In one of my previous blogs, I mentioned the dreadful Wanamaker quote. You know, the one about half the advertising budget being wasted but not knowing which half. It’s a dreadful quote because it’s been over-used. Nevertheless, the point of it is that it isn’t always easy to measure marketing value. In my last blog, I explained that it is no longer an option for marketers to NOT measure their added value. Marketing’s stakeholders demand it! The problem is that there is a category of marketers that are convinced you cannot quantify marketing value. So what’s a marketer to do when he must quantify marketing’s value, while he’s convinced it can’t be proved? He can redefine ROI, by making the distinction between hard ROI and soft ROI. Rebekah Paul has a great weblog titled Marketing ROI or Die. In her recent blog, The Softer Side of Marketing ROI, she defines soft ROI as: “those benefits that are difficult to measure but help to achieve worthwile goals.”
Here’s what I think of “soft” ROI: In a way, “soft” ROI is like “vegetarian” meat. Just because you call it meat, make it look like meat, and even make it taste somewhat like meat doesn’t make it meat. Call me a purist, but to me, the whole idea behind ROI is to offset benefits against investment while hoping for a positive result.
No one will contest that there are benefits to employee & customer retention, to brand awareness & brand trust, to engaging customers, to sharing values, et cetera. But put in the context of ROI, the question is: will the benefits outweigh the related costs? And that’s a fair question. How else do we determine what’s the right cost for realising these benefits?
I do recognise that it isn’t always easy to measure the effects of these benefits. But that doesn’t mean it is impossible. If we are convinced that these benefits are powerful ways to drive business, then we must be able and ready to support this with data.
Hence my opinion: much like there is no such thing as vegetarian meat, there is no such thing as soft ROI.
CALCULATED MARKETING SUCCESS!