Goodbye, Outcomes Era: Why Quality Will Define The Industry’s Future

There is a narration of the industry that has the potential to deepen structural shortcomings in digital advertising rather than bring us to the new paradigm. Some of the sharpest minds of our industry claim that we are entering an era of results.

Instead I assume that we were In the era of results for more than ten years. It is high time to leave it and accept our entrance to the quality era.

There are many ways to deduct this debate, all of which should lead to the conclusion that quality, not results, will be the dominant currency of another era of advertising, as was the case in our previous analog/broadcast era.

What time were we?

Does anyone seriously mean that this industry is in a good place with their obsessed focus on demonstrating efficiency with results? This obsession often results in the media assignment to assign credit for business results to which it has not contributed, and the spread of easy metrics masked as results.

All this happened when we had a user/device identification on a large scale without almost any restrictions on its use for targeting or measurement. However, our approach to these signals is decreasing.

The extensive and growing part of the digital media expositions has no longer joined the only one known to the user or with the purchases they do. So how do we even have a chance to build a healthy system based on the results when we couldn’t even do it in a third -party cookie era?

The only way it could work is if the system accepts and accepts the buyer, a serious level of inexplicable and unudcial probability modeling, which is simply unsustainable.

What is the result?

Ad tech notoriously captures vague terms, some carry great weight. The results are one of those, not by chance next to his performance and conversion synonyms.

In my almost two decades in the digital advertising space, I have heard almost every measure referred to as the result, from “hard results” such as sales and visits to shops, to “soft results” such as range, visible impressions and clicks.

If the result of the word is completely open interpretation, is it not wise to focus on it as a driving force that supports the measurement and decisions on the purchase of our industry?

The Goodhart Law explains many failures of our industries: “If the measure becomes a goal, it will cease to become a good measure.” If almost all measures were referred to as the results that have ceased to become good measures as soon as they happen, why it would also differ with a vague umbrella?

What is the quality of the media?

It’s easy to knock out the results. However, let us not assume that the case of quality has proven, although most agrees with its importance.

After all, the quality is also often thrown as a nonsensical buzz.

We will shorten the scope to focus only on the quality of the media and set aside aside Creative and audience/data quality.

The most amazing definition I was able to come for the quality of the media is the “collective sum of attributes and inventory characteristics, which is not bound to a single user or device, indicating the relative value for the advertiser due to the expected probability that this ad will result in the desired result. “This desired result may be a representative of a short -term and/or long -term goal, but the elevator must be really increasing.

The quality of the media can be easily considered to be the importance of the placement of advertising, the potential for its attention to its attention, and whether the context of the AD exposure can affect the perception of users. (I have explored the quality of the media on a number of lenses here.)

Are the results and quality mutually exclusive?

Can a person have quality without results? Yes and no.

The quality is defined by its correlation with the results, but that does not mean that each media exposure must be deterministly correlated with the result. Instead, there may be likelihood across large AD exposure groups, users and results to find different proxy.

Can one results have without quality? Yes and no.

It depends on how the result is defined. MFA websites, Outstream Video incorrectly developed as INTEREAM, and even invisible impressions were notoriously provided for a loan for results justifying many billion dollars.

The results verify the quality. But because the results are so freely defined, the edges are easily low in quality. The quality should therefore be our primary focus.

Quality, with spraying results

However, the results remain critical. No decent manager does not allow to spend marketing dollars without any evidence that this contributes to a business result.

As cookies disappear, the attribution models will be under pressure from the lack of ground truth data. Traders will re -redesize the correct measurements and experimenting, such as modeling marketing mixes and randomized control attempts to ensure that they lead to an increase in business results.

However, traders will operate these experiments for about 5% of any budget. Their planning, purchase and offers will be driven by media quality signals that are the most reliable proxy to the measurable results.

Which we think is a better aspirive northern star for a healthy industry and a functioning market: an era of results or quality era?

And for those who want it to have both ways to ensure that a system assignment created by our current obsession is not the results of the results?

We are standing at the intersection. Do we continue along the way to which all the most rooted forces agree was failure? Or will we start a new way that is in line with the time -tested marketing foundations?

“Data Divent“It is written by members of the media community and contains new ideas for the digital revolution in the media.

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