(MarketingROI) Mass marketing may be growing in some quarters, but not among the business-to-business executives surveyed by Epsilon.
A poll of 175 marketers in the U.S. showed that 79% are cutting their mass budgets in favor of trackable media. Indeed, a majority are already spending half of their ad dollars on channels like direct mail, e-mail, telemarketing and search.
“Companies are looking at the relationship between dollars being spent and the return on investment,” said Al DiGuido, president of Epsilon Interactive. “Never before has there been a tighter scrutiny of the way marketers are spending money.”
This leads many marketers to interactive channels in which ROI is easily tracked, DiGuido added.
On average, the firms surveyed allocate 66% of their total marketing budgets to traditional media like magazines, television and radio. But this category also includes response media like telemarketing and direct mail. The latter gets 26%–the largest single share — of the overall traditional ad budgets.
The respondents spend the remaining 34% on interactive media. This is broken down as follows:
*Internet display ads — 32%
*E-mail — 24%
*Affiliate marketing — 16%
*Search — 15%
*Other interactive channels — 13%
In addition, almost 75% practice integrated marketing. And 62% of those that do report double-digit lifts in performance.
How do these marketers gauge the success of their integrated campaigns?
For 62%, the key metric is the overall lift across all channels. But 43% also look at the separate hike in sales per channel, and 33% by the overall increase in brand awareness.
Another 31% calculate lift by average customer spend, 27% by lift in return visits or loyalty. Finally, 27% rely on customer satisfaction and 22% on the likelihood of recommendation.
DiGuido sees “nothing super disappointing” in the survey results. But he observed that “sometimes marketers want to have the path of least resistance.”
This may be seen in the finding that 46% of the firms surveyed make rough estimates based on experience when allocating money across channels for specific marketing efforts. Only 23% rely on sophisticated modeling and planning. Another 19% say they have a certain amount allocated, and 11% indicate their agency develops a media plan.
However, the marketers do use data and modeling tools when determining target markets for each channel. Forty percent use existing customer data and preferences, and 31% rely on sophisticated modeling and planning. In this area, only 18% make rough estimates based on experience.
Meanwhile, almost all said their CRM could be better. And almost 40% do not believe they have easy access to data.
But they are planning to address those failings by investing in their data systems. Of those surveyed, 27% plan to start data mining within the next year. In addition, 26% will use campaign management and workflow tools, 24% will invest in marketing automation tools and 22% will turn to Web analytics.
“It all starts with the marketing database,” DiGuido said. “Some folks have archaic databases. They kept data in silos. They don’t have a 360 view of the way in which their customers interact with channels.”
On the positive side, 53% of those surveyed already doing data mining. And 44% are using campaign management and workflow tools, 41% have spent on marketing automation tools and 49% are conducting Web analytics.
Epsilon conducted the survey with GfK NOP.
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