• by Wayne Friedman , June 8, 2018

New ways to target audiences also means higher costs to marketers. There is some silver lining here: Your existing media agency tools are still a decent place to start.

“The agency tool kit is actually pretty good,” says Josh Martin, executive vice president-head of mass acquisition media at Performics, speaking at MediaPost’s TV & Video Insider Summit. Martin says syndicated research companies such as MRI are helpful.

In addition to looking at cable networks' age and demographics, the agency will ask “if the viewer is staying for the full length of the program. Are they also staying tuned to the commercial break?,” asks Martin.

As a way of measuring results for his agency, Martin compared network selection criteria to programmatic TV providers.

“There was perhaps 90% overlap in placements, [with] a few points of differentiation,” he said. This differentiation, he said, might be due to talent, content issues or sports sponsorship element.

Future targeting tools -- first-party, second-party and other data -- continue to hold promise, he says.  

For example, when users consider back surgery or back remedies from a number of providers, agencies can target specific audiences -- say people with bone spurs, bulging disks or pinched nerves. “The idea of age and demo is meaningless,” he says. 

Results include lifts in engagement, metrics and possible media spend. Martin says costs in ad targeting can be four to six times more. Better targeting and segmenting can work, even when it comes to somewhat longer creative.

James Chanter, media director of m/Six, says for a financial-services marketer client, there was a 85%+ video completion rate for a three-and-half-minute spot, when comparing new targeted audiences versus generic audiences. And the spot was skippable.

But doing similar new targeting for a jewelry marketer, with higher CPMs, didn’t work as well. Its website activity grew 30% to 40%, with sale revenues only improving 15%.  

“So in that instance, targeting didn’t work,” he says. Chanter says this could be due to the narrow luxury space. Alternately, he believes going toward more mass marketing -- at a lower CPM -- would have seen better results.