Viral campaigns are less effective: Sapient Interactive survey

Digital agency Sapient Interactive has released the findings of a survey, titled Digital Marketing: The CMO perspective. The survey figures out the views of chief marketing officers (CMOs) or marketing heads of 52 organisations represented by sectors such as automobile, airlines, telecom and FMCG on various aspects of digital marketing and commerce. The findings are based on interviews conducted among respondents.

The report indicates that digital media is the third most preferred option after print and television for advertising. In an average CMO advertising budget, 17 per cent of the overall advertising spend goes to digital media, while 24.7 per cent and 19.4 per cent of the total advertising amount is allocated to print and TV respectively. Outdoor gets 10 per cent, while 4.5 per cent ad spend is allotted to radio.

All (100 per cent) of the airline and telecom marketing heads, more than 80 per cent of the respondents from FMCG, insurance and automobile sectors agreed that they have used digital advertising in the past.

On the basis of results delivered by different advertising formats of digital media, maximum number of CMOs rated website advertising or product based microsites as most effective. Viral campaigns are regarded as the least effective way of digital advertising. Website advertising and viral campaigns get an average weighted score of 100 and 30.7 per cent respectively.

Search marketing campaigns (score of 94) and e-mail marketing (score of 90) are considered as the second and third most effective ways of digital advertising respectively. Banner ads have received a score of 78.

Almost 100 per cent of the respondents agreed that the main constraint in adoption of the digital medium for advertisement is the lack of understanding of metrics used to measure the effectiveness of digital advertisement. Another interesting hurdle mentioned by CMOs in adoption of digital media is the inability to adapt traditional media practices to new media.

About 59 per cent of the respondents said that they would invest less in traditional media as new advertising formats emerge within digital media.

Sapient Interactive conducted the survey in partnership with IMA India.