Digital Media Delivers Dollars In New Ways That Make Sense

             One of the biggest complaints about digital marketing, and social media in particular, is that it can often be very difficult to monetize investments. While return on investment (ROI) metrics such as clickthrough rates, cost-per-click, number of fans / followers, etc. are often used to measure brand engagement through digital channels, many sports managers still cannot see how money spent on digital media leads to new revenue. In fact, many people still see television, radio, and newspapers as “safer” choices for their marketing, advertising, and promoting dollars. For example, advertising on television allows sports decision makers to target large audiences to the demographics who are watching these shows. Yet, television viewing can be a passive act, and it is unclear how much audiences engage with the message.   

            This dynamic is what makes Facebook’s new custom audiences feature potentially a game changer for digital media spending. According to Facebook, custom audiences, “let marketers find their offline audiences among Facebook users. Using email addresses, phone numbers or Facebook user IDs to make the match, you can now find the exact people you want to talk to, in custom audiences that are defined by what you already know.”

Many sports organizations have collected an enormous amount of data about different audiences through a variety of different sources. This includes information from sources like Google Analytics and Facebook Insights about the people most likely to interact with a brand’s website, social media, or mobile presences. In addition, many sports organizations are using customer relationship management (CRM) solutions to help mine this data for information about what drives purchasing decisions. Yet, it is not always clear how sports marketers can use this information. For example, if I know that certain fans buy tickets to games against a specific opponent, how can I create a promotion that only targets these fans when that opponent comes to town?

            Facebook custom audience allows sports organizations to accomplish this goal. Sports organizations can now provide demographic information along with highly relevant promotions, messages, and advertising to Facebook. Then, Facebook will ensure that these ads are delivered to these audience members that sports organizations have identified as their most lucrative customers through its news feeds and promoted ads. In addition, sports marketers can track the interaction with their brands in real time. For example, they can see when a user clicks on a link for a specific promotion.

            B6A wants to make it clear that we do not own Facebook stock or have any financial interest in the company. The larger point is that custom audiences is part of a continuing trend of digital marketers to show why their services should be used instead of more traditional channels. While television, radio, newspapers, and other traditional forms of advertising can be effective, they cannot ensure that you will be able to target and track specific individuals in the ways that web, digital, and mobile providers allow. Digital media spending is no longer about connecting with large audiences who may or may not click on a banner advertisement. It is about sports organizations using the information they have collected to reach targeted audiences who are most likely to buy their products and generate revenue.

            To take advantage of these new opportunities, sports organizations need to have their own infrastructure in place to collect and gather information about specific audiences. For organizations that lack CRM solutions or do not track sponsorship, media, or promotions spending, B6A provides solutions that can help address these issues.