Here's why you need to better understand digital performance reports

This article isn’t for the people with digital in their title. It’s not for the people with Double Click logins or for the programmatic traders. Instead, this article is written for the people close to, but not part of, digital advertising programs.   

Today we’re going to talk about digital display advertising. Banner advertising. The leaderboards and medium rectangles that seem to populate every corner of the web. You know the ones. The ones you don’t click on.    

Do you know how your digital advertising program operates?

In my experience, most clients utilise online display placements primarily to generate leads and conversions. It’s about customer acquisition. Direct response. With programs routinely optimised toward the most efficient networks, publishers and buy-types. The results of these programs then go on to be shared widely within client organisations, to people like you, in sound bites: “our digital program delivered 300 test drives this week at a cost per lead of $212 etc.”

It’s all very accountable and good.

But what if these digital programs aren’t delivering what the reports say they are?

Consider the two methods by which conversions are counted:

1. The post-click conversion
2. The post-impression conversion

Let’s use a made up car brand to illustrate the difference between these two methods. Call it Maguar.   

A post-click conversion is simple to understand. A user is exposed to a Maguar display ad placement, clicks on that placement, visits the Maguar website and converts by requesting a test drive.

The post-impression conversion is different. This person never clicks an ad placement. Instead, a typical journey might be that a Maguar display ad placement is served on a website a person is browsing and a few days later that person visits the Maguar website and requests a test drive.

Most people are aware of how few people click display ad placements, so it shouldn’t surprise you that post-impression can often dominate a display digital program and can sometimes represent the lion share of total conversions.

Are you still with me?

For clarity, almost everyone counted as a conversion in digital programs has probably never clicked on a digital display advertising placement. 

Is that ok? 

Let’s take a step back for a second. If we agree that the role of Maguar’s digital display program is to generate incremental test drive requests, then the digital display program should be measured on its ability to generate these incremental test drive requests.

Importantly, to measure incremental test drive requests, Maguar needs to establish the baseline of test drive requests. How many people are going to request a Maguar test drive anyway? 

This idea of establishing and removing baseline speaks directly to criticism of some digital display advertising programs as “spray and pray” and “cookie bombing”. These are the programs that seek to drop a cookie on as many browsers as possible in order to claim responsibility in the event that a browser converts. 

How do you ensure your digital program isn’t one of these “spray and pray” boiler rooms?   

It can get down to incentives and unintended consequences. Does your business KPI your digital program based on reported conversions? An incentive like this may result in digital advertising programs being reluctant to voluntarily remove baseline from the numbers. 

Who in your business oversees the methodology of the digital advertising program? Are they also KPIed on volume? There may be a conflict there.    

It’s difficult to get your head around, but a more stringent digital advertising program with a lower volume of conversions and higher costs per acquisition is probably more valuable to your organisation than a less stringent one that reports lower costs per acquisition, because it claims everything. 

Confronting isn’t it?

So how could a brand like Maguar go about removing the baseline of test drive requests from their display digital reports? There’s no one right way. Some people will do things like drastically reducing cookie windows, but I think a better way is via A/B testing. 

Imagine if Maguar trafficked two display ad creatives. One creative is for Maguar’s new model and other is for the Make-A-Wish Foundation. After a robust number of impressions has been served against each creative, Maguar’s digital team analyses the incremental uplift achieved by the Maguar creative over the Make-A-Wish creative. This is the actual contribution of the post-impression conversions. Simple. 

Given the vast majority of funds spent on digital display advertising is spent chasing post-impression conversions, wouldn’t it be better if you understood the true contribution of post-impression conversions?

Unfortunately, in the seemingly endless race for volume, I don’t see or hear of many digital teams undertaking this type of critical analysis. How does your digital program value the contribution of post-impression conversions?