Wavemaker's Lauren Greenhough was awarded a distinction for this Advanced Certificate in Communications Planning essay explaining why measurement needs to be underpinned by an understanding of clear objectives and an evaluation framework that considers the data, analysis, and application to make it meaningful.
It is true that measurement must be considered in the early stages of communications planning as a determining factor in understanding whether a campaign has successfully met business objectives. However, measurement on its own cannot provide all the answers, SMART objectives and an understanding of what data must be measured is imperative for robust measurement setup and analysis, hence the need for a toolkit. This essay will explore these points in more detail.
Measurement is an essential component of the communications planning process, however measurement needs to be underpinned by an understanding of clear objectives and an evaluation framework that considers the data, analysis, and application to truly make measurement meaningful.
In what we are calling an ‘Era of Accountability’, businesses are scrutinising every area of investment and advertising is no exception to this (Tomlinson & Whittaker, 2023). Marketers and agencies have a responsibility to their clients and businesses to justify every penny spent on advertising efforts. However, marketers still live in a world where advertising budgets are the first to be cut, which is no surprise when 40% of CMOs claim they still struggle to prove the return of investment of marketing to their CEOs (MacRae, 2022).
When investment is being scrutinised, it is important to remember that decisions are made by stakeholders when there is clear evidence. To provide clear evidence of the impact advertising has on business objectives, measurement must be considered at the start of the communications planning process. Without it, there is no clear evidence of success, no benchmarks and only speculation and therein runs the risk of budgets being cut. However, measurement is only half of the story. It cannot be applied without robust and SMART objectives; one cannot operate without the other.
Measurement is defined as the action of measuring “something”. Herein lies the problem, there is a lack of detail. Starting with the idea of measurement is essential, however, when talking about the importance of measurement, there needs to be a consideration for what is being measured and how in a tangible way.
There is no denying the importance of SMART objectives; these are realistic achievable, timebound, relevant and importantly measurable, as a clear indicator of success is imperative for robust analysis (Ritson, 2022). To ensure that the correct measures and data points are evaluated, it’s important to have a clear view on objectives that are most relevant to the campaign strategy, from the beginning. Tesco’s Turnaround Story started and ended with the key objectives, the need to increase consumer trust and perceptions of the brand. With these clear objectives in mind, the brand was able to implement brand tracking to measure against these key objectives.
Without focus, there is a huge risk that the campaign measurement evaluates the wrong measures (those not relevant to the business objectives) and the current data points are not identified for the input. There is also the potential to divert to short term objectives, as these metrics are quicker to track than longer term (Ritson, 2023).
Therefore, measurement alongside SMART objectives should be the starting point of the communications planning process, because “if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it” (Murphy, 2022).
The benefits of designing measurement and objectives in tandem means that from the very start, there is a holistic view of both long- and short-term measures. This helps to avoid the situation The AA encountered – a perception vs reality gap.
The brands Sparkplugs to Singalongs case study details how detrimental it can be when there is just a focus on short-term metrics. By looking at short-term leading indicators, The AA believed they were doing exceptionally well. Profit had increased by 5.7% per annum but, they were slipping into a decade-long brand decline with all brand tracking metrics reversing. Only once they looked beyond these short-term metrics did they see the reality of the situation the brand faced.
A toolkit consists of 3 dimensions of evaluation.
We have access to a vast array of data sets, sometimes too much meaning planners can suffer choice paralysis (Millard, 2023) and overthink the inputs needed for evaluation. An evaluation toolkit alongside SMART objectives gives planners and brands a way to formulate campaign measurement and advertising success against objectives by choosing the right datasets for evaluation and analysis.
It is important to note that the data, analysis, and application will differ across all brands therefore a nuanced approach should be taken to the toolkit. This is evident when comparing the case studies that each brand approaches their evaluation toolkit differently. Tesco’s Turnaround Story highlighted the use of leading indicators such as profit, share price, transactions however without a view of long-term brand analytics of brand perception, quality and trust which paint a picture over the course of the 4 years, the brand would only be able to see the what and not the why. The AA looked only wards the leading indicators of profit, and thus missed out on clear longer-term analytics which painted a very different picture.
The analysis and application element of the toolkit is particularly important, as data on its own doesn’t equal insight (Millard, 2023). Within these two stages, planners can really highlight the value of measurement and evaluation to brands. Again, it’s important that both the long term and short term is considered to ensure that there is an ongoing approach to analysis. For example, emotional campaigns can typically take up to 3 years to accumulate brand effects (Binet & Field, 2013), the John Lewis: An Amazing Decade is a great example to demonstrate how the brand accounted for both long- and short-term data sets within their evaluation toolkit. The brand invested in emotional storytelling at Christmas and considered both long term (brand health, penetration, average spend per customer) that expanded 10 years’ worth of data analysis and short-term (web traffic, online sales metrics, in-store sales) metrics all underpinned by econometric modelling. Without sight of all these leading indicators, it took the brand until 2012 to see the highest increase in customers jumping from 106 to 115 in 2012.
In conclusion, measurement is an essential component of the communications planning process, however measurement needs to be underpinned by an understanding of clear objectives and an evaluation framework that considers the data, analysis, and application to truly make measurement meaningful. All elements discussed have equal importance to delivering what is a strong understanding and management of short-term and long-term success of advertising activity in order for brands and planners to justify the spend into advertising.
Lauren Greenhough is Strategy and Planning Director at Wavemaker. This essay was awarded a Distinction as part of the Advanced Certificate in Communications Planning.
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