No Long-Tail Publishers, CPMs or CPAs: What Digital Advertising Should Leave Behind in 2024

This year, third-party cookies are set to disappear, and with them, several other mainstays of digital advertising, like measurement, spurring marketers to look at transaction data and attention metrics, and critique alternative forms of media. “There has been a lot of talk whether CPMs (cost per thousand impressions) or CPAs (cost per acquisition) even still make sense as a metric, whether viewability is a viable metric in this media universe,” said Ana Milicevic, co-founder of programmatic consultancy Sparrow Advisors, at Adweek’s Outlook 2024 event in New York earlier this week. “I’m not convinced we should be carrying [over] those old-school metrics." Outlook 2024: Publishers Push to Prove Their Value Amid Cookie Collapse Panelists were not only skeptical of the longevity of measurement frameworks facilitated by third-party cookies, but also whether whole swaths of media would prevail if advertisers didn’t have this mechanism to find their audiences. “I think long-tail publishers don’t have a long history left in them,” said Josh Lowcock, president, media at Quad. “They’re destined to die.” New measurement paradigms Instead of cookies, Lowcock said, Quad’s brand clients are going to rely more on transaction data, as it “doesn’t lie” on the connection between advertising and outcome. However, he cautioned against overly deterministic approaches. “Other surveillance-based proxy measurements are going to be challenged,” he added, noting the Federal Trade Commission’s recent crackdown on location data brokers. “[We’re] being wary and making sure we don’t lean on those.” While The New York Times has been investing in developing its stores of first-party data, Gabriel Dorosz, its executive director of audience strategy and insights, said advertisers need to think beyond simply deterministic, lower-funnel strategies, especially in an era without cookies. “I hope for a meaningful conversation about whether the constant quest for knowability in all respects is actually an effective strategy,” Dorosz said. "Is contextual just as performative?” Buyers Can't Test Privacy Sandbox APIs in Google's Ad Platform DV360 The Times is developing playbooks for advertisers on how to drive particular brand objectives, like awareness, favorability and purchase intent, Dorosz said. The publisher is also using attention metrics, a newly in-vogue way of tracking which media audiences pay the most attention to. “We really like attention as a potential way to quantify the quality of an impression,” Dorosz said. “We like the idea of benchmarking like-for-like in terms of our inventory and the inventory out in the world.” Lowcock noted that the fact that attention metrics are taking off now shows a failure of prior measurement techniques. “I get frustrated with the obsession with attention because the purpose of advertising has always been to get attention,” he said. “So our pivot to attention is a recognition that we failed to deliver on the promise of what advertising should be.” New media paradigms Advertisers are not only still using yesterday’s measurement, but they’re also buying yesterday’s media. Lowcock said too much money is being invested in display advertising, while Milicevic added that streaming television, a white-hot sector of digital media, is getting too much investment for the quality of inventory. “There’s a discrepancy between the quality of the advertising product and everyone’s desire to put more money toward it that we need to address as an industry,” Milicevic said. There is a certain desire to do risky things but not so much of an appetite. Ana Milicevic, co-founder of programmatic consultancy Sparrow Advisors Email advertising, the panelists agreed, is underinvested in by marketers. “[Email] satisfies the attention thing,” Lowcock said. “It’s a moment. It’s guaranteed delivery. It ticks all these metrics, and yet we’re not focused on it as an industry.” Another emerging media channel for brands to consider is partnering with athletes as creators, instead of only buying sports media from traditional channels. “We’re seeing more deals that are directly over the top. You’re going directly to athletes as a brand,” Milicevic said. “You don’t have to go to the Olympics sanctioning body and pay a lot of money.” There are opportunities for brands to avoid the fallout of a media landscape in dislocation, only if they’re savvy enough to take them. “You need to have flexibility and understanding and have an appetite and a risk for being wrong, which doesn’t gel with peoples' P&L (profit and loss),” Milicevic said. “There is a certain desire to do risky things, but not so much of an appetite.”

Measurement

No Long-Tail Publishers, CPMs or CPAs: What Digital Advertising Should Leave Behind in 2024

In a year marked by cookie deprecation, current media and measurement techniques are under pressure

Catherine Perloff

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Catherine Perloff