The solution of preventing advertising fraud by creating an approved list for advertisers to limit their advertising to will only solve 1/2 of the problem. Advertising on known sites is a start. But the traffic to those known sites must be verified to be real. This is where auditing comes in.
There used to be “a thing” called “over-exposure” that was thought to apply to some celebrities, particularly in relation to product endorsements. It made sense that if a particular person was seen to be endorsing too many products it would tend to put pressure on their perceived veracity, implying that their opinion could be bought, and perhaps bought cheaply.
Lately — okay for decades — digital advertising’s spread from supporting content to supporting every sort of amusement, game, software application and yes, keeping us in touch with friends, and their friends, and their friends, has so multiplied digital advertising that it, too, is over-exposed.
Ad sales executives need to keep good negotiating practices in mind when the negotiation starts. When a client devotes time to an actual discussion of whether you can meet their price, it is a powerful signal your property is one of a few, not one of many choices.
As we should know from many other industries, when there is a lot of money available, very creative scams will be hatched. Recently Advertising Age ran this article explaining how more sophisticated scammers have developed technology that avoids bot blockers by appearing to be a human scrolling and interacting with a web page.
Too often media companies feel pressed to ad in free pages or free digital impressions when that is really not different from lowering the price. Media companies would be far more successful with breaking those ties, assuming they have their media priced appropriately, by offering research.
Digital content environments are known for short attention spans, and difficulty introducing advertising for unknown brands and products because the user has so much control, to the point of blocking banners. “Magazines don’t have the issue of ad avoidance… People happily read ads alongside content in magazines, and are equally likely to remember ads and editorial.”
How many times have you talked with a prospect when they voiced an objection and wouldn’t agree with your answer even though you answered with evidence that was logically irrefutable? Now, maybe, we know why.
Sales people must seek out the objections, starting with the price objection, to make sure the prospective understands your value proposition. If your customer has a hidden price objection, thinking there are less expensive ways to accomplish what your medium offers, it is often because they don’t properly value the media you are selling. So it is critical that your sales people are trained to probe for objections and to handle objections with all the skill you can help them develop.
