided for marketing mix modeling seems to address an issue with this form of analysis: It’s built around traditional media channels like television. As Digiday has reported, some advertisers are so beholden to their historical marketing mix models that it is limiting the flow of ad dollars moving from traditional TV to streaming and digital video. “They’re more of a blunt instrument,” an agency executive said of MMM.

Nonetheless, what those models are showing is that advertisers are surrendering some of TV’s efficiency as they move money to streaming, said a second agency executive. Advertisers may be exchanging TV’s broad reach for streaming’s more targeted options, but the streaming’s higher ad prices result in advertisers reaching fewer people for more money, which is an issue for brand advertisers aiming for broad audiences.

Marketing mix models “are not stupid. They’re catching up fast and saying we took a really efficient dollar [in TV] and made it inefficient [in streaming],” said the second agency executive.

Moreover, marketing mix modeling remains an important tool and even seems to be growing in importance. Not only is TV’s measurement system undergoing an overhaul, but digital measurement systems must reckon with the looming demise of the third-party cookie and mobile app tracking crackdowns by Apple and Google. These changes have spurred “a little bit of a resurgence of that MMM measurement,” said Davidov.

Additionally, the collision of TV and streaming advertising may lead to streaming eventually overtaking traditional TV’s share of ad dollars, but the traditional TV ad buying model seems to be winning out, as ad buyers discussed during the Future of TV Week Town Hall on April 19. That will likely only reinforce the role of marketing mix modeling in advertisers’ media planning processes.

“Marketing mix models will catch up, but the way we plan and buy TV today, that’s not changing,” said the first agency executive.

Opening up more data to MMM providers could at least help to catalyze the flow of money to streaming by giving advertisers and agencies a better read on their streaming ads’ performance relative to TV and other media channels so they may identify how to shore up any inefficiencies.

When it comes to data on creative types, Roku will break out information by video ad and display ad, such as the banner ads appearing on the CTV platform’s home screen. The video-specific creative data will also include the duration of an ad so advertisers will be able to gauge the impact of traditional 15- and 30-second spots as well as the newer six-second placement.

“Creative types are super important,” said the first agency executive. “Nobody talks about the role of creative in all of these conversations on effectiveness. We know that 70% of the impact [an ad has] is from the creative and the context it appears in. So to the extent, they’re providing this information, that’s a great thing.”

In this edition of our Confessions series, in which we exchange anonymity for candor, a media communications specialist shared how strained client-agency relationships are now and why “PR is no longer like a one-trick pony.”

 This interview has been lightly edited and condensed for clarity.

Talk to me about the PR landscape right now.

In a lot of ways, clients come to agencies right now and they’re like, “I want to go viral. I want press.” They associate press with going viral and that is a huge misconception. They fail to realize newsrooms are shrinking, readership is shrinking. Back in the day, it used to be press and TV ads. That’s how you learned about new things for the most part. Now it’s influencers and bloggers. There’s new media platforms, traditional press, trade [publications], podcasts, etc.

All that is to say, PR is no longer a one-trick pony. That is the approach I think a lot of agencies are still doing, even though they know it’s a wider range. Your clients come to you like, “I want press.” So naturally, you feel the need to give a client what they want.

But that’s still not satisfying clients?

So a lot of times, the agencies deliver press even in significant publications. For example, we had a client and we got them placed in TechCrunch, which is a huge deal. But they still ended up dropping us a month later. You need to become a jack of all trades. That’s why clients drop. Even though you’re getting them in Byrdie beauty, Marie Claire and reputable publications, it’s not driving the results that they are looking for. Covid-19 changed how we digest information. I wholeheartedly believe it’s just diversifying. [Things have] changed and people digest information differently, so it requires us to just diversify our efforts.

You mentioned that press is not your sales or marketing team. Talk about that frustration. 

PR does support the [marketing] funnel and it does help a lot of those marketing functions. But at the end of the day, PR will not alone drive your dollars. It definitely does support those functions. However, it’s not going to give you that spike that you’re looking for. If you’re in the startup [stage], your PR program should look different than if you are in that mid-stage, where people know about your brand and your brand has some momentum behind it. The program should look different, but we approach them the same. That causes a little bit of pain points. 

Is the onus on agencies or clients to find the resolve?

Both. Agencies just want to please clients and do what they want. But it requires agencies to be bold and say, “You think you know what you want, but just trust me on this. This is going to get you there.” Clients have misconceptions. Sometimes, honestly, clients just want vanity press. There’s [a] misconception on the client side, which leads agencies to just want to please them, do what they want and not be bold enough to say, “Let’s redirect, I think you need this, actually.”

What would it take to get everyone on the same page?

Having clients who are open to being redirected would be a huge, huge component. There is education needed from the PR agency side to educate clients on exactly what you’re going to get from this. That’s one of the solutions, educating clients to understand what they need and not just letting them tell you what they want. You hired me to be your expert. Let me talk you through this and walk you through what this landscape looks like, and how we can get you to where you want to go.