Recycled Bullsh-IT

About 20 years ago I came across ‘The Guerrilla Marketing Handbook’ by Jay Conrad Levinson. The concept was to create branding and lead generation through unconventional and small-scale activities and events that could have as much impact as a large seven figure advertising campaign. Unfortunately, a lot of people took this as an excuse to commission irritating and humourless “viral” internet campaigns churned out by clueless marketing agencies. However, the concept of getting maximum results from minimum resources has stuck with me.

Gorilla Marketing

A lot has changed in marketing over this time. Instead of large brands and agencies bending media and channels to their will, we now have a tail-wagging-dog situation with the digital channels holding their clients to ransom.

 A depressingly high percentage of modern marketing budgets (62%) is spent on digital channels ($389Bn in 2021), with about half of this going on mobile ads. Google, Facebook and Amazon get about 64% of digital ad spend. These 800 lb gorillas, who control many of the internet and mobile journeys for consumers, are wielding the big sticks, while desperate brands spend ever increasing amounts of ad money on clickbait with no idea whether it is working or not.

If these digital ads were really effective, you’d expect to see clear causal correspondence between ad spend and revenue uplift. Interestingly, through the pandemic in 2020 many brands found that reducing digital ad spend made no difference to revenues. So, what’s the problem:

• Tainted Brand: With very little say on ad placement online, many brand ads are appearing alongside content that can range from off-putting to offensive. Being associated with radicalism, revenge porn, or erotic remedies, doesn’t go down well with the Fortune 500 fraternity
• Channel-centric not Consumer-centric: Because of the fragmented footprint most consumers have across the internet, virtually all engagement with the target audience is spread across multiple disparate channels, making it difficult to focus on the individual target
• Click Fraud: As it is so easy to place a digital ad, it is ridiculously simple for current crooks to scam Joe Public with identikit spoof ads, lead them to a fake site and relieve them of their hard-earned furlough funds.  No wonder fewer fools are willing to click on ads
• Money Pit: The effectiveness of digital ads is wildly oversold. Large-scale studies of ads on major sites like eBay and Facebook found that brand search ad effectiveness was overestimated by up to 4,000%. No wonder investment in ad tech companies has plummeted and has led to worries that this industry could be the next internet bubble to crash and burn

How to get Ahead in Advertising

John Wanamaker’s old adage that “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is, I don’t know which half” needs to be amended to “90% of digital advertising is wasted”.  But how can you reach your audience, particularly Generations X, Y and Z, who seem to filter real life through their smartphones? Try these:

• Eyes not Clicks: It is becoming clear that getting the brand seen is more important than click-throughs for sales uplifts – many sales come after the ad has passed, providing a lasting influence on preference
• Less is More: Brand fatigue is common on frequently run or placed ads, so replace daily/weekly with monthly/quarterly
• Quality Pays: A lot of digital advertising has descended into just bidding up specific words, then pitching a few bytes of meaningless marketing messages to encourage the click-through. Mad Men era focus on standout style and subtlety will catch the interest much better
• Local Eyes: Localising ads is complicated and time-consuming, but pays dividends in appealing to the country/region/city/tribe loyalty your punters feel

So, Guerrilla Marketing can still beat Gorilla Marketing if you don’t go ape over digital ads.

John “Bonobo” Moe