A few days back, in a meeting, a strategy model was shared on how to leverage digital. This is how it looks…
Notice how this model states that key things to do on digital is banner advertising (and the next slide gave examples of ‘impactful’ (read expensive) portal super takeovers) and definitely be present on Social Media.
Hmm.. this didn’t seem right, so I raised my hand and asked if such a strategy was worth pursuing in a market like India. The person who was giving the ‘gyan’ (who happened to be an Aussie) said, “absolutely” without blinking an eye.
I wasn’t convinced. So, while the talk was on, I did quick back of the envelope calculation (for a campaign that I had overseen and just finished) to see how much it cost me to reach an average person on various media. I would have loved to analyze it for a particular TG but availability of data, especially for Digital, limited it.
Medium:: Cost to reach a person once :: Unit
TV :: Rs.0.29 :: 30 second TVC
Radio :: Rs.0.21 :: 30 second Radio ad, RJ mentions & innovations
Print :: Rs.1.32 :: Full Front page innovation & Full back page ad
Digital Banner :: Rs.0.95 :: 10 second, 3 frame, East Floating Banner
A few things to note,
- The data for TV and Radio is sourced from TAM, RAM and is basis actual evaluation of the # of people who saw the ad.
- The data for Print is from IRS and assumes that all the people who can be reached have seen it.
- The data for Digital is Doubleclick impression data (removing duplication as there was a frequency cap).
- Print is full front page takeover innovation. The same cost for reach with a solus ad with the same message would have been Rs.0.48
But the most important thing is the amount of information I could give out given an ad format. I felt that print enabled me to give the best message out followed by TV & Radio. Digital & Outdoor were media where I couldn’t do much in terms of messaging on the ad unit itself.
FM Radio was the cheapest though in absolute reach, it was 1/10th of TV. Digital has a reach 1/200th of TV and is clearly the most expensive. 3 times more expensive than TV or Radio and delivering a sub optimal message. Clearly, Digital guys should realize this and slash CPM prices (or move into alternate pricing models). And definitely doing digital banner ads are not an awareness building (tell) exercise!
I have another issue with the model – the point of Social media, especially Facebook page. Will talk about it some other time.
