The fragmentation of the media market has pushed advertisers to find ways to reach consumers among more devices, and determine which ones produce the best results. This approach to cross-screen measurement reflects changes in viewing habits.
“When we plan media on behalf of our clients, we don’t plan them in channel siloes. We plan across multiple screens, because that’s where media is being consumed,” Nancy Beekman, group director of data sciences at WPP-owned media agency Wavemaker, said in this interview with Beet.TV. “In addition to measuring the delivery, we need to measure the impact. That can be complicated, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t do it.”
Advertisers face a key challenge as technology giants like Google and Apple take steps to protect consumer privacy. Google delayed plans to stop supporting tracking cookies in its popular Chrome web browser, but the deadline still looms. Apple has given its customers more control over device identifiers they share with third-party apps and websites.
Advertisers also have to content with a variety of “walled garden” media environments that each have proprietary consumer data. It’s not always clear whether brands are reaching the different consumers as they use Facebook, Google or Amazon – or watch video on ad-supported streaming platforms like Hulu or Peacock.
Beekman said that she’s encouraged by work on data “clean rooms” that protect consumer privacy, while also opening up the possibility of measuring how advertising is reaching different audiences. She also is optimistic about using panel data to study purchase behavior among retailers in real time, and to change campaigns mid-flight.
“Some of the challenges are: how do we include the walled gardens when they sometimes prioritize not commingling their data with other platforms?” Beekman said. “It can be difficult with digital tracking when we think about the advancements that have been made for consumer privacy.”
This video is part of the Global Forum on Responsible Media produced by Beet.TV, GroupM with the 4A’s. This track on cross-screen measurement is sponsored by Nielsen. For more videos on this topic, visit this page.
The entire Forum can be watched on-demand here, and all videos from this project can be found here.
