• by Steve McClellan  @mp_mcclellan, April 30, 2013

After months of working on the effort, UM’s Custom Content division has adopted UM’s proprietary cross-media measurement platform known as AMP to create a process for proving the effectiveness of branded content.

The work was spearheaded by Mike Siegenthaler, UM chief experience officer, who oversees the Custom Content unit at the agency, part of IPG Mediabrands.

According to Siegenthaler, measurement -- or the lack of it -- has been a barrier to wider adoption of branded content by marketers. So has the relatively higher cost of branded content compared to more traditional forms of advertising, like TV spots or print ads.

Now, UM has AMP-derived metrics that prove content created for specific brands can be significantly more effective at boosting brand awareness, purchase preference and sales, among other measurements, says Siegenthaler.

“Custom content costs more,” said Siegenthaler. “It takes more people, more time and more thought. The question for the client has been is it worth the extra time and expense. Now we can quantify it.”

Just as important, he said, the new metrics help the agency determine what types of content better help move the needle for specific brands.

Generally, the agency has found that custom vignettes lead to the highest increases in awareness, while in-show integrations have much larger lifts in brand research. Both formats seem to lead to boosts in purchase preference -- although vignettes a little more so, per the data.

Custom content used to be considered a “one-off” value-added component to a media buy, said Siegenthaler. “We think that approach is antiquated,” he said. Marketers should think of content as part of their broader integrated plan. Now, he says, UM has the metrics to back up that argument.

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