Traditionally, marketing mix models (MMM) have analyzed performance by channels – such as TV, print, radio, and digital – all because it aligned to how media was bought. Nowadays however, buys are increasingly integrated, meaning that media conglomerates like Comcast, Facebook, and Google package multiple channels together.
When channels like TV and digital are bundled together, their impact on ROI and media becomes less relevant to specific channels, and more relevant to vendors. As a result, channel measurement is becoming more complicated as we are presented with issues on how to classify and allocate the bundled investment back to specific channels.
Given these persistent channel-level issues, should these reports be vendor-based and more closely connected to the media buy?
In this approach there would be no channel-classification issues. The focus would shift, for example, from channel comparisons between TV vs Digital vs Print to comparisons of Comcast vs Google vs Facebook. This approach allows your marketing analytics team to more accurately track spend back to specific vendors and buys, thus increasing model accuracy, attribution and relevancy to the planning and buying process.