Senior Marketers: Little Confidence in Ability to Track Multichannel Campaigns

More than half of senior-level marketers say they are only “somewhat confident” or “not confident at all” in their organization’s ability to track campaigns across multiple channels in real-time (see chart), and only 19 percent say they can make campaign changes in less than 24 hours, according to a new study, reports MarketingCharts.
Social networking was cited the least “trackable” digital channel (see chart), according to Sapient’s annual Interactive Marketing Survey (via MediaPost).

However, it was the channel with the largest anticipated increase in marketing analytics spend for 2008:

• Only 12 percent of respondents tracked social networking campaign performance in 2007.
• But 42 percent anticipate using analytics in 2008 to track this increasingly important channel.

“While marketers have developed an aptitude for tracking more traditional online channels, the emergence of social networking further complicates the interactive landscape,” said Sapient Chief Creative Officer Gaston Legorburu.

“In 2008, marketers will seek the ability to seamlessly incorporate this medium with their other channels, including search and email, and the capability to monitor and measure performance to ensure they are achieving optimum results.”

Among other findings:

• Marketers are confident in tracking search and email campaigns:
  • Email (32 percent) and search (30 percent) were cited as the two channels that marketers were most confident in their ability to track.
  • Moreover, 38 percent of marketers said search resulted in the highest ROI to their organizations.
  • A plurality (28 percent) of marketers plan to increase search spending in 2008 (see chart).
• Cross-channel measurement is a major concern:
  • Nearly half the respondents said they do not believe that campaign data provided to them evenly measures and compares performance across all digital channels.
  • Difficulty in comparing metrics across channels is the most common hurdle to accuracy in this area, cited by 28 percent of respondents (see chart).
• Shifting spend in 24 hours not an easy task: Only 19 percent of respondents said they could make changes in campaign spend in less than 24 hours; the rest would need a couple of days or more.
• Recent acquisitions cause concern: Marketers are concerned about the wave of acquisitions involving Microsoft, aQuantive, Google, Double Click and others. 41 percent of survey respondents fear being lost in the shuffle with thousands of other clients as a result of consolidation in the online advertising industry.

About the study: The Interactive Marketing Survey is a national survey designed to provide insight into how marketers are implementing and tracking campaigns, the challenges they face and how they will allocate marketing spend across channels in 2008. Sponsored by Sapient, the survey was conducted via Zoomerang, an online survey services provider, and polled 120 respondents, all of whom are either directly or indirectly responsible for managing digital marketing budget allocation across multiple channels.