CPG marketers cite return on ad spend most important performance indicator

According to “CPG Marketer Report: Attitudes of Industry” prepared by Brand Innovators Inc. and NCSolutions (NCS), the results of a new survey on the future of outcome-based metrics and tools for marketing effectiveness, 67% of CPG marketers say that return on ad spend (ROAS) is the most significant advertising key performance indicator for their business today—followed by 16% indicating target audience reach was most critical, purchase intent (10%), and clicks and online engagement (7%).

When asked what methods marketers use to measure advertising campaign outcomes, almost three-quarters (74%) say market mix modeling, 71% incremental sales lift, 42% multi-touch attribution, 30% last-click attribution and 13% cited other metrics inclusive of return on ad spend, site engagement and brand health tracking. Respondents were able to select multiple options.

Data clean rooms investigation on the rise

Data clean rooms, also known as customer data platforms, have received much attention over the past year as companies become more serious about privacy, data and in-housing their applications. Among those CPG marketers surveyed, 59% indicate they evaluated a data clean room at some point over the last two years, with 20% planning to do so in the next 12 months and just 20% indicating they have no plans to do so. The reasons cited by CPG marketer respondents for exploring a clean room include:

More control over data (58%)
Support first-party data strategy (53%)
Ease of aggregating data (49%)
Privacy (45%)

Third-party data critical for a range of marketing applications

The report also indicates that the importance of third-party data is underscored by the range of purposes marketers noted. The top uses cited are customer acquisition (67%), first-party data enrichment (62%), personalization in campaign activations (54%) and outcomes measurement (43%).

The B2B focused survey, conducted in Q4 of 2021 by Brand Innovators in collaboration with NCS, set out to examine CPG marketers' advertising spending plans and attitudes towards a range of next-generation marketing and advertising effectiveness tools and the various issues impacting their efficiency and the effectiveness of their ad campaigns. There were 69 CPG marketers surveyed.

Those [processors] that haven’t used automation in the past now have it at the forefront of their growth plans.”
— Dan Crist, vice president at A M King