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More than 80% of marketers intend to switch part of their direct marketing budgets to digital or social advertising in the coming year, but only 36% intend to put resources into monitoring the results, according to study from Alterian.

 

The data suggests marketers are waking up to the opportunities presented by social media but are yet to work out how to assess its effectiveness.

The survey of 1,000 marketers by the web marketing firm found that 84% of marketers intend to divert money to digital or social media ads over the next year, with 21% preparing to shift more than 30% of their direct marketing budget to the sectors.

However, surprisingly few marketers are investing in media monitoring tools or projects to measure campaigns’ effectiveness. Such data would help target ads more effectively and a lack of investment in monitoring is likely to diminish the impact of additional spending in the sector. 

Simon Lewis, editor of digital recruitment advertising specialists, Only Marketing Jobs, commented: “For all its fantastic benefits social media is notoriously difficult to quantify.  Marketers are still trying to convince their finance teams and HR departments that social has a tangible ROI. Without monitoring tools and tracking systems justification will be difficult.”

Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg recently said Facebook could become a bigger advertiser than Google. She says that although Google’s search ad system is the best means of reaching customers who already know what kind of product they want to buy, Facebook could take a lead in "demand creation".

However, the impact of ads designed to create a desire for a product or raise brand awareness is far harder to track than the impact of Google-style search ads. This hurdle may be deterring advertisers from engaging in tracking the impact of their spending on social networks.

One reliable source of metric determination comes from leading online measurement and response providers, Nielsen Online, whose director of industry solutions, Brad Little, says: “The depth of intangibility within social networking can be hard to fathom but there are sophisticated mechanisms – as well as increasing know-how – that are able to better quantify the importance of social engagement.”

 

Are marketers right to turn all attention online? Where does this leave traditional below-the-line advertising?

 

Source: Written by Jasper Jackson, StrategyEye.com

Additional: Simon Lewis | Editor | Only Marketing Jobs

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