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You can make data tell any story you want with enough creativity. They use ridiculous attribution modeling to justify all sorts of ROI that doesnt really exist

You can make data tell any story you want with enough creativity. They use ridiculous attribution modeling to justify all sorts of ROI that doesnt really exist. They aren't actually truly measuring impact, they are justifying an expense where there are no ramifications if their modeling doesn't reflect reality. I worked for a company that lived and died by paid media. If something really didn't work, people lost their jobs. Without that level of accountability...it is just a bunch of BS people sell themselves to justify their decisions and/or make themselves look good. You and I both know that ad tech spin data in all sorts of ways to make them look good. I mean, do you really think a below the fold, unseen ad impression that was delivered to someone who bought 3 weeks later should get any credit for that sale? Do the exchanges report on view through conversions? Of course they do... Even, an above the fold impression, that was seen by a human being, is still 90% of the time ignored by ad blindness, but if that guy buys 29 days later, they'll still call it ROI. Let's not pretend there is true accountability in digital media today. We both know thats just not true. Edit: I thought I was replying to someone else and said "your exchange and corrected it to the exchanges."

x0x0 10y ago
Conversion modeling has it's issues, but run eg a state-wide geo fenced test and the ads work. And, again, all fraud and/or fake conversions or whatever it is you believe is rampant gets priced into what companies pay for ads. With 0% fraud you can pay up to (discount x conversion value) / (ad count). With fraud, the numerator doesn't change. Buyers just spend less on ads. There's lots of ad buyers making lots of money buying ads and they're going to keep making lots of money buying those ads. And, to repeat myself, the idea that buyers don't push on how conversions are calculated plus run their own calculations is true only in a fantasy world.
- davemel37 10y ago
  > gets priced into what companies pay for ads. This causes adverse selection which devalues high value impressions, which ultimately means more of the advertisers money is wasted on fraud, arbitrage, and poor placements. You can assume that it's all good because they price it into their bids...but if you really think about it, a 3% conversion rate is a 97% failure rate. This massive inefficiency should not exist in todays world of Machine Learning...problem is, the stakeholders all benefit from bad behavior. > the idea that buyers don't push on how conversions are calculated plus run their own calculations is true only in a fantasy world. This is true in a broad sense, but those "conversions" are not always based on whats actually driving sales. Everyone wants to be in a defensible position, so they push for accountability...but its not real accountability, it is anecdotal storytelling that aligns with their interests instead of the bottom line sales. I have clients that are publishers who only want to show growth in unique sessions. I have clinical trial clients who want to make sure their executives and shareholders see their ad, Retailers constantly force manufacturers to invest in TV, OOH and other media in order to even get shelf space, big brands are spending money on the recommendations of kids a year out of college who got dazzled, wined&dined, and flattered by account executives at agencies and ad tech providers, or their friends who got a job at a hot new startup. The incentives to truly be disciplined instead of just telling a good anecdotal story simply don't exist in the real world. It only exists in private companies where the decision maker is spending his own money and actually knows better. I really hope you don't believe that digital advertising today is mostly accountable to statistically significant and disciplined calculations about direct correlation and indirect impact on sales. They spin their tales with data that makes everyone feel good, but doesn't really reflect the true impact of their advertising. It is an industry with incentives aligned with all sorts of things besides true performance. Worse is the first party data movement that is essentially tricking brands into spending money they dont need to spend to drive sales they would get anyway. Find me an ad tech company who says, well save you money and Ill trust them. Find me an ad tech company that says, start with $50k and than next month well do $30k for the same volume of sales and leads... and ill trust them. For now, they all say well make you money, and than they scam their way into taking a piece of a pie they never really earned.
  - x0x0 10y ago
    The thing is the stakeholders do not benefit from bad behavior. For the reasons you enumerated above (adverse selection, etc). I'm not sure how you fail to connect the dots. Google, for example, is very aggressive about ad fraud. We all would love to completely end ad fraud because it would get us paid more. I've told you this. Large ad buyers in this thread have told you this. Mocking 3% conversion rates (a 97% failure rate) is dumb. The world is stochastic. You think because you have crappy clients that all ad buyers are incompetent? Or that giant cpg companies waste their ad spending, or have never thought to run tests around it? I think this entire conversation has reinforced my prior that people calling themselves "Thought Leaders" are anything but.
    - davemel37 10y ago
      I don't really know where you fit in the ad world, so I can't uncover your bias...but one of the largest ad buyers in the world, Machine Zone's own CEO talks about the blatant fraud throughout the ad world. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXBqzpExvrk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXBqzpExvrk I never said all ad buyers are incompetent. Performance advertisers are very disciplined, but most of the ad world is not performance ad buying. If you were truly honest with yourself you would know how often data is manipulated to tell an anecdotal story or support a clearly biased outcome. If you really believe most advertisers are disciplined to statistical significance, and demand true accountability from their ad dollars, you should read https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/psychology-of-intelligence-analysis/PsychofIntelNew.pdf https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intellig... To learn more about cognitive biases and how to properly use data. ------------------ I am not saying that advertising doesn't work or that you cant turn a profit with all the fraud, or even that a 3% conversion rate is bad... I am just saying if it doesn't get you pissed to see all the waste, you are part of the problem, not the solution. I will never stop trying to improve results...its a stupid cop out to say, "we price fraud into our bids." For what its worth, the stakeholders do benefit from the bad behavior. Ad tech companies are struggling...realizing their fancy data and algorithms don't justify the price they need to charge. They are forced to show growth to their investors, so they turn a blind eye to fraud and bots. They pay it lipservice, and thats it. Ad agencies are using archaic billing models from 70 years ago, and are essentially sales organizations forced to get ad spend up and willing to do anything to justify that spend. The big brands are not demanding a fully closed feedback loop. They are using tests for things like Lift and all sorts of correlated data that doesn't really reflect true accountability. There is so much BS being spun in the digital marketing world and 3/4 of the industry would be out of work if they were all honest with themselves and where they are going. Google and Facebook are the only two ad tech players who have sustainable models. all the other ad tech companies are stealing from peter to pay paul and most will eventually crumble and fall. re: your personal attacks and your beliefs about thought leaders? Ask yourself this. who is questioning the status quo and who is defending it? Thought Leaders break away from the pack and ask the tough questions. You are of course welcome to disagree with my viewpoints. But that doesn't make me wrong and you right. Things are never that black and white. We both have sincere and legitimate perspectives and as long as we are discussing it, its a useful conversation. I feel like your attacks mean you are on the defensive. I apologize for upsetting you. I obviously don't know you and had no intention of attacking you or putting you on the defensive. In a similar vain, I am not saying everyone is a corrupt crook. I actually think most of the people in digital marketing are sincere in their beliefs...From my perspective though, many of them are blinded by self interest and can't really see the forest from the trees. Every advertiser I ever worked with demanded accountability, but 9/10 times it was more about having good news to deliver up the food chain and not about actually succeeding. When I watched ad strategies failing leading to job layoffs, I realized that this isn't some game to just throw money at, and find data to make you look good. Marketing is very serious, and its time people started questioning everything from pricing transparency in exchanges to fully closing the feedback loop on lifetime value. Its time we actually measured everything possible, instead of just enough to impress our bosses.

x0x0 10y ago

Conversion modeling has it's issues, but run eg a state-wide geo fenced test and the ads work. And, again, all fraud and/or fake conversions or whatever it is you believe is rampant gets priced into what companies pay for ads. With 0% fraud you can pay up to (discount x conversion value) / (ad count). With fraud, the numerator doesn't change. Buyers just spend less on ads. There's lots of ad buyers making lots of money buying ads and they're going to keep making lots of money buying those ads. And, to repeat myself, the idea that buyers don't push on how conversions are calculated plus run their own calculations is true only in a fantasy world.

davemel37 10y ago
> gets priced into what companies pay for ads. This causes adverse selection which devalues high value impressions, which ultimately means more of the advertisers money is wasted on fraud, arbitrage, and poor placements. You can assume that it's all good because they price it into their bids...but if you really think about it, a 3% conversion rate is a 97% failure rate. This massive inefficiency should not exist in todays world of Machine Learning...problem is, the stakeholders all benefit from bad behavior. > the idea that buyers don't push on how conversions are calculated plus run their own calculations is true only in a fantasy world. This is true in a broad sense, but those "conversions" are not always based on whats actually driving sales. Everyone wants to be in a defensible position, so they push for accountability...but its not real accountability, it is anecdotal storytelling that aligns with their interests instead of the bottom line sales. I have clients that are publishers who only want to show growth in unique sessions. I have clinical trial clients who want to make sure their executives and shareholders see their ad, Retailers constantly force manufacturers to invest in TV, OOH and other media in order to even get shelf space, big brands are spending money on the recommendations of kids a year out of college who got dazzled, wined&dined, and flattered by account executives at agencies and ad tech providers, or their friends who got a job at a hot new startup. The incentives to truly be disciplined instead of just telling a good anecdotal story simply don't exist in the real world. It only exists in private companies where the decision maker is spending his own money and actually knows better. I really hope you don't believe that digital advertising today is mostly accountable to statistically significant and disciplined calculations about direct correlation and indirect impact on sales. They spin their tales with data that makes everyone feel good, but doesn't really reflect the true impact of their advertising. It is an industry with incentives aligned with all sorts of things besides true performance. Worse is the first party data movement that is essentially tricking brands into spending money they dont need to spend to drive sales they would get anyway. Find me an ad tech company who says, well save you money and Ill trust them. Find me an ad tech company that says, start with $50k and than next month well do $30k for the same volume of sales and leads... and ill trust them. For now, they all say well make you money, and than they scam their way into taking a piece of a pie they never really earned.
- x0x0 10y ago
  The thing is the stakeholders do not benefit from bad behavior. For the reasons you enumerated above (adverse selection, etc). I'm not sure how you fail to connect the dots. Google, for example, is very aggressive about ad fraud. We all would love to completely end ad fraud because it would get us paid more. I've told you this. Large ad buyers in this thread have told you this. Mocking 3% conversion rates (a 97% failure rate) is dumb. The world is stochastic. You think because you have crappy clients that all ad buyers are incompetent? Or that giant cpg companies waste their ad spending, or have never thought to run tests around it? I think this entire conversation has reinforced my prior that people calling themselves "Thought Leaders" are anything but.
  - davemel37 10y ago
    I don't really know where you fit in the ad world, so I can't uncover your bias...but one of the largest ad buyers in the world, Machine Zone's own CEO talks about the blatant fraud throughout the ad world. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXBqzpExvrk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXBqzpExvrk I never said all ad buyers are incompetent. Performance advertisers are very disciplined, but most of the ad world is not performance ad buying. If you were truly honest with yourself you would know how often data is manipulated to tell an anecdotal story or support a clearly biased outcome. If you really believe most advertisers are disciplined to statistical significance, and demand true accountability from their ad dollars, you should read https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intelligence/csi-publications/books-and-monographs/psychology-of-intelligence-analysis/PsychofIntelNew.pdf https://www.cia.gov/library/center-for-the-study-of-intellig... To learn more about cognitive biases and how to properly use data. ------------------ I am not saying that advertising doesn't work or that you cant turn a profit with all the fraud, or even that a 3% conversion rate is bad... I am just saying if it doesn't get you pissed to see all the waste, you are part of the problem, not the solution. I will never stop trying to improve results...its a stupid cop out to say, "we price fraud into our bids." For what its worth, the stakeholders do benefit from the bad behavior. Ad tech companies are struggling...realizing their fancy data and algorithms don't justify the price they need to charge. They are forced to show growth to their investors, so they turn a blind eye to fraud and bots. They pay it lipservice, and thats it. Ad agencies are using archaic billing models from 70 years ago, and are essentially sales organizations forced to get ad spend up and willing to do anything to justify that spend. The big brands are not demanding a fully closed feedback loop. They are using tests for things like Lift and all sorts of correlated data that doesn't really reflect true accountability. There is so much BS being spun in the digital marketing world and 3/4 of the industry would be out of work if they were all honest with themselves and where they are going. Google and Facebook are the only two ad tech players who have sustainable models. all the other ad tech companies are stealing from peter to pay paul and most will eventually crumble and fall. re: your personal attacks and your beliefs about thought leaders? Ask yourself this. who is questioning the status quo and who is defending it? Thought Leaders break away from the pack and ask the tough questions. You are of course welcome to disagree with my viewpoints. But that doesn't make me wrong and you right. Things are never that black and white. We both have sincere and legitimate perspectives and as long as we are discussing it, its a useful conversation. I feel like your attacks mean you are on the defensive. I apologize for upsetting you. I obviously don't know you and had no intention of attacking you or putting you on the defensive. In a similar vain, I am not saying everyone is a corrupt crook. I actually think most of the people in digital marketing are sincere in their beliefs...From my perspective though, many of them are blinded by self interest and can't really see the forest from the trees. Every advertiser I ever worked with demanded accountability, but 9/10 times it was more about having good news to deliver up the food chain and not about actually succeeding. When I watched ad strategies failing leading to job layoffs, I realized that this isn't some game to just throw money at, and find data to make you look good. Marketing is very serious, and its time people started questioning everything from pricing transparency in exchanges to fully closing the feedback loop on lifetime value. Its time we actually measured everything possible, instead of just enough to impress our bosses.