Marketing Around The Table
QUESTION: What portion of your marketing budget will you be spending on digital in 2009 and why?
1
Peter Russell
Head of marketing, Fsher & Paykel
The industry we operate in (major household appliances) has been surprisingly slow to integrate digital within its overall marketing communication strategy. It depends what one includes under the term digital of course – the list continues to expand.
One of digital’s primary components, however, online, I would estimate received no more than five to 10 percent of a typical advertising marketing spend. Even cursory analysis a year ago showed most players within our space were sticking with traditional media to the almost total exclusion of any real digital use. There has been some dabbling, but that is all it has really been.
Much of this has to do with relevance of course – Betty from Bankstown is hardly likely to respond to an SMS promotion that day for a 20 percent off refrigerator sale.
The low level of online adoption by our competitors is something we naturally saw as a potential for competitive advantage. The issue going forward though is one of competing mediums for our limited funds.
Lobby, mall or outdoor digital signage is becoming very compelling as the opportunity for rich relevant (and changeable) content has revolutionised this space.
So what sort of portion would Fisher & Paykel allocate? Conservatively, in the 30 percent range – again it all depends on what is included as ‘digital’. It could easily be more, but like most marketers the risk is in spreading one’s brand and resources too thinly or likewise jumping at the latest technology without thinking fully about the effectiveness or relevance of the medium involved.
One thing is for certain – avoid digital at your brand’s peril.
2
Jacquie Riddell
Director of marketing, SBS
I’ll start with the ‘Why’ – Obama. I know every man and his dog is falling over himself to proclaim and adore the new President as the world’s fi rst wired president. I can’t help but join the clamour.
From his campaign’s use of social networking tools, to the amazingly straight-up transition website (http://change.gov), the Obama machine really ‘gets’ digital. I’d like to think we here at SBS really get digital.
We’re pumping brainpower, ideas and resources into being great at it, but in media there are no experts. Everyone is trailblazing.
Ultimately, we provide great content to Australians – on television, on radio, on DVD, online or direct to their inbox. Many have said it – it’s just a matter of time. One day soon, more people will watch, listen or interact with our content through a computer rather than through traditional broadcast distribution.
Broadband infrastructure is holding us back, but that’s all about to change in Australia. Already, we have hundreds of hours of SBS content available to watch, listen to or interact with at sbs.com.au. And 2009 is all about the ‘C’ word: communities.
We are developing our CRM to link audiences to content, enable interaction and form a never-ending circle of engagement.
At present around a fi fth of our ad spend goes online, promoting SBS content at websites where our key target segment of information seekers are active. That will grow fast.
Our future is digital. End of story.
3
Robert Leach
Head of MCN Connect
My view on this issue is that STV linear TV ad revenues will continue to grow this year, though perhaps not quite as fast as they have done recently.
Rightly or wrongly advertisers tend to seek the accountability of more response driven media in harder economic times and they shy away slightly from big TV branding campaigns.
There is a strong argument that says this is a mistake, but it still happens. More money tends to get spent in online and other accountable digital media, and as a result I think that we are better placed than any other media owner in Australia to benefit from this shift. I think that our online revenues will at least double year on year (excluding Fox Sports).
I also expect signifi cant growth in interactive advertising and VOD, especially when we have upgraded the service and we have launched the ‘Advanced Measurement System’, which will give advertisers the measurement and accountability that TV is sometimes erroneously accused of not delivering.
I think, however, that the really opportunity for smart advertisers is effectively combining the two – online and TV advertising.
There is now a lot of evidence of the ‘media multiplier effect’, where TV and online combined works harder than either medium on its own. We represent the same engaging, targeted channels on both TV and online.
By running truly integrated campaigns across TV and online, all the research suggests that the advertiser will get a much bigger bang for their buck.
4
Sally Ling
Marketing manager, Open Universities Victoria
The short and quick answer to the question is ‘more than before’.
The longer answer is, as a percentage of budget, Open Universities Australia’s (OUA) digital spend will increase in 2009 and this trend will undoubtedly continue until we feel we have achieved a healthy balance among all of our media channels.
All the reasons we are increasing our spend fall into two main categories: student expectations when you provide a pathway to online university education and the habits of our changing student base.
In the early days of digital education in 1995, OUA (or Open Learning as it was known then) led the way in computer assisted learning in Australian higher education and units were developed by leading academics experimenting with new technology for the first time.The short and quick answer to the question is ‘more than before’.
The longer answer is, as a percentage of budget, Open Universities Australia’s (OUA) digital spend will increase in 2009 and this trend will undoubtedly continue until we feel we have achieved a healthy balance among all of our media channels.
All the reasons we are increasing our spend fall into two main categories: student expectations when you provide a pathway to online university education and the habits of our changing student base.
In the early days of digital education in 1995, OUA (or Open Learning as it was known then) led the way in computer assisted learning in Australian higher education and units were developed by leading academics experimenting with new technology for the first time.
Our history leads students to expect a seamless digital experience from the first time they hear of OUA to researching studies and enrolling through our website and, finally, to when they actually start studying.
There is no doubt, and research has verified, that digital consumers have constantly evolving habits. We have to choose the right channel with the right message not just to speak initially with our customer base, but to keep the dialogue going.
We’re currently in the process of exploring our limits, cognisant of the dangers of going too far, but also not far enough. The past couple of years were littered with case studies of companies who just couldn’t find the right way to communicate with their customers and were met with scorn.
While we’re lucky because OUA has never had to reconcile its attitude to online and digital spend, we are still trying to strike the right balance with our students.
Our history leads students to expect a seamless digital experience from the first time they hear of OUA to researching studies and enrolling through our website and, finally, to when they actually start studying.
There is no doubt, and research has verified, that digital consumers have constantly evolving habits. We have to choose the right channel with the right message not just to speak initially with our customer base, but to keep the dialogue going.
We’re currently in the process of exploring our limits, cognisant of the dangers of going too far, but also not far enough. The past couple of years were littered with case studies of companies who just couldn’t find the right way to communicate with their customers and were met with scorn.
While we’re lucky because OUA has never had to reconcile its attitude to online and digital spend, we are still trying to strike the right balance with our students.
5
Anthony Choi
Managing director, Bannershop
We have now entered the digital age. The majority of people browse the internet for information and they no longer rely on printed press. Does this mean that Bannershop would spend the majority of marketing budget on online marketing?
Over the years, different types of advertising products have developed, but printing has remained mainstream. As we are a large format digital printing company, I believe printing cannot be replaced with digital advertising and we do not see the need to spend a vast amount of money on digital advertising/marketing, especially when we can do digital printing and promotion ourselves in an economical way.
The price of a digitally printed A1 poster can go as low as $5 and it has become an affordable marketing tool. Printing, not digital, is the basis of marketing for any businesses. We are surrounded by printing products and I cannot imagine walking down the city without seeing one single piece of signage or billboard.
We have not cut our marketing budget – instead, we are putting a greater proportion of money and other resources onto our website. Our aim is to achieve widest exposure with limited budget.
While Bannershop relies on printed flyers and magazine advertising as the major way of marketing our products, we spend about one-third of our marketing budget in developing our website and marketing online. Bannershop also exhibit in 38 tradeshows worldwide.
I have to admit that the trend of ‘digital merging with printing’ is inevitable. In the near future, we shall incorporate more digital elements into our marketing campaign. As digital marketing is growing at the speed of light, we are also spending more resources into developing our website to facilitate the needs of our clients.
QR codes, bluetooth to simple sms call to action enable your audience to "build a bridge" from one platform to another. This is by no means to say that online spend should reduce to cater for mobile - online is and will always be an essential tool for the modern world in not only finding information, but increasingly with webTV and higher speed broadband and gaming opportunities an entertainment platform in it's own right.
You've seen the results of increased interaction and awareness by extending your campaign out to online, try and look to incorporate elements of mobile and see what more you can offer your audience.
If you're an FMCG, it reverses: 70%-80% should be devoted to offline spend & 20%-30% on digital. Even at the 20-30% mark, few FMCGs are going anywhere near that figure.
As for mobile ... hmmm ... how many of you have your bluetooth turned on? How many of you have your 'receive service messages on'? And how many of you want advertising/promotional content on your mobile? It's accepted on the web, it's (to most) unacceptable on mobile. Sorry, but I just don't see mobile as a valid & valuable marketing tool with so many users overtly blocking marketing messages from hitting their phones.
So far, I haven't had a real go at it online, 'traditional' methods online are flooded by Internet Marketing and Web Designers, so needs some time and effort to show a point of difference.
Not huge on mobiles, maybe for a viral campaign, but if the reader can block the ad, they will. I'd probably keep it simple and go for an SMS campaign.
Gavin Mace
www.rawonline.com.au