Branding and awareness in a performance-driven landscape

[00:00] You really want to dive into the patient and the audience’s mind and build a more Evergreen lens into that campaign and understand how each Channel and tactical item can deliver and work together and impact that consumer decision. It really allows us to take a wider lens. Everything’s on the table now building an efficient plan that’s going to align to your patient Journey how HCPs are interacting and building out that larger ecosystem to truly be effective. [00:40] Hi there. My name is Lecia Bushak. And I’m a senior reporter at MM+M. I’m super excited to be part of today’s podcast interview with AbelsonTaylor Group in this episode. We’ll dive into the evolving landscape of media strategy with a special focus on brands with modest to mid-tier budgets many of these Brands mistakenly believe that their budget forces them to concentrate solely on Mid or low funnel performance-driven media at the expense of crucial branding and awareness efforts, but with recent technological advancements and the right strategy brands at any budget can now leverage solutions that nurture every phase of the funnel and fuel real growth will dive into how AbelsonTaylor Group’s full service media agency at active 8 has found a sweet spot for brands in this budget range offering Dynamic budget agnostic strategies that stand apart from the larger holding companies will also talk about how Ableton tailors approach incorporates branding awareness and performance media providing. [01:40] A more holistic solution that resonates across the entire consumer Journey here with me today is Terence Prudhomme media strategy lead at AbelsonTaylor Group. [01:55] Terrence thinks so much for being here today. Thank you for having me excited to be here. I’d like to start out Terence by asking you about driving awareness for media strategy. Why is driving awareness considered a critical component of any media strategy today? Well remaining top of mind is always key for any brand or patient solution. You can’t provoke an action or conversation around a solution without our patients potentially being aware of it. And so now with media consumption being so fragmented, it’s more critical than ever as really there’s never been more competition for that share of mine with all the noise out there. So, you know for any campaign that awareness and that top of funnel piece is just so key to provoking that action and really crucial to any campaign movement. [02:51] How do you approach balancing awareness with performance media in your campaigns? [02:57] Well, it’s going to be unique to any campaign as you really want to start with the audience first. [03:03] Really diving in you want to understand what their consumption habits are both psychographic behavioral data can also be leveraged. How is the condition impacted in their life? Where does the brand sit from a life cycle standpoint and a competitive standpoint as well. You know, you take all those factors, you know you build in like that data-driven inside gumbo as a so to speak and really kind of build a campaign bespoke to addressing the needs for patient and really best positioning Your solution for success. [03:38] now there’s a quote that that comes to mind that I wanted to bring up by John Wanamaker half the money I spend on Advertising is wasted the trouble is I don’t know which half [03:49] Can you explain the origins of this famous quote and how it’s still resonates today? Yeah, so, you know really what the Crux of that quote is really your blasting out Impressions, you know, you’re making an impact and building awareness for your brand, but you really don’t know what is most effective and the ability to optimize and lean in further. So once digital media and marketing became ubiquitous many Brands felt that they had a solution there. [04:19] However, what they began to learn is reallocating and leaning in heavy to that mid and lower funnel didn’t always provoke those down funnel conversions at scale from when they had the larger awareness advertising so, you know truly just generating results and read messaging your best prospects is not going to get you the scale and success that you need. So overall brands are rethinking their approach and really starting to understand that with technology and attribution being as ubiquitous as it is now we’re we’re effectively able to leverage awareness advertising at scale but also understand that it is driving the performance that we’re looking for. [05:05] Been a shift from awareness to targeted performance media how has that shift away from awareness driven Vehicles evolved as more targeted performance media has emerged. [05:18] technology via [05:21] Vision has really bridge the gap where nearly every dollar in a media campaign is attributable in some form or fashion brands today are able to effectively get a direct view into how hard each media dollar is working for them. So really it’s less about performance versus awareness and how each [05:43] Channel can effectively deliver an action against the patient. [05:48] What are some of the challenges that arise when your transitioning from broad awareness campaigns to more targeted approaches and then you know, it’s sort of a follow-up to that question is what are the opportunities I think for me, you know starting with the ladder right the opportunities remain within the continual optimization of campaign where you’re able to be more Nimble than ever before with the right bi-modal and attribution via measurement. You can scale and reallocate as needed across every channel and you don’t necessarily have to wait to that traditional post-campaign analysis every quarter to make a decision on what’s working. And so the challenge is there are to basically as you aggregate all of that data really lean into where those key insights are and finding that and actioning that and setting up your body and your campaign. So you’re able to effectively re optimize towards. What’s [06:48] Working for you and move away from what’s not without being in Holden to larger deals where you effectively need a quarter plus to take options and get out of your more lean more Nimble and therefore more effective. [07:04] Now when it comes to the so called non-linear funnel and unconscious decision making when decision making is happening at that unconscious level. How does the idea of a linear marketing funnel change? Yeah. So I think back to a book written by Gerald Altman and how consumers think there he states that roughly 95% of cognition occurs within the unconscious mind. This means that the approach to The Funnel of awareness consideration trial is much less linear than what we originally thought and needs to be driven by each tactical mechanism working in concert with each other to provoke that action. So, you know, really we thought you had to start with the awareness then push things down funnel and really it’s every every channel and tactical item working together to promote that action. You have one side where you know, your top of Mind awareness. [08:04] Your large video creative is going to provoke that emotional and intuitive aspect within the Mind whereas your downfall is working with that rational and logical in that short term response. And the thought was that they would have effectively push through in the phase approach. But really they need to work together in concert more Evergreen throughout the campaign. [08:27] And that’s sort of underscores the need for continual influence throughout the consumer Journey. How does that affect media strategy? Yeah. So from from a strategic perspective, it means the old approach of launch versus sustaining doesn’t quite resonate a strongly with such the fragmented consumption of a consumer. And so you really want to dive into the patient and the audience’s mind and build a more Evergreen lens into that campaign and understand how each Channel and Technical item can deliver and work together and impact that consumer decision. [09:09] I also want to talk a little bit about some of the recent advancements in martech and awareness channels in your mind. How have those recent and advancements made awareness channels more accessible and performance driven for Brands? Yeah. So this is really exciting because [09:27] Previously Brands were limited in their channel selection based on their budgets technology has really bridged that Gap by leaning to a more budget agnostic approach to planning. And so, you know using linear TV as an example with the inventory that’s available through dsps biddable models programmatic linear is now emerging, you know, it’s exciting because previously there was such a high out of pocket cost. Well the cpms were relatively efficient. [10:03] It branches shied away because of that high out of pocket investment that was required. Now, you can take a look at your audience. Look at the consumption. If you are a modest sized brand, but you have an older audience that older audience is going to consume television at 5 to 7 plus hours a day. And now you can truly kind of through technology really fish where the fish are and find your best prospects in a budget agnostic manner. [10:33] And I’d love to hear some specific examples where you’ve seen this technology that has enhanced both awareness and performance in your media planning. Yeah, I mean, it’s really setting up that tactical framework where you’re aligning across the consumer Journey, right? So, you know, we know that video resonates with particular audiences. We know what they’re consuming how to deliver that bespoke messaging and tactical framework for any particular audience. It really allows us to take a wider lens. Everything’s on the table now build an efficient plan that is going to align to your patient Journey how hcp’s are interacting and building out that larger ecosystem to truly be effective. [11:23] When it comes to tailoring messages throughout the consumer Journey, what are some of the key opportunities to tailor messaging throughout a consumer’s exposure and journey. Yeah, so dco Dynamic creative optimization is a really exciting solution for this. It’s becoming a key component to a lot of our campaigns as it offers the ability to deliver effective messaging to both consumers at hcps at each relevant stage of their Journey. So for example, if you have a dormant hcp you can deliver that messaging if a patient’s visited your website, you can tailor messaging to that and typically that started in a tactical framework such as retargeting remission. What have you but really now your tailoring the creative to where each consumer and hcp is in their journey and this is the Italian you’re buying platforms to your data. [12:23] Aggregation to your creative warehousing and it sounds like a lot but it’s really an effective solution in delivering that relevant messaging at those key aperture moments. [12:34] Terrence how can Brands leverage personalization and adaptive messaging in media strategy that responds to Consumer behavior in real time? Yeah, so essentially what you’re doing is your time you’re buying platforms to your data aggregation and your creative warehousing to deliver that relevant message at those key option moments to be effective as possible in the messaging. So you’re able to gain those learnings action them optimize and really understand what’s working. What’s not optimizing optimize out and make sure and keep the framework where you’re always leaning into what works and moving away from what doesn’t and making sure that the attribution and measurement are there to truly understand the performance of your campaign and be as effective as possible. [13:26] Now Abelson Taylor group has just launched a new Full Service media agency called at activate. Can you tell us a little more about 808 and its offerings? Yeah. So at group was a legacy agency with over two decades of experience and you know offering that full service across creative engagement strategy marketing intelligence and what they found was [13:53] Clients were asking really smart questions and particularly around their media investment their media strategy and it really started to present that need for a full service media agency to address those comprehensive questions. And so recently built out the solution with our head of media Christie volki and myself in the lead strategy role and what we found is being independent being not beholden to any larger deals in place allow us to be effective and efficient in our Solutions and not only are we sitting in house next to creative next to engagement strategy right hand next to our data analytics and marketing intelligence teams. We’re really able to service. [14:43] Both full service clients as well as media only clients that are looking for that solution from an independent media agency that can build out the budgeted agnostic effective campaigns. [14:56] Looking ahead to the future, you know as this evolving landscape of media strategy continues. What are some of the emerging trends that you are most looking forward to are most excited about? Yeah. Well, there’s a couple I mean one right now ai has become a buzzword people are kind of waiting to see how that’s going to be actioned. You know, I really think there’s an opportunity there in relevant contextual messaging and seeing how it fits in and how you can deliver that relevant message to a patient on their Journey particularly as search GPT and other items become more ubiquitous. The other is as technology continues to bridge that Delta between what’s accessible and what’s not I think we’re going to look at awareness messaging much more differently as that. [15:51] Media consumption continues to become fractured and how we can build out those Evergreen top of Mind Focus campaigns that are truly aligned to consumption habits as things shift through these accessible buying platforms and models. It’s going to be more efficient more targeted and therefore more effective. [16:15] And for our audience members if you want to learn more about at activate, you can find out more online at at activate.com Terence. It was a pleasure speaking to you and thank you so much for joining us today. Thank you for having me. That was Terence prudholme media strategy lead at AbletonTaylor Group. This is Lecia Bushak for the MM+M Podcast. Take care.