Advertising Myopia: How a one-eyed view of measurement is failing an industry

Steve Lockwood

The binary view of performance and brand-building is an artificial distinction and advertisers must shift from this to become more outcome-focused.

Most people working in the ad industry will be familiar with the quote from John Wanamaker, “half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” These words nicely encapsulate the industry's existential challenge: how to effectively measure the impact of marketing and advertising.

In response to this challenge, over the last 20 years, two types of marketing have emerged: performance and brand building.

It has become common practice across the industry to treat these two pillars as separate entities, each with their own distinct goals and strategies. But as the industry has...

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