Digital Marketing — Overrated & wasteful
For the second year running, marketers have mentioned digital marketing techniques as overrated in this survey by MarketingWeek. We need to stop and reflect on this for a moment!! Digital marketing is overrated!! I think it is about time we understand that the water has run its full course and is coming back to its origins.
In the article, ITV CMO Jane Stiller makes an important point — “I do think those core skills of traditional marketing have been distracted by digital tactics.”
According to eMarketer, digital advertising spend (one component of digital marketing) is expected to jump by 13.2% in 2024. There are hundreds of other such data points, each different but all predicting an increase in 2024. If we take both these aspects, they increasingly fall on opposite ends of the spectrum.
In April 2023, the respected DigiDay reported that $5.6 billion of digital ad spend was wasted in 2022 (a whopping 41%) from Next&Co. Digital Media Wastage Report. Google once found that 56% of ad impressions are never seen by customers. Just like predicted growth, there are numerous such figures for digital advertising wastage.
It will be wrong to make a presumptuous statement that digital marketing can’t be used to build long term brand equity. It definitely can be. But those kind of initiatives move the needle towards strategic vs tactical, which is where a majority of ad wastage lies. You might say, show me the data!!
A study by the respected ANA towards end-2023 found that 25% of programmatic ad dollars are wasted. A large proportion of this waste is driven by low quality media, invalid traffic, and non-viewable and non-measurable inventory. Classic examples of tactical spending going wrong and having enormous leaky buckets.
It won’t be presumptuous if we were to say that when it comes to strategic brand building, owners would be more careful, considerate and conscious of where their digital advertising dollars are going. In such instances, we move away from overrated tactical digital marketing skills to more impactful scenarios.
In 2024, if the growth in digital advertising is realised (as predicted) and marketers become increasingly wary and pessimistic about digital marketing, it would be important to realise the potential of digital for brand building. This has long been ignored or given second grade treatment in favour of billions of dollars of wasteful tactical spending.
Careful placement of brand building campaigns and assets on high quality digital media, curated list of platforms and communities visited by customers and correct messaging at different points of engagement are the aspects that need to be considered.
The next biggest trap that marketers need to avoid is AI-driven accelerated marketing assets creation, which makes wasting your advertising media dollars easier and faster. The focus needs to be on quality, regardless of how efficient the process of running a digital marketing campaign has become over time.
