Media Management

Let’s get excited about audits

The Challenge For Procurement

“Biddable media creates specific challenges for procurement. The lack of fixed price benchmarking can make ‘savings’ and ‘value’ less tangible and new metrics are needed to recognise savings from digital optimisation”

Audits, generally, do not inspire handclaps and whoops of joy. There can even be the odd boo hiss… but I think it’s time for a rethink, both of what audits are but also how they help us all, from advertiser to agency do our jobs better.

A change in attitudes is increasingly vital in an age when so much of our media is traded democratically across auction-based environments.

In such environments, traditional performance audits simply do not work and a new range of measurement metrics (as well as the introduction of supplementary metrics e.g. quality and performance) are required.

Partly because of this change, we also think it’s time that the term ‘media auditing’ should represent a far broader service and suite of tools than in the past.

It should also include insight and advice for improving agency practices, return on investment, business outcomes, how to improve transparency, how to reduce fraud and unnecessary fees, which is the best tech to use, safeguarding against poor quality inventory, aligning clients with the best partners and so on.

Because when you think about it like this, media audits help all of us do our jobs better, including our overarching shared KPI – building better brands.

To hear more from Mark Andrews of ID Comms speaking on this subject on 17 April in London, book your ticket to the Marketing Procurement iQ Conference (Europe) NOW!

Digital challenges

Many advertisers struggle to understand how to evaluate the effectiveness of their digital media channels, particularly their biddable media.

Research from industry bodies such as ISBA and the ANA into digital media supply chains has highlighted key areas of risk associated with biddable media buys but there is a way to go to ensure all advertisers understand why a different approach to evaluation is required.

Some still try to utilise price benchmarks to evaluate digital media, but these do not cover any of the typical risks associated with biddable media such as poor quality, high levels of fraud, inefficient bidding and lack of transparency.

A low CPM across a programmatic buy, for example, may look like great value on the surface, however, when paired with inventory quality data, it may be found that the buys were fraudulent or not brand-safe. Furthermore, when supplemented with performance data, it may be revealed that the buys have not achieved primary and secondary KPIs.

Progressive advertisers understand that digital media channels are complex, dynamic and have unique challenges, therefore biddable media evaluation requires a collaborative and multi-layered approach.

They know that audits should always be conducted by an independent third party but also that the process can be geared to make it simpler for all parties. The depth of analysis into each digital channel can work on rotation i.e. deep dive into programmatic in year 1, into social in year 2, for example.

This is not only more cost-effective, but it also ensures that over a set period of time, all digital media channels receive a thorough evaluation, helping to uncover the true potential of each.

Translating findings to action

Whenever or wherever you audit, however, the historically negative sentiment (and our natural human reluctance to change) towards audits means that recommendations aren’t always picked up.

If the goal of an audit is to identify areas for improvement, then it’s no use if those findings aren’t actioned by any party from advertiser to agency. We regularly encounter and navigate the following challenges:

Behavioural change: When auditors identify opportunities for change, agencies may need to deviate from their standard buying approaches. For instance, even if agencies typically rely solely on algorithms for optimisation, our insights may reveal the necessity for human intervention. Whilst it is crucial to consider workload constraints, agencies occasionally resist altering their day-to-day behaviours simply because it goes against established practices.

Media buying fragmentation: With digital media bought through multiple platforms, each with unique datasets, it increases the workload to aggregate, normalise and analyse the data effectively, whilst accounting for the unique attributes and buying behaviours of each digital media channel.

Third-party vendors: Heavy and potential tactical use of third-party vendors for campaign delivery by agencies prevents auditors from conducting in-depth analyses of digital campaign implementation as they would across agency DSPs.

Knowledge gaps: The intricate and dynamic nature of biddable media channels requires advertisers to possess, at the very least, a foundational understanding of channel intricacies to fully grasp the recommendations provided by audits and insights.

Data access: Digital media data sits within each ad platform i.e. Google, Meta which can often be owned by the agency. Progressive audit approaches look to have direct access to the data/platforms as not all insights are found in the numbers. In certain cases, agencies may be resistant to providing such access, which slows down the audit process.

Low representation of traditional media: as media consumption habits change, advertisers evolve and widen their media mix for greater reach. More investments are diverted towards addressable media traded through tech platforms. This means less and less spend gets assessed through traditional audit methods.

Relevance: Traditional audit reports are ready for clients 12 to 15 weeks after the end of the analyses period. By then there is limited opportunity for the client or agency to take the remedial action recommended. 

The procurement challenge

Biddable media creates specific challenges for procurement. The lack of fixed price benchmarking can make ‘savings’ and ‘value’ less tangible and new metrics are needed to recognise savings from digital optimisation.  

Since such auction-based media will soon form the majority of all media spend, it is important to apply clear governance and identify savings here too. We recommend a long-term, strategic approach, working collaboratively with agency partners to drive incremental improvement.

In this environment, winning is about implementing best practices that will deliver long-term value, not about getting to the end of the year and demanding money back. Areas of wastage can be identified through auditing your digital media. This can then be used to set goals for improvement and value that can then be optimised for ongoing success.

The power of audits is that they spur action, from marketing, procurement and media teams, both in-house and externally. Merely commissioning an audit often prompts agencies to conduct internal checks, enhancing efficiency and effectiveness, for example. They provide a benchmark and recommendations that advertisers can use to challenge their agency to produce their best work. 

Modern auditors need to be agile enough to deal with the changing landscape, overcome the challenges faced by traditional benchmarking and provide actionable insights for reducing waste and generating savings.

They need to do this in partnership with advertiser and agency, because at the end of the day we are all in the service of brands and the right audit helps us ensure that brands get the best media.