What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
mackgrenfell.com
What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
1–10 of 42 posts
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#2No Performancer Marketer takes it for face value, we all know they don't, the problem is they still sell it to their clients as if they did.
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#3No Performancer Marketer takes it for face value, we all know they don't, the problem is they still sell it to their clients as if they did.
None of the good agencies do this.
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#4Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#5No Performancer Marketer takes it for face value, we all know they don't, the problem is they still sell it to their clients as if they did.
None of the good agencies do this.
Isn't that basically a "no true Scotsman" fallacy, though?
I can completely believe both sides of this: the original Fishkin article, and this rebuttal which claims that "actually, marketers are competent and knowledgeable".
One way to look at this, mindful of [Sturgeon's Law](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_law) stating that ninety percent of everything is crap, is that good marketing agencies will rise above, but if I own a store selling scented candles and Google "online advertising" and hire one of the random agencies listed, maybe, just maybe, I'll get one of the 90% of bad ones that will try to hoodwink me into believing unsupported incremental conversion numbers.
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#6> As impressive as these examples might seem, we have to consider the fact that no company would ever publicise their results had they observed the opposite. No CMO is going to go on Medium and write an article called We dropped our spend by X%, and saw our volume drop by X%. Even if they did write such a case study, it's unimaginable that it should become part of modern marketing folklore in the way that Airbnb and Ebay's experiments have
In other words: Survivorship bias is the driver of these anecdotes. Obviously no company is going to brag publicly about shooting themselves in the foot by reducing advertising spend, so the only possible anecdotes that can exist publicly are positive ones.
Also: Most companies aren't established, household brand names like AirBnB or Uber or eBay. Those companies have built enough of a reputation and have enough word of mouth momentum that advertising campaigns aren't going to move the needle much.
I agree with much of this article. The original claims that performance advertising is a "scam" is playing to general distrust of marketers or a dislike of advertising. Any small companies trying to ditch advertising because AirBnB did it (after they were established and had saturated the market) are making their decisions for the wrong reasons.
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#7On the Airbnb point -- we ran many incrementality experiments prior to COVID -- COVID just completely changes things. Also 5% of Airbnb's revenue is alot.
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
None of the good agencies do this.
Isn't that basically a "no true Scotsman" fallacy, though? I can completely believe both sides of this: the original Fishkin article, and this rebuttal which claims that "actually, marketers are competent and knowledgeable". One way to look at this, mindful of [Sturgeon's Law]( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sturgeon%27s_law ) stating that ninety percent of everything is crap, is that good marketing agencies will rise…
Personally I have never found a good agency for these type of things, and I have worked with a bunch. Some in the gaming space were decent enough.
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#9Wow. This article is excellent. It’s not just the content; he’s even made nice graphics… And the aesthetic of the post on mobile is 10/10.
The issues at hand in this post are real.
1. Problem 1 - Awareness
Many marketers outside of mega super super high paying startups are BARELY aware of these factors.
I’m an amateur at this stuff but people look at me like I’m a wizard when I get my - VERY SIMPLE - Spreadsheets out.
That’s one thing.
Problem 2 - The tools
these platforms and analytics tools are kind of shit at piecing the story together.
I’m the sole marketer at a (very rapidly growing, if I may) software startup.
Every so often, as an exercise, I go back and piece together the entire journey of our highest value opportunities and prepare a nice little report.
The idea is to show the team that the buying process is complex and that tracking in our neat little funnels is a rough proxy at best.
Problem 3 - untracked interaction
We sell a product that is used by teams. This means that a TON of our traffic is going to be from team members coming in to have a look after team member A discovers us. But what happens if it’s team member C that gets in touch? How do you attribute that?
Doing regular deep dives on individual customers is the best way to maintain sanity in an organisation and stop the inane conversations that non-marketing team members tend to start. The deep dives, in my experience, tend to be the thing that most generates trust in the marketing activity - because it goes from being just an abstract game of big numbers to ‘oh hey, that actually works, how clever.’
Re: What if performance advertising isn't just an analytics scam?
#10> As impressive as these examples might seem, we have to consider the fact that no company would ever publicise their results had they observed the opposite. No CMO is going to go on Medium and write an article called We dropped our spend by X%, and saw our volume drop by X%. Even if they did write such a case study, it's unimaginable that it should become part of modern marketing folklore in the way that Airbnb and…
I don’t understand the survivorship bias argument. If any company tried to follow in AirBnB’s footsteps and saw their revenue decline as ad spend went down, wouldn’t they widely publicize this fact? “Hey! AirBnB is wrong, and following their advice nearly destroyed my small business” would be a compelling read and get a lot of traction.
I find it hard to believe that such a demonstration of the value of marketing wouldn’t be immediately shouted from the rooftops by CMOs everywhere and find its way into marketing textbooks.