How poor metrics undermine digital marketing, McKinsey Quarterly, 2008.pdf

m a r k e t i n g
october 2008
How poor metrics
undermine digital marketing
The Web is the most measurable medium in the history of marketing. Now all that’s
left is figuring out how to measure it.
Jacques Bughin, Amy Guggenheim Shenkan, and Marc Singer
Article The digital world has developed faster than the tools needed to measure it. This lag has
at a made it difficult for marketers to fully exploit the Web’s promise as the most targetable and
glance measurable medium in the history of marketing.
Hobbled by nascent technologies, inconsistent metrics, and a reliance on outdated media
models, marketers are failing to tap the Web’s full power. Unless this problem can be
addressed, the inability to make accurate measurements of digital advertising’s effectiveness
across channels and consumer touch points will continue to promote the misallocation of
media budgets and to impede the industry’s growth.
panies, though, are developing analytics that allow them pare the
effectiveness of their on- and offline efforts. Others are learning how online marketing
messages convert shoppers into buyers, both online and in stores.
The rapid growth of online advertising hides a serious challenge: the digital world has
developed faster than the tools needed to measure it. This problem has made it
difficult for marketers to fully exploit the Web’s prom