 | Hi, I’m Paula Skier, Director of Digital Product Strategy for Polk. My job is to figure out how to take the data assets and expertise that have served our clients for decades, and deploy them effectively in today’s digital marketplace. Over the past 20 years, I've held several positions here in sales, business development and product strategy, but I can honestly say that my current role is the most interesting & exciting of my career. I really enjoy learning new things and networking with different companies to identify strategic partnerships and new business opportunities. I encourage your comments and hope we can develop a thought-provoking online conversation. |
In September, I attended a session at the Interactive Advertising Bureau MIXX Conference entitled "The End of Digital Marketing." In his presentation, Google President Nikesh Arora opined that digital marketing is not a discipline unto itself, but simply a part of marketing in general. The same principle can be applied to online automotive marketing. I propose that the auto market as a whole consists of both online and offline elements, neither of which will do the job alone.
This was the theme of our presentation last week at the Polk Industry Outlook Summit 2009. I was fortunate to be joined at the podium by Julie Enzweiler, Automotive Research Director at the Nielsen Company. Our premise is simple: Automotive marketers must incorporate both online and offline research, targeting and measurement to form an effective overall marketing strategy. The pieces come together to form a complete puzzle, as illustrated below.
Take, for example, assessing the target audience and competitive set for a new vehicle being launched. We can measure the accuracy of the competitive group by examining online new vehicle shopping activity – who is shopping the vehicle, what are their demographics, and where are they located? Does this align with the intended target?
Further, what vehicles are being cross-shopped online, and does this correlate with offline conquesting & defection behavior? We took a look at the Honda Insight as an example and confirmed that there is, in fact, strong alignment between online and offline behavior.
*Source: Nielsen MegaPanel, Jan-Jul 2009;
**Polk Manufacturer Loyalty Excelerator™, Jan–Jul 2009
So, what does this mean for automotive marketers? Well, for starters, make sure to integrate online and offline intelligence to develop and refine your marketing plans throughout the vehicle lifecycle. There is still a tendency to create organizational silos that treat online and offline marketing as completely separate disciplines; this can severely impede your ability to leverage information across the organization.
In today's complex automotive market, we believe that companies that can break down organizational barriers and integrate information from all available sources, both online and offline, will be most successful.
On a scale of 1-10, with 1 meaning "completely separated, no integration" and 10 meaning "fully integrated, no silos," between the online and offline disciplines, how would you rate your company and why?
Inquiring minds want to know.
P.S. If you would like a copy of the presentation from our customer summit, send your company rating and contact information to me at paula_skier@polk.com.
Posted by Paula Skier, Polk, Director of Digital Product Strategy (11.2.2009)
Last week, I attended the BlueKai Data Boot Camp, a digital marketing event in New York. The focus was on behavioral targeting (using previous internet behavior to target relevant advertising messages to users). This field is expanding in new and exciting ways. Some companies are using social networks to find more people who “look” like the target market. Others have figured out how to bridge offline consumer data to the internet for use in online targeting.
But one thing they all had in common was a major focus on identifying “in market” consumers, in vertical markets such as travel, financial services and automotive. Given the state of the economy, particularly the automotive industry challenges, it’s not surprising that OEMs and dealers are focusing on lower-funnel targeting. However, it got me thinking, “What about the rest of the purchase funnel?” Obviously, a major purchase like a car is not an impulse decision. If you are already comparing vehicles and estimating payments, chances are you’ve narrowed down your consideration to a small group of vehicle makes or models. So if a brand you’re not considering pays to serve an ad to you, are they wasting their money?
For decades, marketers have relied on traditional media such as TV and print for brand advertising. Why isn’t the internet – which supports a much higher degree of targeting without sacrificing reach – being widely used for branding in the same way? I suspect it’s because there is no easy way to measure the impact of branding campaigns. After all, they are not designed to drive specific, immediate behaviors like clicking on a display ad or performing a search. This makes it harder to determine ROI and justify marketing spend in the current budget-squeezed auto industry. But as the market begins to turn around, I predict we’ll see a dramatic increase in online brand advertising. What do you think?
Posted by Paula Skier, Director of Digital Product Strategy, Polk (07.17.2009)
But one thing they all had in common was a major focus on identifying “in market” consumers, in vertical markets such as travel, financial services and automotive. Given the state of the economy, particularly the automotive industry challenges, it’s not surprising that OEMs and dealers are focusing on lower-funnel targeting. However, it got me thinking, “What about the rest of the purchase funnel?” Obviously, a major purchase like a car is not an impulse decision. If you are already comparing vehicles and estimating payments, chances are you’ve narrowed down your consideration to a small group of vehicle makes or models. So if a brand you’re not considering pays to serve an ad to you, are they wasting their money?
For decades, marketers have relied on traditional media such as TV and print for brand advertising. Why isn’t the internet – which supports a much higher degree of targeting without sacrificing reach – being widely used for branding in the same way? I suspect it’s because there is no easy way to measure the impact of branding campaigns. After all, they are not designed to drive specific, immediate behaviors like clicking on a display ad or performing a search. This makes it harder to determine ROI and justify marketing spend in the current budget-squeezed auto industry. But as the market begins to turn around, I predict we’ll see a dramatic increase in online brand advertising. What do you think?
Posted by Paula Skier, Director of Digital Product Strategy, Polk (07.17.2009)
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