For over the past 150 years, US companies have been actively involved in the process of advertising their products and services to a wide-range of consumers. The mechanics of most of these marketing efforts has been based on the concept of ‘reach and frequency', namely - getting the advertising in front of as many eyeballs as possible. In a nutshell, the more people who see the ad the more new customers will be acquired. Or so we like to think.

There is little doubt that exposure to a brand or service increases the number of customers for that brand or service. But the mass marketing models of yesteryear are also highly inefficient and often rely on large numbers without being able to real measure if individual marketing programs are moving the needle or not.

The challenge most traditional media faces is that marketers are unable to know exactly how this media is being ‘consumed' by consumers. For example, an advertiser can easily measure if a 30 second commercial spot has been played as contracted with a media outlet but can't get a clear picture of exactly how many people saw the ad, how many understood the offer, how many made a mental note to check out the offer in the future…and how many were in the kitchen making a snack when the commercial ran.

One of the greatest advantages that online advertisers have today is the ability to accurately measure how their advertising is being ‘consumed'. The internet is a dynamic environment. Nothing online takes place without a consumer making a decision every step of the way. And every single point of contact between consumers and advertisers can be measured as well. This means that the guessing game has gone out of advertising. It's no longer about getting an ad in front of as many people as possible, it's now about getting the right message in front of the greatest number of people who will respond to that ad in some way. Measure how consumers are interacting with an ad and you can measure the overall effectiveness of that ad. Every single click.

This advertising accountability also means that marketers can measure campaign results during every stage of the campaign and don't have to wait until the ‘smoke clears' at the end of the campaign to determine success or failure. This means that no campaign's fate is set in stone but gives advertisers plenty of time to make changes to the creative, the media buy and any other points of campaign optimization which can mean the difference between a successful campaign and a disaster.

If you're interested in learning more about how online advertising campaigns can be tracked and measured, I invite you to check out a brand new full-day training course called “Intelligent Research, Targeting & Measurement of Online Ads & Audiences“ offered through The Laredo Group. This training focuses on helping marketers better understand the online marketing process and how to plan campaigns which can be measured and optimized along the way to greatly improve marketing results. You can learn more about the schedule and costs of these training programs at the Laredo Group website.