In this thought-provoking presentation, Erin challenges the digital advertising industry's obsession with ad-attribution, urging marketers to embrace a more holistic approach. Showcasing how solely relying on primary KPIs can lead to myopic decision-making, as advertising's incremental impact and less tangible effects are often overlooked. By combining scientific rigor with the art of human intuition, advertisers can strive for the true essence of effective advertising - cutting through the noise, capturing attention, and ultimately, driving behavior change. Join us for a fresh perspective on how to optimize to the less tangible and drive bottom line business results.

1. Elevate your Media Strategy by
Keeping Advertising Human
(Spoiler Alert: it's more than
Ad-Attribution & Impressions)
MASTER
CLASS
Erin Mullaney
ASSOCIATE MEDIA DIRECTOR
CONNELLY PARTNERS
BOSTON, MA ~ JUNE 12 - 13, 2023
DIGIMARCONNEWENGLAND.COM | #DigiMarConNewEngland

2. Elevate Your Media Strategy By
Keeping Advertising Human
BOSTON · DUBLIN · VANCOUVER
Erin Mullaney
Associate Media Director

3. CONNELLY PARTNERS
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CONNELLY PARTNERS
150+ makers/thinkers/doers
A global perspective in
BOS · DUB · VAN
Full service marketing & advertising
agency, independent since ‘99
About Connelly Partners

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Clients

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WHY is what makes
us Defiantly Human.
Our team of strategists and cultural
anthropologists focus on understanding the mood
+ motivators of your audiences. We use this to
identify simple human truths so we can create
messages that resonate at their core.
We find and protect human truths in the
process of helping you succeed.
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Our Approach

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Keeping Advertising Human
Connelly Partners

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It all starts with the
consumer journey.
WHO
WHAT
WHEN
WHERE
WHY
HOW

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The point of Advertising is
to influence consumers to
change their behavior.
It’s common sense. But it gets lost in translation.

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We’re excited by
measurement.
We like to show good,
tangible results.
We redefine the objective from
business, to marketing, to media.
Until we’re no longer assessing or
accountable for the bottom line
business results.

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The truth is…advertising cannot
work and still produce results.
Connelly Partners

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Connelly Partners
Let’s market to people who are
interested in traveling to Las Vegas
*Person looking up fights to Vegas*
Targeting Algorithm: A contender!
Ad of Vegas thus deploys while or
soon after search
*Person visits Vegas as intended*
Marketing Report: We did it!
Reported Results: 1 Conversion from your ads
Real Results: 0 Incremental Conversions
ANDY/STU WAS GOING TO VEGAS WHETHER
HE SAW OUR AD OR NOT

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How do you optimize to real business results?
Connelly Partners

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Incrementality & Impact
Connelly Partners

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Incrementality >
Attribution
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A portion of your
advertising
results are not
incremental.

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EXAMPLE:
Viewability
Standards
80%
50%
Viewability
Rate
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Attributable
results are just
a piece of the
puzzle
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How do you assess incrementality?
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Correlate
business
results.
Increase in advertising
activities 🡪 increase in sales
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Check in on
marketing
efficiency ratio.
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BUSINESS
REVENUE
ADVERTISING
SPEND

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Test & Learns
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Vendor,
platform, & 3rd
party studies.
Connelly Partners

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When conversion
rates are higher
than ad recall rates,
that’s a problem
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How can you attribute it to your ads?
How is that incremental?
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EXAMPLE:
Incrementality
Test
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Custom Data Science Models
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Illustrative example

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Privacy Is Now
● Attributable results are lessening and will be
more difficult to hang our hats on.
● GDPR, CPRA, IOS Opt-out are already in
effect, Google Chrome will be testing
cookieless in 2024, individual states have
passed legislation, and several bills have
been introduced/discussed around this topic
in Congress.
● What’s considered PII (Personal Identifiable
Information) can continue to evolve (enter IP
addresses, and other “cookieless” solutions).
Connelly Partners

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So what do we do?
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Incrementality >
Impressions
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Strategize To Incrementality
Over Attributable Results.
● Plan for IMPACT; marketing is less about attributable
results and age-old reach & frequency, but behavior
change. How can you truly influence the consumer?
● Free yourself of prioritizing channels that show
attributable results and prioritize research, learnings
and measurement to discern & invest in what’s actually
impacting the bottom line.
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Let’s Scroll Together…
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Average scroll
time is less than
3 seconds
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Let’s have some fun…
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Open camera & focus
on QR code
Click the link
Make the video full screen

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These ads
cost the
same

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Your Budget, Even At Its Most Cost-
Efficient Version, Can Only Get You A
Specific Number Of Impressions
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Where Can We Create Incremental
Return Without More Media Spend?
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Focusing On Impact
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This Is Not A Creative
Presentation.
● IMPACT should be considered in each
part of a communication plan
● The consumer journey
● The market & target audience
● The media mix
● The message
● The creative
● The integration of it all
Connelly Partners

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These ads
cost the
same
But It’s Easiest To Show With Ads

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Some Days We See More Hours Of Media
Than Hours We’re Awake
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13
16
Avg Hours Spent
With Media

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TARGETING ALGORITHM:
A fast food contender!
ACTION:
Person orders lunch from fast food chain*
ACTION:
*Person goes back to
social feed or
browsing online*

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It’s Wicked Crowded
Out There.

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Connelly Partners
Don’t Be Afraid To
Keep Advertising
Human.

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Your Competitors Are Using Your Same Targeting.
How Are You Standing Out?
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Attributable results-focused solution: Impact-driven solution:
● Keep your audience broad, the
algorithm will do the work for
you…
● Along with all your competitors
creating a saturated marketplace
and higher CPMs
● Can you prioritize a geo-target
more relevant to your business
compared to competitors to
reduce waste?
● Can you use research & learnings
to find a less obvious targeting
approach that will still lead you to
your target audience with less

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Connecting The Dots
Connelly Partners

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Marketers & Brands:
Common Challenge
● Multiple communication
departments.
● Connected to many additional
related departments.
● Marketing can only influence a
business so much. Many other
factors that funnel into sales.
● BUT if marketing is not producing
incremental returns on investments,
WHAT’S THE POINT?

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There’s No Quick
Fix; But A Best
Practice Approach
● Strategizing & optimizing to impact
& incrementality requires integration
and communication.
● An integrated measurement strategy
is the key to pulling it off
.
Campaign Metrics + Consumer Metrics + Business Metrics = Integrated Measurement Plan With Holistic Results

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Sales, Revenue,
EBITA, Incremental ROI
6
Consumer Sentiment, Brand
Recall, Brand Searches
5
Attributable Sales, Email Sign-ups,
Conversion Data
4
Site Traffic, Engagement Rate,
Most Viewed Content 3
Video Completions, CTRs, Social
Engagement, Likes & Shares 2
Impressions, Reach,
Frequency, GRPS
1
Leading indicators are predictive
measures that provide directional
insight about future outcomes
Lagging indicators are output
measures and provide insight about
the achievement of business goals
Media & Site Measurement
Business Measurement Consumer Measurement
Optimizing at the intersection of media,
consumer, and business performance
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Aggregating an
array of data
signals to tell a
holistic story

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If You Only Care
About The KPIs, You
Could Be Missing
The Big Picture.

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Connelly Partners
New Vegas Ad
Old Vegas Ad
PRIMARY KPI: Cost per Visitor
Cost/Visitor: $330
Cost/Visitor: $300
Ad Comments: 300
Ad Comments: 5
Results Optimizations
Results Optimizations

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DON’Ts
● Shy away from being correlated with
real business results
● Judge performance solely on KPIs
● Keep marketing metrics close to
your vest
● Rely on attributed results as the key
to success or reporting

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DOs
● Create a tangible log to track learnings
on a regular cadence
● Monitor more than the KPIs: look at all
campaign/tactic measurements
● Benchmark metrics ahead of the
campaign for added context to
performance
● Share the results across departments
for cross-department learning &
implementation
● Analyze results within additional
business data & context

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Let’s Wrap This Up.
● Strive for incrementality in marketing
efforts
● Maximize for impact throughout the
marketing strategy & execution
● Integrate data sources &
communicate cross-departments to
unlock full picture insights

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Keeping Advertising Human
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Defiantly Human.

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Connelly Partners
Erin Mullaney
EMullaney@ConnellyPartners.co
m
Boston, MA

59. BOSTON · DUBLIN · VANCOUVER
Any Questions?
emullaney@connellypartners.com

60. THANK YOU.
BOSTON · DUBLIN · VANCOUVER