OPA Trashes Ad Networks … Badly

In a blatant attempt to convince advertisers that there are fewer than 50 sites online that can drive brand awareness and purchase intent, the Online Publishers Association—a trade organization that represents media firms known mostly for their offline brands, such as the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times—recently published a study claiming ad networks are close to worthless for non-direct-response purposes.

Moreover, the press release announcing the OPA’s findings included a disclaimer that utterly discredits the study’s claims.

First, the findings:

According to the OPA, online ad-awareness metrics were 21% greater for ads on OPA sites than overall MarketNorms—a benchmarking service offered by Dynamic Logic—and portals, and 50% more than ad networks.

Also, purchase intent was about two-thirds higher on OPA sites than portals, nine times that of ad networks and 50% greater than overall MarketNorms, the OPA reported.

Video ads on content sites represented by OPA members have the greatest impact, the OPA claimed. Purchase intent was 163% higher than overall MarketNorms data and 93% more than portals, the study concluded.

However, buried at the bottom of the release announcing the findings under the heading “About Dynamic Logic’s MarketNorms” was the following: “The results cited have not been adjusted for exposure frequency, demographics, ad size, Web sites, advertiser industry and other factors that may contribute to brand impact.”

Exposure frequency is one of the most important factors in driving brand awareness, yet the OPA, by its own admission, didn’t control for it and a bunch of other factors that may have brand impact.

Moreover, the very idea that sites outside the OPA’s membership can’t drive brand awareness and purchase intent defies common sense.

Jarvis Coffin, chief executive of ad network Burst Media, contends that the OPA is trying to drive down the value of advertising on all content sites except for those of its 48 members.

“They’re trying to pull up the drawbridge and keep the peasants from taking over the castle,” he said.

Also, the OPA is attempting to denigrate the branding value of content on small vertical sites, he added.

“Take the subject of lactose-intolerant kids,” he said. “Parenting [magazine] does something on it twice per year, yet there are sites out there dedicated to the subject twenty four/seven. You’re not going to tell me that’s not quality content.”

In a blog post on the subject, Coffin wrote the OPA “opted to set fire to the forest floor yesterday with the release of a study on brand advertising metrics that, by the time they finished, scorched the effectiveness of the entire Internet as a brand medium save for its 50, or so, members who served as the “proxy for content sites” in the study. That means all the other non-proxy content sites served by ad networks or sales representatives, plus portals—or, basically, the remainder of the Internet—were voted off the island by the report.”

He added: “This is what lashing out looks like. The OPA didn’t release a study yesterday; the OPA lashed out at the industry, which it feels conspires every day to wreck the value propositions of its members who are important, dedicated, hard-working, First Amendment freedom fighters that are sick and tired of being trampled by midgets. Honestly, I think they are just that frustrated. Every day it’s attack of the killer ants.”