The Future of Measurement is Commercial
“What began over 35 years ago ends tonight”. The latest Star Trek sequel named after one of its most famous character Captain Picard has come to a, more or less, satisfactory end for its fans. A fascinating story that’s been spanning over more than five decades. The key to its success? It has reinvented itself constantly to retain existing and attract new fans while staying true to its core storyline of exploring strange new worlds, seeking out new life and new civilizations, and to boldly go where no man has gone before.
Within marketing measurement and analytics, there is a similar story to be told. Marketing Mix Modeling (MMM) has been around for decades, helping brands optimize their marketing mix and related activities, helping them discover new marketing strategies with an analytical, data-driven approach. There have been add-ons to it, and sequels like Multi Touch Attribution (MTA) building on new technological features which came along with digitalization – which now have to come to an end with the death of the third-party cookie.
However, recent changes within the larger economic and marketing ecosystem have resurfaced the need for classic MMM – but they are also making clear that MMM must evolve to speak to that ever-changing market. To help identify what’s necessary now for future success, Analytic Partners contributed to the WARC Future of Measurement report and have helped to highlight three key messages for brands to consider when building their marketing measurement program.
- The trend towards the full commercial picture
Given its backward-looking, higher-level approach, classic MMM offers a satellite view and does not have the capacity to capture the complexity of all the drivers of consumer behavior. MTA can help track and analyze each marketing touchpoint a customer experiences before a sale. Combined, they’ve become a unified solution.
However, this is only a one-dimensional snapshot and today’s increasing complexity is calling for brands to look at the larger picture. They must combine all internal and external factors, such as demand, inflation, and pricing, with the larger goals of the business and the customer journey. That’s why MMM has to evolve to the full commercial picture which is what we call Commercial Analytics.
- Measuring the long and short across all media
“Short-termism neglects the fact that marketing campaigns and channels work in synergy, unfolding their true impact over time.”
Maren Seitz, Senior Director
A second crucial differentiator of MMM over other measurement solutions is the capability of measuring long-term effects. The rise of MTA is often attributed to the focus on short-term goals, which has recently been only increased by the fear of a recession and the need to prove marketing’s instant worth.
Just like Les Binet, Head of Effectiveness at adam&eveDDB, and Peter Field, critically acclaimed marketing effectiveness consultant, have pointed it out clearly in their work “The Long and the Short of It”, we are also seeing in our ROI Genome research just how important the long-term impact is for a brand’s success. Moreover, we have constantly made the case to leverage channel synergies and build out a cross-media measurement approach for a more effective use of marketing budget.
- Asking the right questions now for future success
External and long-term growth factors differ depending on industry and brand. That’s why brands must be clear on what they want to achieve with their marketing strategy and always keep their business’ overall commercial success in mind. The McDonald’s CEO, Chris Kempczinski, just made it very clear in a recent interview: “As goes our brand so goes the economic health of the company”.
These goals and KPIs lead to all following decisions and should be the center of evaluation and analytics. However, there is a clear need for remaining agile as well as external factors are constantly changing.A more holistic, commercial view allows brands to go from just asking the question of “Is my advertising working right now?” to a much broader approach that focuses on the whole business, adaptive decision-making and scenario planning.This enhances its ability to be flexible and adjust according to market and brand conditions as needed, versus needing to reassess strategy and process when questions are open-ended.
Shaping the future
Marketing Mix Modeling has come a long way since the first season. Due to its strong foundation and great core story, it is now experiencing a true renaissance. Just like any good series has to adapt to new pop trends in order to remain relevant, there are factors that are shaping in what areas is has to evolve now to help brands grow in the future.
Marketing measurement, the final frontier. These are the voyages of Commercial Analytics. Its mission: To explore new media, to seek out new channels and customers, to boldly go where no marketing initiative has gone before – more granular, holistic and adaptive than ever before.
