show me the money - Ebiquity

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INTERNATIONAL

MARCOMMS INSIGHTS FROM EBIQUITY

SHOW ME THE MONEY

The media agency business has become less, not more, transparent in recent years. Nick Manning explains what clients can do about it. Let’s get together Reputation Management | Bringing content to life Innovations in Media | the future of media auditing media auditing Watch your position television | How to succeed in the BRICs Advertising Insight | Get more from your media plan media planning View more insights at ebiquityopinion.com Issue number 6, Autumn 2011

AGENCY renumeration

SHOW ME THE MONEY

Show me the money The media agency business has become less, not more, transparent in recent years. Nick Manning explains what clients can do about it. Once upon a time the mysterious ways in which media agencies made their money were simply never discussed. Now there is more open discussion about rebates and the other benefits that media owners give agencies, but there’s still comparatively little real scrutiny of the way money flows through the market. Some advertisers are being given some of the non-trading benefits earned by agencies investing their media budgets and some are not, but there is as yet no clear pattern. Client contracts that date back even a few years often do not deal with the issue at all, although many advertisers have now renegotiated to ensure greater transparency; it is now also a fairly uniform feature of media agency pitch briefs. Unfortunately, in recent years the media transaction chain has become less rather than more transparent for two key reasons. Firstly, the level of rebates that media agencies receive has risen. The economic downturn of 2008/2009 triggered a significant fall in media-owner revenues. Some responded by increasing the Agency Volume Bonuses (AVBs) to incentivise volume or share. Paradoxically, the media channels that have increased rebates by the greatest amount are those that have seen their revenues eroded most. Print, in particular, has been at the forefront of this approach but there are also some eye-watering rebate deals for online campaigns. It is estimated that media agencies are now making more money from AVBs than ever before. This is even after they have refunded some of the cash to those advertisers that have negotiated the return of rebates earned from their money. The second reason that the media business has become less transparent is the creation of buying “super-groups” such as Group M and Vivaki.

Such buying groups not only oversee deals for the media agency brands they represent but also negotiate benefits for themselves, including AVBs, free inventory, later payment terms, research advantages and other forms of value. Unfortunately, there is little transparency between the buying groups and the clientfacing agency brands. As a result, the detail behind these deals does not generally find its way down to agency level. Since most clients don’t have a right of audit at group level, there is no way to follow the monetary trail from start to finish.

“The opacity of the media-buying business poses some tough challenges for even the best financial sleuths.”

Impact on strategy Rising AVBs are more than just a nice little earner for agencies, they also incentivise them to favour rebate-richer media. Out-of-home may be recommended as a suitable vehicle, for example, partly because it tends to offer greater rebates than other media. And even within out of home, choice of creative unit or contractor can potentially be influenced in the same way. If a media-buying group commits to deliver a certain volume of advertising to a particular medium or vehicle, there is also the danger that client monies may be inefficiently diverted to reach that target. Brand owners need to understand which media channels offer the highest AVBs, and within those media channels, which media vendors and formats attract the most rebate. This varies enormously from medium-to-medium and country to country. It might be thought that the involvement of procurement would put a stop to such machinations. However, the opacity of the media-buying business poses some tough challenges for even the best financial sleuths. They struggle with an agency culture that is not transparent and rarely volunteers up information. As a result, they have become suspicious of the evasion and tardiness they routinely encounter. View more insights at ebiquityopinion.com

SHOW ME THE MONEY Confusion is exacerbated by the fact that some rebates are used as part of the media discount purchasing process as opposed to a year-end financial rebate. This especially applies to free inventory negotiated as part of a group deal. It’s particularly hard for advertisers to audit the value of the “softer” benefits that agencies negotiate, such as deferred payment terms.

Finding a solution The first step to a solution is for clients to recognise the need to reward and incentivise their media agency properly for the work they carry out, with appropriate benefits for outstanding performance. This doesn’t just apply to media buying, although this is probably the most measurable element; agencies should be appropriately rewarded for strategic excellence, smart planning, the integration of channels and other vital disciplines as well. Clients may want full transparency – right up to holding company level – but this can only be achieved realistically if the media agency

AGENCY renumeration is sufficiently well-remunerated to be able to afford to provide it. Marketers and procurement departments must recognise that if the base level of remuneration is not sufficient to fund the services needed, it’s not advisable to insist on full transparency. Clients also need to concentrate on contract compliance; media agencies have traditionally not excelled in demonstrating full compliance, and this needs to change if the media agency sector wants to be viewed as a proper business partner. Best-practice should involve quarterly certification of contract compliance, provided by people who have full access to all of the workings of the agency group, including at a local level, as compliance doesn’t always trickle down to all media agency offices. The vital component in the discussion between client and media agency is trust and this may require a truce on past ways of working as previous lack of transparency and less-than-full disclosure can contaminate the relationship. The real answer, as ever, lies in thorough and honest negotiations and a crystal-clear contract that minimises ambiguity. This takes longer, is more complex and can cause tension, but given the scale of media agency appointments these days, it’s worth taking a couple of extra months to finalise a long-term contract. Media agencies are going through a transition from opacity to transparency. That process will take time, but with goodwill and honesty throughout the various stakeholders, the media industry can achieve the eventual goal of a more transparent, more responsible and professional way of working. Nick Manning is Managing Director for Business Development at Ebiquity

View more insights at ebiquityopinion.com

“Rising AVBs are more than just a nice little earner for agencies, they also incentivise them to favour rebate-richer media.”

reputation management

LET’S GET TOGETHER

Let’s get to

Social media demands that companies link both their paid Andrew Challier asks what t In the age of the informed consumer, big brands are subject to an unprecedented level of scrutiny. That scrutiny extends way beyond the confines of their products and financial performance. If brands are under the microscope, it is social media which has provided the means to dramatically increase the order of magnification. The bigger the brand, the bigger the target, and so the bigger the threat posed by what would historically be labelled a ‘PR crisis’ but which now should be seen just as much as a ‘brand crisis’. BP, Toyota, almost any bank and, most recently, News International have all suffered from the attentions of the social media ‘chatterati’ as well as the mainstream media. On the plus side, however, the opportunity to manage the crisis – via the same social media channels – is greater than it ever has been. We all recognise that ‘reputation management’ seeks to mitigate the negative and accentuate the positive. In this new world, however, we also need to recognise that reputation management is no longer the preserve of the Corporate Affairs function, nor is ‘brand management’ the sole preserve of Marketing. The consequences of misaligned communication have never been more critical. A greater variety of influencers Reputations and brands are impacted by a wide variety of stakeholders, internal (staff ) and external (consumers, investors, lobbyists etc) and businesses need a way to measure, manage and influence these various constituencies. Paid media is an important part – but only a part – of the picture. Brands need to benchmark and analyse both paid and unpaid media, to help identify both the ‘danger signs’ and the opportunities.

To create effective tools, a brand needs to understand the context for how its key products (within key markets) – and those of its competitors - are being discussed in social (and editorial) media around the world. This helps start to build an understanding of the issues of most importance and how they might choose to engage with relevant groups/audiences in a relevant way. At the same time, by benchmarking paid-for messaging versus their principal competitors, companies can analyse the extent to which they are able to ‘own’ important topics and the extent to which they or their competitors are achieving better alignment between what is seen as important and the messages transmitted. Benchmarking the price paid for that media and the quality of its placement completes this circle. Choosing the right measures and tools There is an increasing amount of message monitoring software available to brands – paid, unpaid and social media etc. Most of it adds little value: whilst it aggregates the data, it lacks the human intelligence to draw meaningful, business-relevant conclusions. Clients are demanding an integrated ‘vital signs’ marcomms monitoring service tailored to their individual needs. Such a system need not be complex (in fact, the less complex the better), but the benefit is magnified when the total picture is assembled from a single, impartial perspective. And it only works to its true potential when brands have identified the correct KPIs within the business that can be reasonably linked to the benchmarking.

View more more insights insights at at ebiquityopinion.com ebiquityopinioncom View

reputation management

LET’S GET TOGETHER

et together

heir paid and unpaid communications and measurement. s what this means for brands. While brands might wish for the holy grail of a ‘one size fits all’ brand optimisation tool – simply drop all the ingredients in the top, pull a lever (or push a button) and out drops an optimised plan at the bottom – the reality is that there are very good reasons to use a combination of methodologies and tools. For example, digital measures frequently underplay the contribution of offline marketing and other media ‘levers’ and, while econometric modelling is great at budget allocation and provides a powerful basis for budget optimisation between markets, brands and different channels, it rarely reflects the importance of reputation.

preach, therefore, is to understand how these different measurement techniques are best used – not to provide a universal panacea, but to inform better quality decision making. Andrew Challier is Head of Marketing Investment Management at Ebiquity

Different – and appropriate - techniques are available for measuring the corporate value of reputation. The ‘brand lesson’ which we

Taking action Messaging

Ensure that corporate and brand messaging are aligned – addressing the key issues in a coordinated manner. Example: British Airways is aiming to rekindle pride among staff and consumers via a new ‘heritage’ marketing campaign; the aim is to regain the trust of both the general public and its own employees disillusioned by strike action, cancelled flights and low morale. Organisation Ensure that the company organisation is aligned organisationally. This doesn’t have to imply a merger between corporate affairs and marketing. Example: Nestlé has appointed Pete Blackshaw – author of Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell


3000 – as Global Head of Digital and Social Media, with dual reporting lines into the global heads of both Corporate Affairs and Marketing. Measurement: Ensure that tracking and measurement are able to answer these two questions from a consistent and comparable perspective: – What are people saying about us and our competitors? – What are our competitors saying about themselves? Example: In response to client demand, Ebiquity has developed an integrated message alignment reporting and benchmarking service, which draws upon data from its Portfolio and Echo Sonar monitoring software, and which feeds into both the marketing and corporate affairs functions.

Innovations in Media

BRINGING CONTENT TO LIFE

Bringing con

QR codes seem to be increasingly prominent, but the next step in mak Martin Radford asks if augmented reality The latest advert for the iPad declares: “Today we can watch a newspaper”. It’s the clearest evidence yet that technology is blurring the lines between old and new media. The gradual uptake of QR codes by advertisers shows that brands have not been immune to the possibilities. New technologies enable advertisers to learn more about their consumers, in the same way that websites give a rich array of information each time someone clicks through to interactive content, the brand has the opportunity to learn something about the time, date and location of the consumer as well as tracking the performance of the title, format or ad size. Press and outdoor can begin to provide information in a way never before possible, and in doing so, they could leave traditional TV behind. However, while QR codes have gained momentum recently, other newer technologies based on Augmented Reality (AR) could provide even more impact. Demonstrations to advertising and media agencies have certainly delivered a “wow factor”. The two biggest names in AR are Layar and Aurasma though Cadbury (now part of Kraft) has also been working with Blippar. Amsterdam-based Layar has been around for a couple of years. It’s essentially a locationbased app so when a phone is pointed at an object in the Layar database, content is overlaid on the user’s screen. This can be anything from posters to signs in restaurants. And because it is a proximitybased system, the user doesn’t have to constantly point the phone at the object in question. The new kid on the block is the UK’s Aurasma. Owned by Autonomy (subject of a $10bn bid from HP), the brand’s logo will also

be seen around the world thanks to a shirt sponsorship deal with English Premier League side Tottenham Hotspur. As well as offering location-based possibilities that are similar to Layar, the company is equally focussed on the advertising potential of AR.

Comparing technologies A QR code can take you to a URL, send you a discount offer, make a call or deliver a business card. The amount of information is limited to just 2,677 characters. AR options offer a much more interactive and potentially fun experience with which to engage the consumer. In 2010, Disney created a secondary world for Prince of Persia via Layar, not only bringing posters and their surroundings to life but also adding on an option to find the nearest cinema. In May this year Italian energy firm Enel took the paper aeroplane from its TV campaign to the streets virtually, using Layar technology on their outdoor posters. In the UK Aurasma has secured a couple of notable successes. The technology was first used by Wally Yachts in the Financial Times. Since then, Universal Pictures (Bridesmaids), Panasonic (Lumix G3) and Dunhill have all added an extra dimension to their ads. Panasonic has even used the technology in POS material in 1,500 retail stores throughout the UK. So all three technologies have something to offer and can encourage the consumer to get more involved with advertisers. However, brands also need to be creative to make them really deliver on their potential.

How popular are they? Much of the success of QR codes in Japan was based around the fact that readers were pre-installed in mobile handsets. That’s not


Innovations in Media

BRINGING CONTENT TO LIFE

content to life

p in making ads more responsive and interesting is already out there. ed reality can redraw the media landscape. the case in other markets or for Layer and Aurasma, consumers need to download the appropriate app before they can experience additional content.

platform and then PPC – but even if it doesn’t work first time, it will become a powerful medium in the future.

Aurasma now claims one million downloads, while Layer has ten million, so while there’s clearly an appetite, there’s also a way to go before AR becomes ubiquitous.

The number of smartphones that can access enabled adverts is growing every day and every advertising campaign that uses AR will drive further increases in the number of Layar and Aurasma downloads.

Even at the early stage, however, there are benefits for advertisers. AR content enables a static ad to become a moving image, traditionally a much more effective medium for conveying brand messages.

AR technology will naturally be more suited to some advertisers than others. Brands that are highly visual and emotive – such as technology and media/entertainment – are obvious early adopters for both Layar and Aurasma.

They also generate word of mouth and links that can be retweeted, liked or emailed to other friends will spread virally, delivering added value for brands. This can be enhanced if brands proactively reward consumers for visiting to encourage sharing.

Enel’s foray is interesting but has little additional benefit for the consumer. Brands need to reward consumers for interacting, not just feed them an advert. Money off vouchers, free downloands, additional content or suggestions for accessories will all help AR begin to reach its potential.

So what next? These are early days for AR and it is comparatively untested. Brands should be willing to trial – the costs can be relatively low as Aurasma are offering free access to the

Try for yourself

If you’re an iPhone 4 or smart phone user who wants to try out Aurasma: 1. Search for Aurasma in the Apple app store on your i-phone 4 or in the Android market on your smartphone. 2. Download the Aurasma Lite app. 3. Open the app. Once open your camera will start up. 4. Hold your phone over the front cover of this issue of Response and watch the embedded content stream live. For more examples of Aurasma enabled advertising see the Ebiquity blog ebiquityopinion.com


Martin Radford is Media Business Director at Ebiquity (UK)

MEDIA AUDITING

THE FUTURE OF MEDIA AUDITING

The future of me

Media auditors need to show clients how they can than simply being limited to checking the agency buy “Media auditors need to move on from just acting as a validation tool for checking the work of media agencies.”

This summer’s US debt financing crisis was a stark reminder of the transformation of the global economy. The world has changed: Western economies are struggling as emerging markets thrive. All businesses including media auditors need to respond. Big global companies are having to come to terms with a more complex picture, managing costs in the low-growth developed markets while at the same time keeping on top of the more unfamiliar and volatile regions of growth. For many, media is one of their biggest budgetary lines and the measurement of value from that budget is a critical component of good marketing. In an era of marketing

accountability, setting and monitoring progress against KPIs is becoming mandatory. Auditing and auditors need to be part of the solution, demonstrating their ability to improve financial returns, through industry insight and bespoke analysis based around return on investment that truly identifies what’s effective and what’s not. Achieving this future sets a challenge for the auditing industry. While well-established in some companies and some parts of the world, the practice is still an embryonic activity for many corporations, especially in emerging markets. Media auditors need to make three key structural shifts, extending their reach in emerging markets, building out a new reputation beyond checking media agency performance and finally demonstrate the ability to deliver analysis that can provide the rationale for key business decisions. Global brands certainly need the skills that media auditors provide as they look for business growth in emerging markets. In many such countries media inflation is high and media ownership can be highly concentrated, making poor media investment decisions increasingly expensive. This represents a major opportunity, if media auditors can also start to focus on real outputs and provide actionable data that helps inform good business decisions. Outputs not inputs Media auditors need to move on from just acting as a validation tool for checking the work of media agencies. Media auditing has traditionally been used to prove rather than improve performance. The term “auditing” itself appears to indicate that it is merely a “boxticking” exercise designed to ensure the media agency has done its job and earned its bonus. This is still a worthwhile role and most big companies now have the metrics in place to View more more insights insights at at ebiquityopinion.com ebiquityopinion.com View

MEDIA AUDITING

THE FUTURE OF MEDIA AUDITING

media auditing

hey can deliver improved financial returns rather ncy buying performance. Martin Sambrook explains. measure buying performance, although increasingly this is handled by procurement and seen as a purely financial discipline. Most media auditing, as currently conducted, measures inputs rather than outputs. A campaign can be interrogated against intermediary KPIs such as dayparts and “position in pod” to discover whether it helped improved brand performance. Media auditing can also make a valuable contribution in other areas, however, but only if media auditors see their role as “media performance measurement” rather than mere performance-checking. This is not just a semantic nicety. The difference between “the agency did a good job” and “the agency did a good job compared to a stretch target versus last year” is a big one. In simple terms, media performance measurement needs to become one element in a joined-up assessment programme designed to tighten up every aspect of the marketing mix. If a brand can improve its media productivity by, say, 5%, there is every reason to suggest that this will help improve brand performance by an equivalent amount, all others things being equal. Making data actionable The third change that media auditors needs to make is to ensure their advice is more comparable both between media and across borders and as well as being used more widely within client companies. We need to create benchmarks that compare the performance and returns not just of individual media but also investments in different countries. By understanding the contribution of marketing to a brand’s success, measured primarily via metrics such as sales, View more more insights insights at at ebiquityopinion.com ebiquityopinion.com View

profitability and market-share as opposed to softer measures such as awareness and consideration, media auditing will become a tool that can be used to modify investment patterns by brand, by territory, by channel, by period and by other variables to enhance effectiveness and efficiency. Although a good media performance can (and does) make a significant difference to a brand’s performance, as yet most companies do not measure its contribution in a concrete sense. For example, if a brand can get better proportionately better value in Russia versus Germany where growth is greater, then that information helps form the basis of a potential decision on where to invest. If a brand can gain market share by piling up GRPs at lower costs in cable households and reducing prime-time in national channels, that too is a great result. The ability to make such decisions will be helped by like-with-like media performance measures between markets and between channels. Media auditing provides an independent perspective on the best way to achieve brand growth. However, this will not happen if media auditing sits on its own – as it does in many companies – unrelated to other measurement disciplines. In short, media auditing needs to become not just the measurement of inputs, but be part of a tool-kit that analyses brand performance in classic ROI terms and plays its part in helping to explain what makes brands perform better or worse. Clients need to act too Achieving these changes is a big challenge: media auditors can expand their networks and skill sets but it will also take action from brand owners.

They rightly demand more from media auditors, looking for more relevant and robust data against which to make significant business decisions. But marketers also need to empower us to incorporate data analytics and the increasingly sophisticated collection, interpretation and analysis of that data, applied as part of an end-to-end measurement programme and rooted in “proper” ROI analytics. Ultimately, the future of media auditing is the use of media performance measurement as part of a continuous improvement programme throughout the marketing cycle. The pursuit of accountability in today’s complex and volatile business world holds out the promise of a bright future. Martin Sambrook is International Media Practice Leader at Ebiquity

TELEVISION

WATCH YOUR POSITION

Watch your position The switch to C3 Ratings has encouraged US broadcasters to play with the advertising break. Brands need to be increasingly careful about where they appear. PJ Leary explains.

Four years is a long time in broadcasting. But over that period we have seen the gradual erosion of key elements of legacy ad deals that have major implications for marketers.

break as a whole. Instead of attempting to rotate spots to appease client demand, broadcasters have effectively been incentivized to structure the break for their own benefit.

The arrival of C3 Ratings – viewing data that incorporates live viewing plus delayed playback for three days – has done more than simply highlight how many of us watch programs after they have been broadcast.

How C3 Ratings shift power

They have also created an environment where it is in a broadcaster’s interest to shift “dull” ads from first in pod to the middle of the break in order to boost their revenue. Decade old-agreements on fair and equitable positioning within the break are shifting in favor of a strategy that boosts total viewing for each advertising

To understand how we have moved from an era of advertisers’ interests to broadcaster power, it’s worth looking back at the reasons why the US adopted C3 Ratings in the first place. For a long time Network TV buyers negotiated ad rates on the basis of the program ratings only and not on the basis of how many viewers stayed tuned to the ads. Whether a program was particularly good or particularly bad at retaining its audience through the commercial break was essentially irrelevant.


TELEVISION

WATCH YOUR POSITION All of this changed at the start of the 2007-08 broadcast season when the Network TV negotiation currency shifted to an average of all commercial minutes during live programming combined with all commercial viewing within three-days of the air date. Commercials fast-forwarded when viewers are playing back a program were not and are not factored in the ratings. The major reasons behind the shift was the growth in DVR penetration and the fact that shows such as American Idol and The Office were attracting more than two-million time-shifted viewers. The shift was good news for some sectors but tougher for others to deal with. According to Nielsen, 95% of all timeshifted viewing occurs with three days of first airing. Packaged goods advertisers, for example, can accept such a delay with relative ease. Some categories, on the other hand, are still hypersensitive to the issue. Movie studios, by way of example, typically have a very small window within which to accumulate awareness and boost box office results. In these instances, a sharp buyer can carefully analyze time-shifted ratings to help clarify where a buy might be better placed and select programs that experience minimal time-shifting.

Strategic use of position in pod The weakness of the new system is that C3 Ratings for advertisers are based on average ratings for each break. Position in break, the length of the break and commercial length do not have any impact. All this makes position in break highly significant. Ebiquity research indicates that an advertiser receiving the first position in a pod can achieve a 28% lift in ad awareness compared to advertisers receiving mid-break placements. Broadcasters gain, however, when more viewers stay for more of the break. Their goal is to minimize audience exodus and maintain a higher average viewership across the break, thereby increasing advertising revenue. C3 Ratings incentivize broadcasters to influence the sequencing of ad content. And if broadcasters can increase their ratings by changing the ad sequence, you can bet they’ll do it.


So a clever, catchy ad for a new tablet is more likely to lead the break, followed by a movie premiere ad. Messages for toilet paper and high cholesterol medications are likely to get buried in the middle – and less effective – portion of the break. In a world where broadcasters have an agenda in programming ad positions – and the ratings methodology encourages them do it – the first attempts at influencing the ratings are likely to be based on “gut” while they test and measure the impact of various strategies. Pharmaceutical advertisers, in particular, will want to watch this space carefully and be armed with data on ad engagement to prove their case if they witness any performance degradation.

The traditional rhetoric from broadcasters to media buyers has always been “we strive for a fair and equitable rotation” of premium positions in break. That’s no longer in their interest. In the age of C3 Ratings, our recommendation to advertisers is to prepare yourselves with data, collect relevant insights and negotiate your best position. Advertisers are right to fight for “gold standard” positions in pod (first, second or last) and should insist that they get their fair share or better.

PJ Leary is Ebiquity’s North American CEO

Other sectors may see greener pastures because their ads are more inclined to garner higher ad awareness (either as the result of ad engagement, product category interest or both).

Ratings in the PVR age Pedro Oliveira, Director General, Ebiquity (Portugal)

Tests over Easter 2011 revealed that total TV viewing was 5% higher when the impact of PVR playback over seven days was included alongside the live viewing numbers. Based on 60 households, the results show that the most time-shifted dayparts were 10.00-12.30 and 20.0022.30. Consumers aged 25-44 were most likely to watch after the live broadcast and top programs included cable news channels, sitcoms and contest shows. Rouvern Dankert, Media Director, Ebiquity (Germany)

New set-top boxes designed to incorporate time-shifted and out of home viewing into the ratings were first introduced in July 2009. Only 2.3% of the ratings panel have PVRs but within these households 77.6% of time-shifting happens within three days of broadcast and is thus included in the official ratings. Overall, linear viewing still accounts for 99.6% of overall TV viewing among 14-49 year-olds.

Out of home TV viewing is accounted for by asking guests to sign in when they watch in a panel household. This can account for as much as 5% of viewing in primetime on Saturdays. Key genres are sport and entertainment shows such as the Eurovision Song Contest. Andrew Wolstencroft, Media Business Director - TV, Ebiquity (UK)

Although some shows attract a strong non-live audience – Dr Who’s Easter Sunday special was watched live by just 68% of viewers – the vast majority of TV viewing occurs at the moment of broadcast. Live viewing accounts for 96.2% of all commercial break messages. Ratings are issued for shows watched live and on the day of broadcast and as “consolidated data” to include playback within seven days of the original transmission. Official ratings do not as yet include TV viewing on devices other than TV sets, however, research suggests that games consoles, computers and mobile phones account for an additional 1% of TV viewing, rising to 2% among 16-24 year-olds. Web TV viewing will be incorporated from 2012.

ADVERTISING INSIGHT

HOW TO SUCCEED IN THE BRICs

How to succeed in the BRICs More and more companies are looking to Brazil, Russia, India and China to drive growth. Matthew Carlton asks what lessons they can learn from local advertising. In 2001 Goldman Sachs coined the term “BRIC” to highlight the economic potential of Brazil, Russia, India and China. This year many multinational companies have become much more overt about their desire to gain market share in one or more of these four countries. Faced with static or declining economies in their traditional markets, they are looking to growth in the BRICs as the solution to their business challenges. With GDP expected to grow much higher in these economies than the developed world, advertising spend is also following suit. And with more advertising, we are also seeing more creativity and innovation, from both local and those international brands that understand the intricacies of these, often complex, markets. Brazil: Melissa – Power of Love The Campaign: Tapping into Brazilian’s love of creativity, colour and spontaneity, footwear brand Melissa created a huge evolving time-video, which used standard Post-It notes as pixels. The brand used the side of retail outlet Galeria Melissa in Sao Paulo as its canvas and encouraged locals to scribe messages about love on different

coloured Post-Its before adding them to the building’s wall. It took 25 animators more than five months to create the effects for the “Power of Love” campaign that included an effervescent heart flower, dancing elephants and a flying balloon. The initiative not only captivated the passing public but it has generated considerable online buzz, particularly on Orkut, Brazil’s leading social network platform, and enhanced the reputation of this eco-friendly shoe brand in both Brazil and internationally. The Lesson: Understand the nuances of local digital usage. Orkut is serious player in both Brazil and India. Russia: Kozel – Beers for Friends The Campaign: Alcoholism is a huge concern in Russia and as a result no TV adverts can be broadcast before 10pm. Content must also ensure drinks are not portrayed as being innocent and fun. SABMiller-owned beer brand Kozel embarked on a crowd-sourcing campaign to promote its positioning as a quirky, embracing beer with a sense of community. The brand printed codes of each bottle-top and consumers were View more insights at ebiquityopinion.com

ADVERTISING INSIGHT

HOW TO SUCCEED IN THE BRICs

encouraged to collect them via poster and POS activity.

China: Dove – Better Than Milk

After they’d collected eight tops/codes, consumers could send off for two free beers. However, the beers were not for them, but were sent to friends along with a personal message – helping Kozel to update and expand its customer database while also demonstrating the brand’s embracing character. Kozel aimed to target 120,000 people with the campaign, but actually reached more than 170,000, including 116,000 new “friends”.

The Campaign: In 2010 Dove was a small brand in China but it quadrupled its market share within four months through an integrated campaign designed to “liberate Chinese women’s beauty potential”.

The Lesson: SABMiller understood that local legal restrictions could also allow Kozel to be distinctive. Such strategies only work if you have a deep understanding of the regulations.

Extensive research into the beauty habits of Chinese women, revealed that bathing in milk was viewed as the ultimate way of caring for skin and Dove took this as the central message for its campaign. The brand targeted women via QQ, China’s largest social media site, with video content showcasing the product’s attributes, while a ‘Dove vs. Milk’ game allowed women to invite friends to play.

India: Cadbury Dairy Milk Shubh aarambh The Campaign: Indians tend to believe that “things that commence on a sweet note have sweet endings” – such as before exams, before starting a new venture and before setting out on a journey. Rather than gate-crashing tradition, Cadbury Dairy Milk highlighted some contemporary occasions of its own – such as a boy asking a girl out for a first date, or a traditional, sari-wearing, middle-aged lady, trying on a pair of jeans for the first time. These were known as “Shubh aarambh” (auspicious beginning) moments, which became the campaign’s tagline. The message was conveyed to consumers in a number of imaginative ways, including via mobile with all new customers on a leading network receiving a greeting SMS with the “Shubh aarambh” message. The brand also had a heavy presence on websites associated with new beginnings – such as marriage, travel and jobs – and days of the year connected with starting fresh starts, including Diwali, Onam and Dussehra. The expression was widely adopted and the campaign saw brand share increase, with 41% of teens and 29% of adults now saying they would consume chocolate “before starting something new”. The Lesson: Cadbury didn’t just piggyback on a local custom but adapted it and made it more contemporary. International brands need to be careful about simply claiming ownership of local traditions.


Russia: Kozel – Beers for Friends

An accompanying “Milk Bath Test” TV commercial demonstrated the product’s superiority against milk, contributing a market share that increased from 2.1% to 7.6%. The Lesson: Advertising in the BRICs needs to be as sophisticated as any other market. Integrated messages such as that adopted by Dove will always be more successful than one-offs.

Brazil: Melissa – Power of Love

To request a complimentary copy of Insight’s BRIC report covering market overviews and campaign case studies, contact: [email protected] Matthew Carlton is Head of Insight in Ebiquity’s Ad Intelligence Practice. China: Dove – Better Than Milk

Cadbury Dairy Milk - Shubh Aarambh

THE SIX-STEPS TO GET MORE OUT OF YOUR MEDIA PLAN

MEDIA planning

The six-steps to get more out of your media plan When businesses invest in advertising to drive sales, the planning of that investment to maximise return. Ralf Schweitzer highlights six critical factors for success.

The process that leads to a media plan is fluid. Proposals are changed frequently as business priorities shift and budgets are revised.

2. Understand the trade-off between seasonality of demand and seasonality of media cost.

To ensure the final media plan is as effective as the initial proposal, it’s crucial to bear in mind the factors that can be compromised by revision and change. Keeping sight of the following six steps will ensure that even the most-reworked media plan will deliver the best impact for the business.

The cheap summer months for TV often get overlooked because “everyone is on holiday”. When we look at actual data, we often find that whilst sales are usually lower, the percentage fall certainly does not imply that nobody is buying. If the low season coincides with months when media is cheap, then it can be an attractive opportunity to earn a good return on your marketing investment.

1. Understand the business environment you operate in. This should go without saying, but as advertising impact is affected by lots of other factors, timing is crucial. Aligning advertising and promotional activity will trigger multiplier effects, while stronger seasonal leverage might be offset by adverse competitive campaigns. Such complexity can only be understood when you have a solid understanding of all factors affecting your business.

3. Understand the memory effect of your advertising. An advertising message doesn’t lose its impact the moment it ceases to appear on TV or elsewhere. The message stays with the consumer for a period of time. The exact period of retention varies from product to product and campaign to campaign, but understanding how long consumers will continue to act on your message is essential to getting the spacing between each burst of advertising right.


MEDIA planning

THE SIX-STEPS TO GET MORE OUT OF YOUR MEDIA PLAN

4. Understand the number of contacts a consumer needs to take action. Every consumer is different but there are frequencies of contact that are more effective than others. These are influenced by the product category and the complexity of the message. Having an idea of the number of contacts that work best can strongly affect your media optimisation, making your campaign much more successful. You’ll know whether to follow a reach or frequency strategy in mass media or when to set frequency caps in digital. Over the years, we have observed that adverts with a strong call to action require a lower OTS than adverts with a softer, image-focused message.

5. Understand that the world is changing and the effectiveness of media with it.

6.

Test and learn.

Change brought about by digital represent a new frontier for many brands. Digital advertising includes a range of formats from display to affiliate to search and their place in the media mix is not established. The power of these platforms to deliver changes in behaviour alongside other media, in particular, is not fully understood. See this as an opportunity to test and learn. Allow some space in the plan to try new things, but don’t forget to make sure they are tried in a way that can be measured, so you can apply any learnings to the next round of planning. Ralf Schweitzer is Manager, Marketing Effectiveness at Ebiquity (Germany)

The media world is changing at an increasingly rapid pace. Combined with technical innovation and shorter product life cycles this means the effectiveness of advertising can change quickly as well – from the launch of a product to on-going campaigns or as a medium loses significance. It is important to re-evaluate regularly to ensure that the latest findings are reflected in your current plan.

Ebiquity News CEE:

Ebiquity launches in Poland – We have expanded our international media capabilities with the opening of our Warsaw office. The office is headed by former CEO of ‘Stars’, Rafal Szysz and will provide media performance management services including auditing and pitch management to both local clients and international advertisers with activity in Poland. [email protected] www.ebiquity.com/pl Russia, CIS and CEE - Our recent acquisition of The Joined Up Media Company means we can better help international brands continually improve their media efficiency across the entire Eastern European region. We have local experts based in Moscow and Zagreb who know the region inside out. [email protected] [email protected] www.ebiquity.com/ru

Germany: Expanded offering from Ebiquity – Our Hamburg office now offers marketing effectiveness services like econometric modelling, budget optimisation and promotional effectiveness. It follows the recruitment of Ralf Schweitzer, a former strategic planner for P&G, who has done modelling work for a host of blue chip clients. [email protected]


DMEXCO Sep 21/22 - Ebiquity’s German team will be exhibiting and speaking at DMEXCO, the Digital Marketing Exposition & Conference in Cologne. The biggest of its kind, the event attracts over 17,000 trade visitors who come to see the latest innovations in digital media and hear from 300 top international speakers. [email protected] www.dmexco.de

UK: BrandMAX Sep 21/22 – Ebiquity is leading 3 sessions at the inaugural BrandMAX Summit in London. Attended by senior figures from the UK Marketing and PR community, it will examine ‘Brand Optimisation’. Ebiquity, alongside Echo Research, will explore the changing marcomms landscape and the challenges of ‘reputation, rigor and realignment’. [email protected] www.brand-MAX.net Echo Annual Summit Oct 7 – Echo Research’s annual summit will be held in London. Entitled ‘Tailoring your fitness programme for the new marketing environment’, it will host a number of influential Corporate Affairs speakers discussing ‘Brand Performance’, ‘Culture & Performance’, and ‘The Future of Reputation Management’. [email protected] www.echoresearch.com/summit2011
