360i CEO: Rethink How to Sell Display Advertising

Image of Bryan Wiener

Full disclosure: my CEO wrote this.

But added disclosure: it’s a really good read.

In Ad Age, 360i CEO Bryan Wiener writes that while display advertising can be effective for both branding and performance marketing, it can’t be sold as all things to all people:

…We need to rethink the way we buy and sell display advertising in a way that clearly distinguishes between various marketers' objectives — whether that is direct response (e.g., e-commerce sales or generating web leads) or enhancing the brand (influencing purchase intent, favorability ratings, etc). We&39;ll be best served by treating it not as a hybrid but as two different tactics….

Marketers face the greatest challenges when they try to achieve both objectives — brand awareness and direct response — with the same advertising unit. Martha Stewart Living CEO Wenda Millard is absolutely right when she argues that the ad unit is devalued when math, automation and instant measurability are overemphasized to a brand marketer.

I’m curious to get your take; feel free to offer your response on Ad Age (or here if you’re so inclined).