Do your clicks matter to advertisers? When advertising first went digital it was believed that we would be able to determine the success of a particular ad by measuring how many times people clicked it. It didn’t take long before people started noticing that there was not much correlation between the two. Others argue that exposure to the brand (even if you don’t click any ads) can be just as effective. Therein lies the debate.
The latter group feels that a measurement of how long a person looks at a page; watches a video; hovers over a particular ad etc. works best. These same people also believe that in order to successfully gauge how well an ad works that a measure of social engagement should be used. In other words, they believe social media sites like Facebook greatly increase an ad’s effectiveness. Think about it. If your friends are all fans of Revlon’s Facebook page you too may become a fan out of pure peer pressure; not to mention the fact that now your incentive to buy is probably higher because your friends approve of this particular brand.
Perhaps we aren’t thinking outside the box. Why can’t we have our cake and eat it too? Clearly both tactics can be successful so why not use both? Google uses both and so does Facebook so evidently it’s not a bad idea. If advertisers are to properly determine which tactics work the best the obvious solution should be to employ both and examine the results.
