Without a doubt the (advertising) industry is in meltdown, as they struggle to adjust from old school 'push/intrusive' advertising models to 'pay walls & pain walls'. The growth in access to 'free to use' technology and social platforms is empowering audiences to take charge around how, when, where they consume ‘ad free’ content has required a radical and innovative rethink of how everyone in the content eco-system can sustain commercial viability!

Recent reports from eMarketer (link to article below) suggest;

A lack of transparency is media buyers’ greatest concern about programmatic advertising, according to a Digiday poll. Meanwhile, a 2018 survey of advertisers by marketing consultancy ID Comms found that agency-client trust levels hit a new low this past year. 

The erosion of trust explains why “transparency” will be the most important word in the ad industry this year, according to a survey of ad execs by Advertiser Perceptions. And in a study from ad measurement firm Integral Ad Science published in January, 63.3% of US agency professionals and 59.7% of US brand professionals said that a lack of transparency was a strong threat to their digital ad budgets in 2019. 

So why are companies still stuck in funding intrusive advertising methods, where the audit trail is so difficult to manage?. 

My educated guess is its because they are still stuck in 'analog' thinking around marketing, and if they are honest, they don't really understand the 'Social Media' space, so it scares the crap out of them because they can't control it.

As the global increase in audience behaviour for 'ad skipping' and 'ad blocking' combined with continued fraud associated with programmatic continues to rise unabated, we believe its vital that brands and companies establish non-intrusive audience friendly viable alternatives for generating insights, attribution and revenues from what is still a growing appetite across all channels to learn more about companies and brands.  

At DLA Ignite we can't seem to evidence many brands and companies leveraging the true value of a 'Social Media' strategy, what we can evidence is that they still think its about advertising the latest gadget, widget, or 'offer of the week' which is just intrusive wallpaper for the folks on social to simply scroll past, or even request for it not to be shown again. 

And for the advertiser very little (if any) transparency that they're not simply getting (and paying for) fraudulent 'impressions' from an offshore 'click' factory. Same issue applies to the so called 'Social Influencers'.

Worse still is the lack of control over those ads ending up next to porn, or terrorist related content. 

Every time we engage with a company and brand it's the same old story, that 'social' just doesn't work for them, well, No Shit Sherlock.....

We then take them through our (Silver Social Bullet) methodology and process, and BINGO its like the lights just been switched back on.

Being involved in the social space is about being SOCIAL, its not about broadcasting your latest offer, it's not talking about you all the time, but it is about connecting with communities who will be aligned to your business and brand, it is about generating value add conversations, and creating new communities that you can 'listen' to in order you can improve what you do, how you do it, and WHY you do it.

At DLA Ignite we specialise in helping brands and companies, along with the internal 'Change Makers' to deliver on all of these challenges, and I'm pretty sure we can help you as well. 

We have a tried and tested methodology, we hold you and your colleagues hand throughout, ensuring we not only 'teach' you what to do, we also make sure its firmly embedded into your firms DNA.

We don't do retainers, we are not an agency that creates and produces copy/content or sells ads for you.

We are active 'practitioners' of what we do, we already know and can evidence the ROI of a robust and internally aligned 'Social' strategy.

Part of that evidence it that you are reading this blog, just like many others - including your competitor!

We also don't do outbound pushy, salesy marketing, so if you would like to explore more, please contact the author of this blog.