Read the topline results from feedback about our second prediction from our ongoing online research into the development and future of connected marketing (CM).

These results are an amalgamation of insight from CM industry luminaries who submitted their views about CM Prediction 2 which stated: ROI metrics will be mandatory for viral, buzz and word-of-mouth (WOM) marketing campaigns. ‘Advocacy rates’ and ’sales uplift’ will become important parts of ROI metrics, displacing traditional measures such as campaign reach.

Sadly, old habits die hard. It seems that most viral and buzz marketing campaigns are still measured in terms of their reach. Practitioners or their clients for the most part still seek to justify their efforts by trying to compare any awareness generated by CM projects to that generated from traditional top-down marketing techniques such as advertising and PR.

In fact, even the measurement of conversations generated by WOM marketing campaigns is in reality a thinly disguised form of reach. It simply misses the point of the CM approach. In contrast, measuring the advocacy generated by WOM campaigns provides a more tangible insight into the impact of customer engagement, as does any measure of sales uplift.

However, the measurement of advocacy per se, without linking its increase to any subsequent business growth such as sales uplift, is arguably no more credible than measuring reach in terms of the exposure achieved.

Then again any sales uplift generated by a WOM marketing campaign may be only temporary, particularly when WOM marketing is used tactically and often at a higher cost of contact than a traditional media approach.

In the end, it’s still early days and there’s still work to be done in developing a set of metrics which show empirically the ROI of viral, buzz and WOM marketing, particularly in terms of an enduring return. And it remains to be seen whether there will ever be a “one size fits all” set of metrics for the wide array of CM approaches. Currently, apples are not being compared with apples.

Submit your own thoughts about Prediction 2 and the other predictions here.

This entry was posted on Monday, May 21st, 2007 at 9:41 am and is filed under news. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.