May 18, 2012

All advertising will soon be integrated, says Google VP


All brands and all ad campaigns will soon run integrated campaigns with a strong digital element, says Google display-advertising chief Neal Mohan. Studies show that cross-platform campaigns are highly effective, Mohan says, but digital will be the most important element of the mix. "With reach, control, quality content and measurement, I think the real question will become: Why wouldn't a brand name digital their favorite medium?" he says. Via MarketingVOX:

Google is making some bold predictions for what it will deliver ad customers in the coming years, and for online advertising's share of ad and marketing dollars. Neal Mohan, Vice President of Display Advertising, spoke yesterday at the Digital media Summit in New York, hosted by Luma Partners. Mohan updated some predictions he made at last year’s IAB Innovation Days summit, among them, that people will have a direct say in 25% of the ads they see. Now he predicts more than 50%. Since last year, “We’ve seen choice friendly formats take off across the industry [and] engaged views of TrueView skippable ads grew 4x last year.” The paywall alternative Google Consumer Surveys has already shown more than 300 million surveys, with an average publisher RPM of $12, the company claims. “Given all the innovation, I actually think we aimed too low and that consumers will have a say in well over half of the ads they see.” (If that sounds absurd, consider the nascent "ad tailoring" available now on Hulu, which allows users to "Choose Which Ad is Most Relevant To You.")

Mohan now predicts that 25% of brands will favor digital ads over all other media. “This is a pretty bold prediction,” he said, “considering today this number is probably close to none.” But audiences continue to move online. In 2011, households with broadband internet and no cable TV increased 23%, according to the Nielsen Cross-Platform Report Q3’11. And, the newly launched YouTube Original Channels alone will introduce 25 new hours of original programming per day. “With reach, control, quality content and measurement, I think the real question will become, why wouldn’t a brand name digital their favorite medium?”

Perhaps the boldest prediction: “100% of campaigns will be integrated everywhere. All signs indicate that campaigns that reach across screens - TV, desktops, smartphones and tablets — are more effective.” Mohan cites a September 2011 joint study by Google and Nielsen Multi-Media Labs in which users who saw a multi-screen Volvo campaign had a 24% higher brand recall than those who viewed Volvo ads on TV alone. “We’re increasingly seeing increased interest in buying across screens on our own platforms, like DoubleClick for Publishers Mobile, where we’ve seen the number of impressions delivered double every quarter.”