Brand advertising is an investment.

Even the most cautious of CFOs now accept that brand advertising is an investment, not a cost. Done right, brand advertising creates long term equity that has a positive effect on future sales. Brand econometrics* has shown that a 1% improvement in consideration and awareness drives a 1% increase in future sales and decreases acquisition costs by 1%.

With small movements creating significant commercial value, it’s essential for your business to maximise brand impact - and embrace brand metrics as a leading indicator of future success.

*Nielsen ROI database

Embrace media fragmentation

Gone are the days of buying a spot in X-factor and putting your feet up. Media fragmentation means, to reach the mass-market, plans now require a bewildering level of complexity. As the IPA put it, it’s “increasingly complex to effectively engage with consumers and optimise media spend accordingly.”

Being able to compare apples with apples is vital to being able to understand campaign performance in this fragmented world. Measurement needs to work across and between media, and especially behind Meta and TikTok’s walled gardens. You can’t optimise your media spend if you’re letting media owners mark their own homework. So, you need measurement which is single-source, cross-media, independent and consistent.

*IPA’s Making Sense: The Commercial Media Landscape 2023

Cross-media plans are magic

1+1 = 2.8. Let us explain: Cross-media campaigns are 2.8 times more effective than single media campaigns*. We call it the Magic Multiplier - because the right combination of media can multiply the impact of your advertising just like magic. You might have heard it called cognitive reinforcement  or the orchestra effect, but the crucial point is this beyond a mere exposure effect.

By measuring the role each media plays in campaign effectiveness - both individually and in combination - you can move planning from an art to a science. If you want to maximise the effectiveness of your advertising investment, you need to combine granular cross-media measurement to identify and leverage this media magic.

*delta between control and exposed for prompted awareness, brand consideration and purchase intent. Base: Brand awareness: (Single n=387/Multi n=270 studies); Consideration: (Single n=359/Multi n=242 studies); Intent: (Single n=342/Multi n=236 studies). 

Respect your respondents

Not enough thought is given to who is answering your brand lift surveys. The hard work you put into measurement can be instantly eroded during the market research stage. When you combine the high-risk of poor-quality survey answers with a constantly-changing signal and consent environment, the need for a trusted first-party panel becomes obvious.

With our consumer app, Curious Cat, we’ve worked hard to build mutual trust with our panel. We deliver a fun, rewarding experience and in return consumers opt-in to a range of measurement technologies. We’ve also implemented photo ID verification and sophisticated anti-fraud measures to protect the community. A trusted first-party panel is a crucial element of effective brand measurement, enabling accurate exposure attribution and ensuring quality research data.

Data is not insight

Data is only powerful if it leads to actions. Technology has made always-on brand measurement fast and affordable. This produces a sea of data, so we’ve enthusiastically embraced automation and AI for data processing, basic analysis and charting. But when it comes to understanding what’s driving advertising effectiveness, there’s no replacement for the human touch and we strongly believe in a managed service approach. From custom balancing for market context to interpreting differences in creative performance, human insight is invaluable.

Research expertise is even more vital when it comes to turning these insights into solid recommendations. To continually enhance effectiveness, you need the right choices to be made to achieve the right balance of outcomes. Data is just the starting point. To succeed you need expert researchers who unlock valuable insights and make informed decisions about what to do next.