Epsilon is on a mission to eliminate wastage and improve how brands personalise and measure their marketing activity. That was the key message at a recent Epsilon dinner event held at Cannes in Cairns hosted by B&T editor Tom Fogden.
More than 25 guests attended a beer tasting session and dinner at Hemingway’s Brewery in Cairns to learn about some of the pressing issues that are challenging marketers.
Epsilon sales director of digital media Jessica Samson-Doel opened the session by pointing out some common concerns of clients.
“It’s about being more efficient, doing more with less, being able to prove that what you’re doing is working, and being able to activate first party data,” Samson-Doel told a room packed full of guests.
“At the centre of everything we do is data and identity. It’s about helping brands activate, whether that’s across digital media, personalised ads, on site personalisation, e-commerce, or retail media monetisation.”
Samson-Doel pointed out another concerning stat – that seven in 10 marketers do not feel adequately prepared for a ‘cookieless world’, even though at least 50 per cent of web traffic in Australia occurs on browsers that have already switched off third-party cookies, such as Apple’s Safari and Mozilla’s Firefox.
“Lucky for them, it keeps getting delayed by Google, but they’re already feeling the challenges with Safari and iOS.”
Epsilon leaders warn that it’s not just the deprecation of cookies that marketers should be aware of when it comes to tracking consumers online.
Rob Odd, the Regional CEO of Epsilon, said: “Brands and retailers have a huge opportunity if they can package up their data in the right way. This can drive not only revenue, but – more importantly – drive performance.”
The Epsilon Dinner and Brewery Tour, Cairns.
Epsilon has north of 120 staff across the ANZ region – which it has from a handful a four years ago – and 9,000 globally. It advises brands on how to get the most out of their data, whether it’s targeting customers and personalising ads, and accurately measuring and optimising the effectiveness of campaigns.
Epsilon, a silver sponsor at this year’s Cannes in Cairns, works with some of Australia’s largest retailers and brands to maximise their marketing effectiveness and efficiency in a closed-loop reporting ecosystem.
This allows brands to measure and track how their campaigns are performing and to optimise them in real-time using an incremental measurement solution using qualified identity markers, rather than rudimentary metrics such as return on ad spend (ROAS).
Another point of difference from its competitive set is that Epsilon looks at measurement incrementally and is accredited with the Media Ratings Council that allows it to correlate outcomes.
For example, its tech can match whether someone that has been served an ad impression then makes a purchase, whether that is in-store or online. Epsilon validates this using independent third-party verification – a far cry from the Wild West days of last click attribution.
But it’s not just a performance, measurement, and transparency play. Using this closed loop approach with rich data can help marketers retain and attract customers.
“It’s about giving the customer a better and more relevant experience,” said Odd. “If you understand your customer better, then you can start targeting those attributes to new customers. There’s no point targeting new customers without understanding what you’re looking for in the first place.
“So, retention is always a great place to start, because you can learn so much from your existing client base, then utilise that and new customers.
This helps to avoid a major concern with alarming levels of wastage in digital advertising.
“It’s been the same story for three or four years now. On average $4 out of $10 spent on digital media is wasted,” said Shane Hanby, managing director ANZ, Epsilon.
“I put this down to a lack of personalised experiences. Advertisers are commonly talking to consumers that have already purchased their products, or even worse they are offering the same recently purchased product at a lower price point. If we treat everyone the same, this can create a negative affiliation with the brand itself and doesn’t encourage lifetime customer loyalty.”
Here are three questions marketers should be asking about their agency and ad tech partners digital media and first-person data personalisation strategy:
1. How are you capturing zero- and first-party data to assist for life after cookies?
2. How are you ensuring you are compliant and up to date with data regulatory changes?
3. How do you measure success, taking into consideration incrementality, and validating what partners are driving revenue/conversions?
