Marketers and agencies have a lot on their minds as 2016 begins, nothing more so than making marketing work better. But there are many ways to pursue that goal. We asked our readers to spell out their agendas -- and what the industry as a whole needs to tackle in the coming 12 months.
Q1. Rate these 14 issues' consequence to marketing and advertising in 2016, from "not important" to among the "most important."
Percentage answering "most important"
Making marketing more efficient |
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Improving creative excellence |
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Finding new ways to reach consumers as they block or skip ads |
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Improving trust between marketers and agencies |
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Improving ad targeting online |
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Fighting ad fraud |
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Being able to grow or maintain my marketing budget |
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Protecting consumer privacy online |
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Improving the viewability of online ads |
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Improving the relationship between the CMO and CTO |
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Finding ways to raise margins for agencies |
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Getting to the bottom of allegations of undisclosed rebates |
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Shoring up the agency-of-record model |
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478 responses
Q2. In your own words, what's the No. 1 issue the marketing and advertising industry needs to deal with in 2016?
Ad blocking
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Creating better, less intrusive ads
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Online flooding of ads making the consumer numb |
Ethical privacy practices |
Online consumer trust |
Engaging consumers when they are tuning advertising out, figuring out how to reach consumers |
in a creative way that is relevant - too many old models are no longer working |
AD FRAUD. I no longer trust what my agency - or any other agency - says. |
I don't have money to throw down the drain |
Ad viewability |
Agency margins |
Fair and honest compensation for agencies |
The rebate issue between agencies and marketers |
Breaking big agency monopolies |
Creating trust between marketers and ad/media agencies |
Partnering with the client not just as a vendor, improving trust between marketers and their agencies |
Diversity, transparency, authenticity |
Trust all around: clients between agencies, between buyers and sellers, within agencies. There is no loyalty any more and with good reason |
Convincing advertisers that investments in marketing and long-term customer development is still relevant |
Accountability of total budgets and aligning sales and marketing objectives with the business objectives |
Raising questions about the old world AOR agency model |
There is a big threat to the industry with content marketing, empowered consumers, marketing efficiency and costs - we need to be on top of this or our value will erode |
Getting programmatic right |
Fragmented media penetration, people skipping ads and no attention span |
Reduction in live TV watching and the move to time shifting and online |
Capture of digital dollars from TV budgets particularly in politics |
Perfecting mobile marketing with more spend, mobile marketing attribution - particularly offline conversions like phone calls and in-store visits |
Measurement and accountability |
Lack of true ROI accounting |
Content marketing versus traditional online ads |
Measuring the effectiveness of branded content |
Diversity and developing talent that reflects a forward vision |
Selected from 410 responses
Q3. What's No. 1 on your particular business agenda for 2016?
Growing revenue
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Improving margins
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Greatly improving share of voice |
Reaching Gen Z |
Maintaining current clients and finding new clients that I actually have an interest in working with |
Real time analytics for linear TV advertising |
Programmatic TV |
Getting click-throughs - Making sure ads are visible, not buried |
Improving creative excellence |
Building trust with advertisers in the value of and investing in creativity |
Working within ever-shrinking budgets |
Content creation efficiencies |
Creative efficiency |
Exploring options outside of traditional advertising |
Using virtual reality in advertising |
Programmatic TV and cross-screen convergence |
Reaching the end user through new video messaging formats |
Measuring new media landscape vs traditional TV |
Reinforcing TV as still the top ad medium, stressing the value of network TV |
Mobile advertising - online traffic is mobile, the banners are not |
Marketing effectiveness and ROI |
Procurement challenges, still |
Shore up agency-of-record assignments |
The challenge and costs of managing numerous small campaigns as opposed to fewer large campaigns |
How to bridge viewing across multiple platforms and measurability |
Showing value and educating clients on paying appropriately for this value |
Redefining the client-agency relationship and moving it to a mutual partnership |
Improving client retention |
Growing client trust and improving work quality |
Making some magic |
Selected from 422 responses
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