• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, November 19, 2018

Many brands have moved major advertising budgets from traditional to digital media, but they lack the proper metrics from data to prove that the move capitalizes on programmatic technology.

Measuring metrics that matter and creating custom indicators that correlate to a brand preference or increase in sales should be the goal of all marketers.

“Most of the marketers we spoke with were still measuring traditional KPIs like cost per visit,” said Matt Sweeney, CEO of Xaxis North America, explaining that it told the marketers that consumers were making the purchase, but there was no way to know the value of the sale because most people don’t click on the ad -- not the dollar value, but long-term value as a customer.

A survey of 1,000 brand marketers in the U.S. and 501 in Canada reveals that 86% are likely to increase their investment in what Sweeney calls “outcome-driven media,” which means different things depending on the type of business.

The survey was commissioned by Xaxis, the Outcome Media Company and GroupM’s programmatic media arm.

U.S. marketers admit to still using click-through rates (CTR), cost per acquisition (CPA) and cost per click (CPC) as their top forms of metrics, while marketers in Canada use CPA, CPC and cost per engagement (CPE) as their top metrics. In fact, 23% of U.S. marketers still use CTRs and 21% use CPAs.

About 87% in the U.S. and 84% in Canada who are participating in the study said they used one or more custom KPIs to determine the impact of digital display campaigns on measurable business results. And 86% in U.S., but only 68% in Canada, agreed strongly or somewhat that it was essential for digital campaigns to drive a direct correlation.

Some 80% of marketers surveyed agreed that being able to link business objectives to digital media spend positively impacted their marketing budget.

While 80% of marketers in both countries believe these primary metrics are either somewhat or very effective, 72% of US marketers and 64% of Canadian marketers are likely to change their primary metrics in the next 24-48 months.

Every engagement brings the consumer close to the sale. And each engagement has a value to it. Marketers know the majority of consumers still buy from an automotive dealer, although they research the cars online. And their engagement with features on the website, such as a finance calculator or tool to design a car, brings the consumer closer to making the purchase. Each one of those actions should have a metric to determine the success or failure of the campaign.  

That’s what marketers are looking for, Sweeney said -- marketers want a digital metric to indicate the effectiveness.