Transparency Is The New Game In Town

By Adam Grossman

The Super Bowl is not just the most important game of each NFL season; it is typically considered the championship for advertising with the culmination of campaigns that have been months in the making. The fact that companies will pay at least $5 million for 30-second television advertising spots shows just how important the Super Bowl is to advertisers.

The most important advertising news this week, however, may have little to do with the Super Bowl. Marc Pritchard, Procter and Gamble’s (P&G) Chief Marketing Officer, this week authored a scathing critique of the advertising industry, which has arguably overshadowing any news of any upcoming Super Bowl commercials. As CNBC explains:

Procter & Gamble, one of the world's highest-spending advertisers, has called on the media buying and selling industry to become transparent in the face of ‘crappy advertising accompanied by even crappier viewing experiences.’ P&G has given agencies a year to get to ‘a transparent, clean and productive media supply chain,’ or risk losing its business, according to Pritchard.…’Better advertising and media transparency are closely related. Why? Because better advertising requires time and money, yet we're all wasting way too much time and money on a media supply chain with poor standards adoption, too many players grading their own homework, too many hidden touches, and too many holes to allow criminals to rip us off.’

Even if Pritchard’s comments reflected only P&G’s perspective then this would still be significant since the company spends $2.8 billion per year on advertising. However, Pritchard articulates something that has long been a problem for advertising buyers; it is very difficult for even the largest companies in the world to secure ROI metrics that are transparent, easily understood, and that fit their business.

Block Six Analytics’ (B6A) solutions are specifically designed to address these issues for both buyers and sellers of advertising and sponsorships. In particular, our Corporate Asset Valuation Model is completely transparent. A company can see exactly how a relationship with a seller impacts its specific business from both a brand and revenue perspective using best practice valuation approaches. This model is consistently updated throughout a campaign or year in our proprietary Partnership Scoreboard software as a service (SaaS) platform so that buyers and sellers can see the value of their advertising and sponsorship at any time.

Pritchard’s comments demonstrate that advertisers no longer think that having these types of clear metrics are just “nice to have.” Instead, companies like P&G are going to require that sellers and agencies clearly demonstrate and communicate the value that is being delivered by advertising before making a purchasing decision. The companies and agencies that cannot provide this information risk losing significant advertising revenue.