TV advertising is part of the digital media age

2 July 2009

Justin Pearse’s Leader in which he talked about TV advertising as if it weren’t part of new media age’s gang and championed the effectiveness of internet advertising over TV (nma 11 June 2009) raised my eyebrows without the need for a funky beat or squeaky balloon. TV is part of the digital media age as much as the internet, and I mean linear digital broadcasting.

To claim online “win[s] the effectiveness argument” is fantasy. Every recent major study into advertising effectiveness (including those by the IPA and PWC) concludes that TV is by far the most effective and is getting more so. That’s why advertisers invest in it, and you insult them to suggest it’s because it feels “safe, familiar or comforting”.

You confuse effectiveness with accountability, but accountability appears to have been an illusion. Online is certainly countable, but the industry itself is having to rethink how it attributes cause and effect. Conversion attribution using online analytics is trying to understand better the exposure effects of online display ads on click-through. Once you do that you must concede that a TV ad might have driven the click as powerfully, and increasingly that’s what advertisers are discovering.

TV advertising is more effective when combined with online, but the reverse is also true. Forget rivalry and let’s focus on being the best integrated media choice possible.

Have your say

Please do not complete the following form field for security reasons.

Name

E-mail

Comment

Post as

Anonymously

Display name

I have read and agree to the terms and conditions