For years, it was taken on faith that television advertising worked. It drove viewers to auto showrooms, opened movies and made products fly off the shelf.
Now in the digital era, faith has been replaced by data and TV networks are generating proof of the effectiveness of commercials and using newly available information about their viewers to more precisely target their clients’ messages
At Future’s Advanced Advertising Summit in New York on March 24, part of NYC TV Week Spring, a panel of top industry executives will look at how return on investment is being calculated and the growing trend of media outlets guaranteeing that the ads they sell will create results in the marketplace.
The panel will be led by former Fox executive VP Bruce Lefkowitz, now head of the consulting firm Six Pack Media.
“Technology is a great democratizer. As a result, we continue to get closer to performance-based allocation of media. Companies that are willing to put their money where their mouths are and stray from the antiquated age/sex demo currency will surely be rewarded,” Lefkowitz said. “To be sure, this is not an overnight process, but those who believe in their relationship with their audiences and the power of their consumers will have the ability to grow exponentially if they can prove and guarantee it.”
Lefkowitz’s panel will include senior execs from Spark Foundry, FreeWheel, iSpot.TV and Samba TV.
Some of the questions they’re likely to address include assessing the risk of guaranteeing outcomes and degree of proof of concept needed --on a category by category basis before a media company is willing to make a guarantee. The panel will also assess which outcomes are worth guaranteeing, such as web visits or sales volume.
“People who attend this panel will get an exceptional return on the time they invest,” said Jon Lafayette, business editor of Broadcasting+Cable, a Future plc publication. “I guarantee it.”
