Marketing Math Blog

May 25
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Is the Ad Industry on the Verge of a Revolution?

By Advertisers, advertising legal, AVBs, Letter of Agreement Best Practices, Marketing Accountability, Rebates No Comments

time for action“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…” Charles Dickens evocative opening to his book; “A Tale of Two Cities” described the period leading up to the French revolution. It may also be an apt description of where the ad industry and advertisers stand on the topics of transparency, fraud and trust.

As an industry, all stakeholders, including advertisers, agencies, ad tech firms, media sellers and the various associations, which serve these constituencies have long been talking about the need to implement corrective measures. Joint task forces have been formed, initiatives launched and guidelines published, yet little progress has been made in addressing these issues. As evidence of the quagmire, one need look no further than the 2016 Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and White Ops report on digital ad fraud, which saw the estimated level of thievery increase by $1 billion in 2015 to an estimated $7 billion annually. This led Bob Liodice, CEO of the ANA to boldly and rightfully tell attendees at this year’s ANA “Agency Financial Management” conference that; “marketers are getting their money stolen.”

The ANA’s message has resonated with the C-Suite within advertiser organizations the world over as CEOs, CFOs CIAs and CPO’s are working with their chief marketing officers to both assess the risks to their organizations and in fashioning solutions to safeguard their advertising investments. From this pundit’s perspective, it was refreshing to see the ANA take such a strong stance and a welcomed leadership position on remedying these blights on our industry.

Some may view the ANA’s recent stance on fraud and transparency and the upcoming release of its study with K2 on the use of agency volume bonuses (AVBs) or rebates as incendiary. However, in light of the scope of the economic losses, financial and legal risks to advertisers and the havoc which transparency concerns have wreaked on advertiser/ agency relationships we view the ANA’s approach as a rational, measured and necessary stake in the ground.

Mr. Liodice was not casting blame when he suggested that the K2 survey would “be a black and white report that for us (ANA) will be unassailable documentation of what the truth is.” It is refreshing to see an industry association elevate dialog around the need for full-disclosure, moving from disparate opinions to establishing a fact-based perspective on the scope of this practice. To the ANA’s credit, this will be followed by a second report, authored by Ebiquity/ Firm Decisions, introducing guidelines for the industry to proactively address the issue.

To be clear, it is not a level playing field for advertisers. There are many forces at play as a variety of entities look to siphon off portions of an advertisers media investment for their own financial gain. Thus, we’re hopeful that the ANA’s message to marketers to “take responsibility” for their financial and contractual affairs when it comes to protecting their advertising investment takes hold.

In our experience, the path forward for advertisers is clear. It begins with re-evaluating their marketing service agency contracts to integrate “best practice” language that provides the requisite legal and financial safeguards. Additionally, this document should clearly establish performance expectations for each of their agency partners, introducing guidelines to minimize the impact of fraud, including mandating the use of fraud prevention and traffic validation technology, banning the use of publisher sites that employ traffic sourcing and establishing a full-disclosure, principal-agent relationship with their agency partners.

Experience suggests that another key element of a well-rounded accountability initiative should include the ongoing, systematic monitoring of agency contract compliance and financial management performance to evaluate progress. Of note, wherever possible, these controls and practices should extend to direct non-agency vendors and third-party vendors involved with the planning, creation and distribution of and advertisers messaging.

The advertising industry is on the verge of a revolution and for the sake of advertisers we hope so. One that can usher in positive change and allow all legitimate stakeholders to refocus their collective energies on building productive relationships predicated on trust. It is our belief that knowledge and transparency are critical cornerstones in this process:

“I believe in innovation – and that the way you get innovation is you learn the basic facts.” ~ Bill Gates

Apr 29
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Principal-Based Buying: A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing?

By Advertisers, Advertising Agencies, Marketing Accountability, Programmatic Buying, Trading Desk No Comments

contract signingRecently, Ad Age ran an article entitled: “Risky Business: Why Media Agencies are Betting on Principal-Based Buying.” To be honest, my first reaction was, what in the world is principal-based buying? It didn’t take long to figure out that it was simply a new descriptor for media arbitrage.

Clever, principal-based buying sounds so much more appealing and less subversive than media arbitrage. However, arbitrage is arbitrage, regardless of what moniker that is placed on the act of purchasing media and reselling said media to advertisers. According to Merriam-Webster, the definition of arbitrage is clear:

“The nearly simultaneous purchase and sale of something in one place and selling it in another in order to profit from price discrepancies.”

 We certainly understand the primary allure of media arbitrage to agencies; the potential for higher margins than what traditional remuneration models would allow for. Let’s face it agency holding companies are publicly traded entities with a fiduciary obligation to drive shareowner profitability.

Simply, “principal-based” buying is a practice that is in clear violation of the principal- agent relationship, which has long been the driving concept behind client/ agency relations.

Forget the opacity, which is a hallmark of this buying tactic and the potential risks to advertisers seeking to optimize media value and boost working media ratios. The main issue with agency ownership of media is the potential impact on the objectivity of the advice, which it offers its clients.

Media time and space is a perishable product. It is also speculative in nature when it comes to projecting future value from a relevancy and audience delivery perspective. So what happens in the event an agency, indulging in arbitrage, has a significant ownership position in distressed, dated inventory? Could such a position create internal pressure on the agency’s media staff to move that inventory? In turn, might such pressure result in agency media team’s pushing that inventory off on clients, whether it represents the best fit at the best price?

Assuming that an advertiser knowingly engages their agency partner’s trading desk and believes that this relationship will yield a price advantage over traditional buying practices there are a few questions to consider; “How will you know? What methodology will you apply to vet the quality of the inventory and the price paid? Who will conduct that analysis for you?” In short, is this a proposition whose economic benefit to the advertiser can ever be accurately evaluated?

Sadly, while the agency community may shrug off the notion of ever having committed to a principal-agent relationship with its clients too often we find that agencies, which have embraced media arbitrage, have not disclosed this fact to their clientele… in spite of the position often taken in the trade publications.

In our agency contract compliance practice we find that in most instances there is not a separate letter of agreement between the agency’s trading desk operation and the advertiser, that the language dealing with “related parties” within the contract is inadequate to cover such a scenario and that there are no limitations in place regarding the percentage of an advertiser’s media buy that can be run through the trading desk.

Hopefully, those agencies that intend to engage in and or extend their use of principal-based buying will also commit to fully disclosing this practice and its application to each of their clients, well in advance of implementing this buying approach on those clients’ behalf.

From an advertisers perspective, it is imperative to assess the type of relationship that you desire with your media agency. If a principal-agent relationship predicated on full-disclosure and the fiduciary obligations, which underlie such relationships, are important to your organization, the client/ agency agreement will need to reflect that position. On the other hand, if there is interest in exploring principal-based buying consider contracting directly with the agency trading desk and establishing caps on the percentage of the budget, which can be invested through that operation.

Apr 11
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Advertiser Audit Rights: Omnipresent but Seldom Enacted

By Advertisers, Advertising Agency Audits, advertising legal, Contract Compliance Auditing, Marketing Accountability No Comments

transparencyVirtually every contract that exists between advertiser and agency partner provides the advertiser with the “right to audit” agency books, records and accounting practices related to services rendered. However, oddly enough, advertisers seldom act upon these negotiated, protective contract provisions in spite of the significant dollars being spent in this area. This is unfortunate for both advertiser and agency alike.

Why? At a time when many client / agency relationships are strained, largely as a result of diminishing levels of trust and transparency concerns, contract compliance work represent an excellent tool for building clarity around and confidence in agency financial management practices, resource investments, and actual performance.

Contract compliance work identifies gaps in understanding that can be negatively impacting client perceptions and agency margins. Whether related to the project briefing, the approval process, rework levels, mushrooming custom reporting requests, and or payment timing issues, independent testing work provides a prescriptive for positive change to benefit all stakeholders.

In our contract compliance practice, it is common to identify process and behavioral breakdowns that have crept into day-to-day activities between client and agency and that can be directly attributed to lack of oversight. Unchecked, bad habits whether accidental or intentional create financial risks that can be very costly to both parties. Periodic compliance work and ongoing performance monitoring can greatly provide new learnings that assist the advertiser to mitigate risks, optimize process, and eliminate unnecessary costs.

Independent audit work absolutely provides assurance and marketing spend governance. It drives in-market performance in a manner that improves the advertisers return-on-marketing-investment. An additional dynamic, born of a consistent marketing accountability program and contract compliance work, is a very real incentive for the parties to reform behaviors that are distracting an otherwise solid client / agency relationships predicated on trust and confidence.

A wise risk management practitioner once shared a somewhat comedic perspective on this dynamic by citing the following question and answer:

“What happens when you lock a wild hyena in a room with an Internal auditor? The hyena stops laughing.”

 Audits can be sobering and should be approached with a healthy and serious level of respect. However, they are not intended to intimidate or strike fear in the hearts of marketing team members or agency personnel. Further, sound audit methodologies should not interrupt client/ agency workflows, nor should they come with an onerous cost in terms of advertiser or agency resource investment required to participate in the process. The goal is to identify opportunities for improved transparency, controls, risk mitigation practices and financial management stewardship, and build long-term relationships.

We see relationships flourish and be strengthened when both parties embrace the process for what it was intended. That is why “Right to Audit” clauses exist and why they are so broadly represented in client / agency agreements in the U.S. and around the globe.

 

 

Mar 28
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Improving Analysis With Analytics

By Advertisers, Advertising Agency Audits, Internal Audit, Marketing Accountability No Comments

analysisBy Rich Lanza

In Marketing, with thousands or millions of transactions (especially in digital) occurring each year, analysts have an inherent need to select population samples to draw conclusions and make decisions, or do they? Sampling is performed because it often appears impossible to gather data from the entire population, but what if you the analyst could gather 100% of the requisite data for a given business process?

A good point of reference is evidenced in the movie, Imitation Game. The actors were trying to stop a device named Enigma that changed its code every 20 minutes. There were 159 million, million, million possible Enigma settings, and each one needed to be tried. If 10 people checked one setting a minute for 24 hours, every day, how many days do you think it would take to check each of the settings? Well, it’s not days, its years. 20 million years. To stop Enigma, the team would have had to check 20 million years worth of settings in 20 minutes.

It is mathematically impossible to manually test and provide assurance for every marketing transaction or media buy. Understandably, it may seem easier to simply pick a small sample and rely on statistics to extrapolate trends, ROI and error rates. However as analysts, as in the movie, we measure activity and outcomes and we rely on ongoing computerized assistance. In our current age of “Big Data” and advancement of digital and social marketing, too many still rely on antiquated approaches, sampling and manual reviews. It is almost as if we use sampling as a more simplistic means of testing a business process, even if a better solution is staring us right in the face.

That solution is to analyze as much of the business process data with analytics. This methodology can be generally referred to as 100% auditing (or data mining). Data mining allows the analyst to visualize and understand financial accounts. It is not a far stretch to imagine at least half of the current procedures where sampling is applied could be turned into an analytic. Please note that many times a business process may not have computer readable data but isn’t that an issue unto itself?

100% auditing is utilized by AARM in working with large advertisers and their agency partners. When a client engages a 100% sampling methodology to continually monitor marketing expenditures, the investment pays dividends in all future years.

Once established, analytic-enabled testing is completed in seconds and can be scheduled to run on a recurring basis. This is much faster than any sampling approach and, as in the Imitation Game, requires very little human resource requirement. Rather, the analyst can be focused on the exceptions and interpreting of results to help improve the marketing process. At AARM, years ago this systematic capability was developed, and named AArmor AnalyticsTM. Our clients have embraced 100% auditing to monitor efficiency and effectiveness of their vast array of marketing expenditures and the financial practices.

Interested in learning more about the use of AArmor Analytics at your company? Contact Don Parsons, Principal at AARM | Advertising Audit & Risk Management at dparsons@aarmusa.com for more information.

Mar 21
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Seeing Their Way to Digital Media Growth

By Advertisers, Advertising Agencies, Digital Media, Marketing Accountability, Programmatic Buying No Comments

visionDigital advertising spend will surpass television in 2017. This according to eMarketer, which is forecasting that digital ad expenditures will grow to $77.3 billion, while spending for television will increase to $72.0 billion.

This growth comes in spite of continued advertiser concern regarding transparency and the fact that 40% to 60% of their working digital media dollars are being absorbed into inventory margin.

With this as a backdrop, we have noted a couple of interesting trends in the digital media space, that directly and positively addresses these concerns.

First and foremost, there have been a number of agencies that have embraced a more transparent model when it comes to digital media planning and placement. They are looking to directly appeal to advertisers’ opacity-busting inclinations and their desire to improve working media ratios.

What are they offering? In short, they are structuring their service and financial management models to eliminate the hidden fees, double charging, rebates, kickbacks and media arbitrage practices employed by a host of traditional media agencies operating in the digital space.

The common link among these progressive agencies is to take more of a consultative approach to working with their clients to solve for the best method to drive brand engagement and to improve consumer experiences. These shops fundamentally understand the importance of integrating customer relationship management (CRM) and online media to create personalized customer interactions across each stage of the marketing lifecycle.

Recognizing the rapid advances occurring on the data analytics and ad tech fronts, they are agnostic when it comes to their role as a full-service or managed service provider. These agencies have come to realize the importance of integrating first, second and third party data and that from a privacy and data governance perspective advertiser ownership of such data may be a more appropriate path forward.

Additionally, they are open to working with their clients to help facilitate direct relationships between advertisers and technology providers to eliminate duplicate costs and boost transparency. They have a comfort level with direct-bill third-party media payment processing models which afford advertisers the opportunity to see exactly what the net media cost is.

For advertisers’ who are comfortable using the agency’s technology stack, no problem. For those that are interested in migrating that ownership in-house, they will consult and work to design and implement an approach that will work best for their clients. This could include everything from identifying DMP, DSP and ad server options to suggesting viewability optimization, fraud prevention and modeling tools. This new breed of agency recognizes that cutting out the middlemen from these areas can greatly enhance an advertiser’s working media ratios.

The benefit of this approach is profound when one considers that according to a recent survey by Technology Business Research (TBR) among 240 ad technology users in North America and Western Europe, they found that “only about 40% of digital advertising budgets are currently going toward working media” and that “the second biggest allocation – 31% of budgets – was going to pay for technology” with the balance being applied to “pay for agency services.”

The second trend that is having a meaningful impact in the digital advertising space is the continued expansion of services offered by technology consultants including IBM, Deloitte, Accenture and McKinsey. These firms have made strategic acquisitions and or built resource bases in the creative design area which allow them to complement their technology integration offerings and provide comprehensive end-to-end solutions. These firms’ gains will likely be to the detriment of traditional advertising agencies as the roles of data management and digital media continue to grow in the coming years.

As Jon Suarez-Davis, Chief Marketing and Strategy officer for Krux recently stated: “Marketers want absolute transparency across the value chain.” Mr. Suarez-Davis’ opinion, based upon his experience on both the ad technology and client-side, where he managed digital media for the Kellogg Company, is that advertisers “would like to have the technology and other non-working costs (that aren’t related to impression delivery) separated.”

As the comedian Bill Hicks, so accurately opined:

“We are the facilitators of our own creative evolution.”

The agencies and consultants that understand this dynamic and have a willingness to morph their service delivery and compensation models to address advertiser desires in these areas will be well positioned to boost their relevancy and revenue growth potential in the coming years. Those that don’t may struggle to keep pace as advertisers take a more proactive approach to optimizing their digital media investment.

Feb 24
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Two Words That Represent Accountability’s Biggest Obstacle; “Who’s Budget?”

By Advertisers, Advertising Agency Audits, Billing Reconciliation, Contract Compliance Auditing, Internal Audit, Letter of Agreement Best Practices, Marketing Accountability, Marketing Agency Network No Comments

accountabilityMany organizations want to implement an accountability program. Virtually all Internal Audit directors would like to extend that accountability initiative across the enterprise and most certainly want to provide coverage for categories with a significant spend, such as marketing.

Yet, in spite of the good intentions, U.S. companies have been slow to embrace independent compliance and performance auditing of their marketing supply chain partners. Ironically, the reason emanates from the answer to a very simple question, “Which departmental budget will be tapped to fund the initiative?” More often than not the answer to that question, in the context of a marketing and advertising spending review, is “Marketing.”

Given this dynamic, it is often a challenge for companies to implement an “unbudgeted” audit project once the fiscal year planning process has been completed, even if results dwarf its cost. Additionally, while many CMO’s have come to value the feedback and insights provided from the independent testing of supplier contract compliance and performance, there are others that still do not embrace audit or accountability initiatives. As a result, unless mandated by the C-Suite, independent accountability testing may never make its way into the budget, causing a huge assurance gap governing that company’s multi-million marketing investment.

There is good news however for procurement, finance and audit executives seeking to remove these obstacles and manage associated risks. Namely, that in addition to the opportunity for process improvements, performance monitoring, contract language enhancements and better controls, these engagements yield hard dollar returns resulting from various financial true-ups and future savings opportunities; far exceeding the fees necessary to conduct the review.

Positive financial returns aside, the costs associated with an audit of an advertiser’s agency network partners is miniscule when compared to the tens of millions or hundreds of millions of dollars being expended in this area.

Perhaps best of all, independent assessments of marketing agency compliance and third-party vendor billings sets a tone of the desired financial stewardship and accountability behavior that the client would like to see employed across its marketing supplier base. In turn, the very act of performing an independent audit, provides a powerful incentive for an agency to diligently self-police itself by tightly adhering to the processes and guidelines agreed to and memorialized in the Client/ Agency Master Services Agreement. In the words of the noted English author and speaker, Simon Sinek:

“Actions speak louder than words. All companies say they care, right? But few actually exercise that care.”

Interested in learning more about fielding a marketing agency network accountability initiative at your company? Contact Cliff Campeau, Principal at AARM | Advertising Audit & Risk Management at ccampeau@aarmusa.com to for a complimentary consultation on the topic today.

Feb 17
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Is the 4A’s Action on “Transparency” a “Tipping Point” for Client/ Agency Relationships?

By Advertisers, Advertising Agencies, Client Agency Relationship Management, in-house ad agency, Programmatic Buying No Comments

Tipping PointMuch has been written about the content of the American Association of Advertising Agencies (4A’s) recently released “Transparency Guidelines,” less about the potential impact of the 4A’s decision to break rank from the cross-industry task force with the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and to act unilaterally.

For the record, from both an advertiser and agency perspective, we believe that the guidelines proposed by the 4A’s have the potential to do irreparable harm to client/ agency relationships. The guidelines appear to driven by greed and a certain naiveté about the source of agency leverage… namely their clients’ advertising budgets. Let’s face it, in the context of a principal-agent relationship there is no logical way to rationalize a guideline which states:

“The agency, (agency group and holding company) may enter into commercial relationships with media vendors and other suppliers on its own account, which are separate and unrelated to the purchase of media as agent for their clients.”

One, the notion that the potential for financial gain would not introduce a level of bias that could influence an agency’s recommendations to its clients is unrealistic. Two, pooling client dollars to use as collateral in cutting side deals with media vendors and suppliers for its own benefit is inappropriate.

From our perspective, we believe that the 4A’s and any of its members that support the association’s guidelines on transparency have made a serious error in judgment. Yet, it should be noted, that not one agency has spoken out against the 4A’s action or the composition of its “Transparency Guidelines” nor has one agency seceded from the association. Thus, one might assume that all of the 4A’s members support the position taken.

At a time when issues such as transparency, trust, talent and compensation are posing serious challenges to the length and efficacy of client/ agency relationships, the 4A’s action on the topic of transparency will not serve their members well in the long-term. Why? There are, we believe two reasons.

First of all without clients, agencies have no means for existence. On the other hand, as it stands today, some may view agencies as a luxury, not a necessity for advertisers. Without agencies, clients still have a number of options for marketing their firms, brands and products. These options range from dealing direct with suppliers that are today considered “third-party vendors” such as; production companies, photographers, content developers and curators and media owners. Additionally, one must consider an advertisers option to create in-house capabilities rather than outsource all or some elements of their advertising.

The second reason is that absent an underlying level of trust, agencies can never hope to recover the coveted position of “strategic partner” that they once enjoyed. In our opinion, the 4A’s action has relegated their member agencies to “vendor” status whose goods and services an advertiser might choose to avail themselves of, without being beholden to the agency in a meaningful way.

In Malcolm Gladwell’s book; “The Tipping Point” he suggested to readers; “Look at the world around you. It may seem like an immovable, implacable place. It is not, with the slightest push – in just the right place – it can be tipped.” Think about that statement in the context of some of the trends our industry is experiencing today:

  • Growing impact of social media in shaping consumer views and behaviors
  • Rapid expansion of programmatic media buying
  • Advances in ad technology, impacting many facets of the message creation & distribution cycle
  • Increasing prevalence of advertiser/ publisher direct relationships
  • Rise of non-traditional alternatives to ad agencies (i.e. IBM, Deloitte, Accenture)

Surely the 4A’s is aware of the aforementioned trends and the moves in recent months by advertisers such as P&G, Facebook, Google, Netflix, Expedia, L’Oreal and Wal-Mart to either move certain aspects of their advertising in-house ranging from creative to programmatic media buying; or are purported to be actively investigating “alternative models.”

Do the 4A’s and their members believe that they are impervious to such trends? What were they hoping to gain by breaking ranks from the ANA and the joint transparency task force? Perhaps more importantly, are 4A’s members prepared for the potential impact of the association’s actions? According to Mr. Gladwell:

“That is the paradox of the epidemic: that in order to create one contagious movement, you often have to create many small movements first.”

For the sake of the advertising agency community, let’s hope that their recent action on the topic of transparency isn’t the “small movement” that fuels the “epidemic” which forever tips their once favored status as trusted confidants to alternative vendors of commodity like marketing services.

Jan 27
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Did You Trust the Banker When You Played Monopoly?

By 3rd Party Vendor Billing Management, Advertisers, Advertising Agency Audits, Agency Fee & Time Management, Contract Compliance Auditing, Marketing Accountability, Right to Audit Clauses No Comments

monopolyIf you were a “gamer” (in the days when board games were the norm) that implicitly trusted both the banker and the individual who controlled the distribution of the real estate properties when playing Monopoly, than this article isn’t for you.

On the other hand, if you are one who turns a wary eye toward those in control of assets, particularly your assets, then we would like to pose one question: “Do you know what happens to your company’s marketing funds once checks have been distributed to your agency partners?”

In our experience, few if any individuals within an advertiser organization have a clear perspective on the disposition of approved funds once an agency invoice has been paid. The primary reason for this is that the industry still operates largely on the concept of “estimated” billing and the pre-payment of funds from the advertiser to the agency. Over the years the resulting transparency gap has been compounded by the fact that few if any advertisers require their agencies to provide copies of all third-party vendor invoices with their final project or campaign billing. Most advertisers have document retention and audit rights clauses in their agreements, but few act upon these contractual rights.

As contract compliance auditors, we review thousands of agency bill-to-client invoices as part of our hard copy vouching and testing process. In general, the lack of specificity contained on these invoices, particularly when one recognizes that there is often little accompanying back-up can be startling. For example, imagine coming across an invoice for the production of television commercials for a major seasonal advertising campaign that simply stated; “Holiday Campaign TV Production – $785,000.” Was that for one commercial or six? Were these :15 second spots or :60’s? Is this for a U.S. campaign or a global effort? Apparently, answers to those types of questions aren’t always required to process payment for that invoice… as long as the invoice amount doesn’t exceed the approved purchase order, if there is an approved purchase order.

Do you know if your agencies are abiding by the contractual guidelines for competitively bidding jobs? Do you know whether or not the agreements with the agencies in your network even requires three bids or at what spending threshold? More broadly, do you know which of your third-party vendors are actually related to your ad agency partners (i.e. shared financial interests, investors or corporate lineage)? If so, was this disclosed in advance of work being awarded to those related parties?

If you’re like most advertisers, you are billed in advance of production or media commitments being made on your behalf, or at least prior to the activity occurring. Likely, your company pays that invoice within 45 days of receipt. Any idea how much time elapses prior to your third-party vendors being paid or whether their billing to the agencies is scrutinized for accuracy? Let’s assume there are credits issued by third-party vendors or approved funds that are not spent by the agencies, how long does it take for the agencies to identify and return those funds to you? Who is involved in determining the disposition of those funds? Marketing? Or are checks cut and sent to finance?

Do you compensate one of more of your agency partners based upon a direct labor model, with estimated monthly fees tied to a contractual staffing plan predicated on the hourly time investment of specific individuals? How often to you see time-of-staff reporting from the agencies? Monthly, quarterly, annually, ever? Have those fees ever been reconciled to each agencies actual time investment? Have you ever tested your agencies time-keeping systems to assess the accuracy of the reports that may be shared with your team?

We have good news for you, news that can provide answers to each and every one of these questions. There is a proven means of closing this transparency gap and providing your organization with the processes and controls necessary to assess the disposition of marketing funds at each step of the advertising investment cycle.

It is called agency contract compliance auditing, it is an industry best practice and it will provide insights, answers and recommendations that will benefit an advertiser’s agency stewardship efforts and their agency partners’ financial management performance.

If you still have some apprehension about this complex ecosystem called marketing, consider the words of former Supreme Court Justice, Oliver Wendell Holmes when weighing the pros and cons of a contract compliance audit; “When in doubt, do it.”

Interested in learning more about safeguarding your firm’s marketing investment? Contact Cliff Campeau, Principal with AARM | Advertising Audit & Risk Management at ccampeau@aarmusa.com for a complimentary consultation on how to implement or enhance your organization’s marketing accountability initiative.

 

 

 

Jan 19
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Advertisers Can Shield Themselves From Digital Ad Fraud… Somewhat

By Advertisers, Digital Media, Digital Trading Desk, Marketing Accountability, Programmatic Buying No Comments

fraudLet’s set the stage, so that we are all clear on the risks faced by advertisers when it comes to digital media in general and programmatic digital media buying in particular. Consider the following quote from Bob Liodice, President and CEO of the Association of National Advertisers (ANA):

“The level of criminal, non-human traffic literally robbing marketers’ brand-building investments is a travesty. The staggering financial losses and the lack of real, tangible progress at mitigating fraud highlights the importance of the industry’s Trustworthy Accountability Group in fighting this war. It also underscores the need for the entire marketing ecosystem to manage their media investments with far greater discipline and control against a backdrop of increasingly sophisticated fraudsters.”

What prompted Mr. Liodice’s comments? Quite simply, the ANA and White Ops updated their 2015 “BOT Baseline: Fraud in Digital Advertising” study, which suggested that the ad industry would see $6.3 billion in digital ad fraud in 2015. In light of the fact that the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) reported that digital ad revenue surged almost twenty-percent through the first half of last year, can we be surprised by the fact that the level of fraud escalated as well. To what, you ask. According to the ANA report, it is estimated that the level of digital ad fraud will grow to $7.2 billion in 2016.

The challenge for individual advertisers is to determine how best to insulate their organizations from digital ad fraud, while continuing to support industry initiatives focused on the same end.

For many advertisers the question is quite simply; “But where do we begin?” The answer as the late Stephen Covey once intoned is to; “Begin with the end in mind.” So what is the end goal? For most advertisers the aim is to focus digital media investment on media sources that can reliably drive the highest level of effectiveness using the best quality inventory at the lowest possible price.

One important component of this challenge is obviously the continued growth of programmatic digital media buying. It should be noted that of the estimated $60 billion in digital media spend, programmatic will account for $15 billion or 25% of the total spend. However, one must consider that programmatic buying represents a very high percentage of digital ad fraud, up to 90% according to some industry experts.

The range of tactics employed by entities and individuals seeking to profit from the growth of digital spending are many and varied, they include; click-fraud, the use of BOTs, hidden ads and impression laundering. However, the primary source of digital media fraud is in the form of URL masking, which makes it impossible for advertisers or their agencies to know where their digital ads are running. Studies have shown that nearly 45% of transactional digital URLs do not match the URL where the impressions were actually served… a sobering statistic to be sure.

In our experience there are three things that advertisers can do to mitigate the level of risk posed by fraudsters.

First and foremost, advertisers must improve the level of transparency between their programmatic buying partner and their own organization. This can be done by employing contractual language and controls which narrow the transparency gap that more than likely exists today. Too often, agencies simply introduce their trading desk operation to their clients, without amending their current agreement or allowing the advertiser to contract directly with the trading desk entity.

Contract language should provide limitations on the percentage of total digital media spending that can be allocated to programmatic and impart clear “signing authority” guidelines in the event those levels are to be altered. Additionally, the agency should be required to provide a staffing plan, which includes data scientists and data analysts, along with the team’s estimated utilization rates and hours by individual. Complement this by incorporating copies of the media verification and performance tracking reports that will be utilized to monitor impression delivery, ad viewability and fraud detection. Finally, we suggest requiring the agency to separate the costs for media, data and technology licensing from agency fees, each of which should be reconciled to actual.

The second line of defense for advertisers comes in the form of requiring their programmatic media buying partners to utilize a Media Rating Council (MRC) accredited digital technology/ platform provider. Firms such as Integral Ad Science and Double Verify, for example, have a range of tools that can integrate with pre-bid platforms to provide real-time impression authentication to improve the odds that an advertisers impressions will be delivered in a contextually relevant, brand safe and fraud free environment. When nefarious behavior is identified, these tools can block impressions from being delivered there and dynamically blacklist those sites. In addition, there are tech solutions now available, which can assess inventory hygiene within ad networks and exchanges, allowing advertisers to target higher quality impressions.

Finally, advertisers must apply their buy-side leverage and demand that their agency partners and third-party vendors work collaboratively to optimize their digital media investment. Those parties that cannot demonstrate that they are continuously improving their tools, methodologies and compliance monitoring processes should be dropped from consideration set. Voting with one’s dollar has always been and remains one of the best ways to incent the behavior and secure the types of results that diligent advertisers deserve.  

In the words of Samuel Johnson, the celebrated eighteenth century English writer:

“What we hope ever to do with ease, we must learn first to do with diligence.”

 

Jan 01
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3 Reasons Why Marketing Accountability Matters

By Advertisers, Client Agency Relationship Management, Contract Compliance Auditing, Marketing Accountability No Comments

accountabilityAs 2015 has come to a close, many of us who are involved in the marketing and advertising industry will most certainly reflect on some of the challenges faced and lessons learned during the prior year. Rightly so, as future success is often based upon the knowledge gleaned from reviewing past experiences. 

We work in an industry that is dynamic and exciting and yes, at times, trying. The dizzying array of issues which industry practitioners deal with on a daily basis are not for the faint of heart; big data, ad technology, media fragmentation, changes in consumer media consumption behavior, industry consolidation, talent procurement and retention and a myriad of financial oversight challenges ranging from ad agency compensation to optimizing an advertiser’s return-on-marketing-investment (ROMI). 

One of the highlights from this past year is that a significant spotlight was cast upon a handful of seminal issues that have a direct and meaningful impact on the industry. These include conversations on improving transparency, mitigating the risk associated with fraudulent activity, particularly in digital media, and the need to strengthen client/ agency relationships. 

As importantly, we believe that a key takeaway from an advertiser’s perspective in 2015 is that accountability matters, perhaps more now than at any point in the recent past. There are three reasons why we believe that it is important for client organization’s to implement marketing accountability measures in the coming year: 

  1. Marketing expenditures represent one of an organization’s largest SG&A expense line times. As such the dollars spent in this area need to be closely monitored to insure that they are allocated and stewarded in an effective manner.
  2. Optimizing ROMI is the primary responsibility of marketers and their agency partners. This has never been truer than it is today given that CEO’s, CFO’s, CPO’s and Internal Audit are more focused on enterprise wide accountability initiatives than ever before. Further, many of these stakeholders view marketing as an expense to be managed tightly on a line-item basis, rather than an investment.
  3. Client marketing departments are the first and last line of defense when it comes to protecting an advertiser’s fiduciary interests. Gone are the days when ad agencies served as principal-agent for their clients. Ad agencies, ad tech firms, trading desks, publishers and fraudsters are all in competition to increase their respective share-of-wallet, often at an advertiser’s expense. As such, it is imperative that CMO’s work with their C-Suite peers to put in place the appropriate financial management processes and safeguards to protect the dollars entrusted to them. 

Ironically, in spite of these truisms, most advertisers have yet to implement formal accountability initiatives inclusive of agency contract compliance reviews, financial management audits or performance assessment programs to protect their marketing investments and to boost ROMI. 

While the reasons are many and varied, they are immaterial in the context of the current state. The reality is that client organizations which fail to embrace marketing accountability initiatives will be at risk when it comes to insuring that their hard earned budgets are spent in an appropriate and effective manner. In the words of Noreena Hertz, the noted English academic, economist and author: 

“Transparency, accountability and sustainability have become the slogans of the market leaders.” 

There are many within the industry, including both client-side marketers and agency executives, who would argue that the move to improve advertiser controls takes time away from the business of creating and executing ad campaigns. 

Quite the contrary, in our experience, we have seen the implementation of accountability initiatives within the marketing area actually improve work flow, project briefing and approval processes; enhance client/ agency alignment, boost clarity around roles and responsibilities, provide rationale to upgrade marketing ops and clearly establish the expectations of both stakeholder groups. In the end, this can improve efficiencies, freeing up time for client facing activities and can help solidify the client/ agency relationship, all while enhancing transparency and controls. 

The primary reason for this is that accountability initiatives are predicated on enhanced levels of communications between clients and their agency partners and they ultimately drive understanding and trusts among C-Suite personnel at the advertiser in their agency partners. 

It is for these reasons that we believe that marketing accountability is a practice whose time has come. The stakes are too high for advertisers not to implement improved controls in 2016. Further, we know from experience that what is inspected is respected and respect is not a bad foundation on which to base a relationship. 

Interested in learning more about launching a marketing accountability program? Contact Cliff Campeau, Principal at Advertising Audit & Risk Management at ccampeau@aarmusa.com for a complimentary consultation on the topic.