• by November 27, 2002

As media planners and buyers gear up for 2003, a recent Mediapost executive poll finds that consumers are still receptive to good advertising, even though theiy're bombarded with it.

"Consumers don't hate advertising. They hate advertising that's boring. We¹re getting that kind of feedback. Consumers understand ads are part of their world," says Cheryl Idell, president of Intermedia Advertising Group, a New York firm that tracks prime-time advertising on the broadcast networks. Idell says that in her firm's experience, the best advertisements entertain as well as tout the benefits of a product. Idell says there should be attention focused on the placement of media, which, while not necessarily more important to an ad's effectiveness than powerful creative, is still crucial. "[Powerful creative] doesn't matter if no one sees it," she says.

Agencies are also placing greater insistence on accountability by advertisers who want to know where their money is going and who is seeing their ads. Mark Ingall, chief media officer at Citibank, says the accountability process is key for advertisers. Many are taking it upon themselves to determine whether their ads are working instead of relying on agencies, Ingall says.

"It's remarkable that accountability is something people talk about now," says Idell, who notes that accountability should have been an issue 10 or 20 years ago. Driving this move toward accountability is the fact that there are tools today that didn¹t exist previously, she says. "Now, you can't say, I'm not sure."

Fallon media director Lisa Seward says she hopes that the human element won't be lost in the drive to measure results. "My fear is that people will build black boxes. Take human subjectivity out of the argument and we'll all be lost," she warns.