I was on an OMMA panel recently debating the relative merits of using an online GRP (gross rating point) for digital video. I think they let me on these things because they know I’ll usually end up articulating the minority dissent, (For the record, I’m not a fan of the digital GRP notion).
If I’m reading the press correctly — Nielsen and TubeMogul have introduced a GRP model that normalizes TV and online video GRPs such that they could theoretically be treated as additive, enabling “apples-to-apples comparisons with television.”
Mistaken identity.
Not so fast. To do this, one would have to establish that Audience A (TV/broadcast) and Audience B (online/digital) are the same. The simplest thing to do would be to combine the available online audience with the available TV audience within a fixed period of time and calculate reach and frequency off that.
I’m assuming that Nielsen wouldn’t tamper with the definition of the broadcast GRP, so that means in order to do this normalization, online-only audiences would have to be discarded. This means that the combined video GRP is most likely a measure of people who are exposed only to TV or to both TV and online video in a fixed timeframe. This implies two things:
• That some portion (possibly a very large one) of the digital audience is not represented in this delivery metric.
• That the measured digital audience is only adding frequency to the calculation, not reach.
Smells like disenfranchisement.
Suddenly, I’m really concerned that I’m in the minority opinion on this issue, because this is starting to smell like a conspiracy to disenfranchise digital media agencies.
For years, digital video providers have been pushing to standardize online video metrics against the broadcast standard to appeal to broadcast planners and buyers. The rationale is that the more digital video looks and smells like regular broadcast, the more likely it is that digital video will capture a portion of the billions of broadcast dollars in play.
If things play out this way, then pure digital media budgets are likely to shrink as the funds earmarked for video in a given digital plan are siphoned back into the broadcast budgets. The digital shops will lose the responsibility for planning with properties like Hulu, YuMe, perhaps even YouTube. This also sets the stage for Pandora, Spotify and other digital audio channels to fall back into the broadcast planning fold as well.
It’s time for someone to call BS on this.
Priority one: Tear down the GRP myth.
Since no one has really stepped up, I’ll go first: I say that priority one is to tear down the myth of the GRP.
GRPs are not units of efficacy; that is to say, they are not unto themselves advertising success metrics. The goal of an advertising campaign is usually to change a behavior or perception: to get an audience to buy or think or feel. A GRP doesn’t ladder directly to any of those things and isn’t even a reasonable proxy for them.
A GRP is a unit of weight, an average percentage of available eyeballs that a property within a given channel has or can deliver. It’s the same thing as saying “ounce”. Only in media terms, it’s “ounces of eyeballs.”
Here’s the problem: Are 10 ounces of eyeballs seeing your commercial on 50” flat screens in the comfort of their living rooms the same as 10 ounces of eyeballs seeing it on their mobile phones on a crowded train? The answer is that there isn’t enough information to say one way or the other and the only conclusion is that it’s 20 ounces of eyeballs. If I’m an advertiser, my reaction is, “Well, that doesn’t tell me anything.” Exactly. We need to be talking about outcomes and objectives. Anything else is an endorsement of a lazy and indolent status quo, where volume remains a woefully under-disguised stand-in for efficacy.
Is Facebook’s move to the Timeline format better for business? Believe it or not, the evidence is already in. The answer is…it depends.
Recently, I was lucky enough to attend a presentation by our T3 social team about the impact on fan engagement for early adopter brands to the new Facebook Timeline format. The team looked at research by Wildfire Interactive, a maker of online marketing software. The research looked at 43 brands ranging in fan size from 22,000 to 40 million fans for 42 days, 21 before the change and 21 after. In addition, T3 evaluated the brands we work with. What they found was fascinating, surprising and not surprising at all, all at once.
Timeline changes.
Let’s quickly review the changes that came with Facebook’s Timeline.
First, there’s the new cover photo with art restrictions that can be summed up as “Keep your sales pitch out of my Facebook.”
Second, there’s one fixed view and three visible tabs, with your other tabs visible only when you click to open them. No more driving people straight to different tabs. Your fans land on your profile page and that’s that.
Third, fan posts are in a separate container and large-format photos and videos can be used in your brand posts. There’s also direct messaging now.
Lastly, you can use brand milestones to illustrate the history of your brand.
And the survey says…
Wildfire Interactive collected data on the following metrics:
• Daily fan growth rate
• People talking about this
• Comments per brand post
• Likes per brand post
That’s pretty much a wish list for what brands want out of their Facebook pages. So here’s what the research uncovered: Brands with less than a million fans saw nearly a 70% growth in people talking about them. Pair that with 40% more comments and 60% more likes per post and you’ve got a huge winner, right? Well, almost. Fan growth rate didn’t change at all.
For larger brands with 1 to 10 million fans, the numbers were mixed. There was roughly a 30% increase in people talking about the brands and 13% more likes per post. But the comments on posts were down 17%. Once again, fan growth stayed exactly the same.
The super big boy brands with 40 million+ fans got pretty beat up by the transition. Everything was down. Significantly. Except one: Fan growth rate. Didn’t change a lick.
Mixed signals.
So is the new Facebook Timeline better for brands? Depends.
If you are a smaller brand on Facebook, it’s much better. Timeline has significantly increased the engagement behavior of fans. Stay focused on great content to keep that momentum going.
For larger brands, the answer is “by and large.” The new functionality has definitely increased interaction between users. If (and it’s a big if) you can create opportunities to join conversations in an unobtrusive way, you can become part of the increased engagement users have with Facebook.
For mega brands on Facebook, the results are worse. But if you’re one of these brands, don’t worry. You’re kind of like the homecoming queen. People only really like you because everybody likes you. Your drop in numbers is mainly because people are nosey and they are off checking out all the other brands in their life. Post another million-dollar giveaway and they’ll all come running back.
The biggest takeaway.
All three groups saw absolutely no change in their growth rate. Zip, nada, nothing. Which leads us back to the core truth of Facebook: People read, like, comment and share what interests them. Sometimes it’s an ad.
Technology simply can’t bear the full weight of generating interest in your brand. Only content can do that. Relevant human content that tells the story of your brand in a relatable way. Tell that story on your page and no matter what Facebook does, it’ll be better for your brand.
Go ahead, laugh. It’s not as ridiculous as it sounds. It’s certainly no more ridiculous than people calling themselves social media gurus.
No one can claim that title yet. Social is still too new of a proving ground to have any discernable best practices. What’s more, it almost evolves too rapidly to establish any.
So what does this have to do with a 900-year-old, two-foot-something Jedi master with a debatable grasp of English? Everything. Yoda’s mantras share the same common truths as the success brands are looking for from social media.
“Size matters not”
Every time I hear a client set Facebook “Like” goals, I die a little inside. Simply put, if you want a million friends, give away a million dollars. You’ll hit that number in a week. And your engagement needle won’t move.
We’re programmed to think bigger is better. But you have to ask yourself, what’s more powerful, an army of people who could care less about your brand or a crack squad of brand evangelists who will preach your good word to the masses?
“You must unlearn everything that you’ve learned”
As marketers, we’re taught to “craft and control” the brand image. We’re also taught that media is something purchased, like a hunting license on a private preserve stocked with our preferred prey. With social media, you can toss all that out the window.
First off, the second you enter the social realm, you are not in control of your brand. Swallow your pride and move on. In fact — in true democratic fashion — the more you turn control of your brand over to the people, the more successful you will be.
Secondly, you must remember your guest status in the conversation. You have to earn your right to be there. And uninvited guests are only welcomed when they are incredibly charming.
“Impossible to see the future is”
For years, marketers have talked about the “conversation” we’re having with consumers. Before social media, that was largely a lie.
With social media, you’re having a real-time, two-way conversation with consumers. And just like a regular conversation you’d have with a friend, it’s impossible to plan out what you’re going to be saying five minutes from now because it’s impossible to know where the conversation will go.
So as much as you want to plan out every post six months in advance so you can be positioned for a dynamic Q4, don’t bother. If you still want to be talking to people in Q4, follow the conversation closely and always have something interesting to say.
“A Jedi uses the force for knowledge and events, not for attack”
All marketers salivate over the engagement numbers in social media. Converting even a fraction it to sales translates into big-time money with an insane ROI. But here’s the bad news: social media is a listening device, not a direct sales tool.
In fact, social may be the best listening device ever created. If you’re willing to listen, you’ll never again wonder what your customer is thinking. Even better, your brand has the chance to respond to those thoughts with a human voice. That’s how brands become timeless.
“Do or do not, there is no try”
Obvious as it may seem, Yoda’s most memorable line seems to be the one brands most often forget. They seem to think that throwing up a profile is social media’s silver bullet. I blame that on the fact that social media appears free and sometimes effortless. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The most successful brands in social media either invest lots of time or pay lots of money for their success. Either way, they go all in.
More importantly, they realize that what drives any conversation is an idea. From Old Spice to Small Business Saturday, a big idea beautifully executed across many platforms was what got people talking, sharing and bonding with the brand. Find yourself an idea true to your brand and bigger than even the grandest post or profile, and “Master social you will.”
