Challenge for 2010: Finding a way to measure commoditisation
Claire Myerscough, News International Commercial business intelligence director, explains how commoditisation can create a false economy for advertisers …
As the worst of the recession is probably behind us and consumer confidence is much higher compared to a year ago, we can now observe what’s a very different media landscape. For those of us lucky enough to be in gainful employment, we can see new company agendas emerging, new business models, better collaboration across the industry and for the consumer, an even more attentive and tailored media scene.
A major challenge for all of us in 2010 is to find a way of measuring engagement, creativity and integration in hard numbers that is acceptable industry wide. The need for this has been exacerbated by the recession and the media industry must take on the challenge and consider ways to tackle this. The ascendancy of commoditisation, which has rapidly accelerated is another reason why we must understand better the true value of our audiences and be able to explain them with accuracy.
Commoditisation is not necessarily a bad thing, it can make life a lot easier for some! Transparency, accountability, return on investment, we know aren’t just buzz words to justify spend from advertisers. They have a hugely important role to play in the communication process and commoditisation should not get in the way of creativity, good planning and the value of desirable, engaged audiences. This is the ugly side of commoditisation; it is not always the case that one and one equals two.
How do we measure, for example, the value of an internet user who spends a significant amount of time reading an article, commenting on it and posting it to their own blog versus an internet user who logs on to a site to check their email and then logs off. Are they simply just two different unique users?
And is the reader of a Sunday broadsheet that spends hours engrossed in their newspaper absorbing, digesting and disseminating its content to their family and peers the same as somebody who flicks through a copy of their friends newspaper to kill time?
Lets not forget that all of us in the ad industry are consumers too and we know the answer, in both cases, is no. But commoditisation would say yes. So how do we tackle this? There are a myriad of options and measurements. One theme that we have been investigating at NI is that of “influence”. So what do we mean by influence? In very simple terms we can break it out into three areas:
- The ability of a medium to influence its audience
- The ability of that audience to influence its peer group
- The influence of consumption mindset
If a medium is actively consumed and its audience is deeply engaged with the content and that the content then has an influential effect on them (whether it be direct action or the way they think) then there is a significant value attached to this.
And if the audience of a medium is more likely to influence its peer group – friends, family or within the workplace – then that’s better still. Finally, if the way content is consumed means it is more likely to be absorbed and acted upon then there is an even bigger benefit.
When we combine these factors it’s clear there’s a significant increase in value; one unique user doesn’t equal another, one reader is not the same as another. This additional “value” becomes even more weighty when we consider the modern purchase cycle is much more fluid. However, commoditisation doesn’t accurately reflect this – it treats eyeballs as equals.
That said, we have to appreciate that we are in an era of commoditisation, and therefore must adapt appropriately. At News International Commercial, we are currently exploring how we will measure the influence of different platforms, brands and audiences in a quantifiable way. This includes employing the latest digital listening tools to track the influence and impact of both content and commercial messages and using Touchpoints to further our knowledge and understanding of how and when consumers are most likely to encounter and be open to communication.
There’s a big challenge here. Whenever we want to take into account an attribute that is above and beyond basic ‘reach’ or ‘eyeballs’ we must measure it in an irrefutable way so that its value can be quantified in the planning process, because commoditisation is here to stay, but it shouldn’t be at the expense of good planning, creativity and audience value.