Publicis’ Performics announced that Daina Middleton, CEO of Performics is the performance marketing agency’s U.S. CEO and discussed the agency’s strategy as well as expansion of its company’s products and services into 72 countries. Read the release.
AdExchanger.com: What are your thoughts about using search retargeting with display? And, given growing momentum for integrated search and display tactics, how will Performics leverage display going forward?
DM: Performance marketing is all about accountable and measurable real-time biddable campaigns focused on buying audiences and delivering engagement, traffic, leads and sales. We have a performance-based team dedicated to identifying, testing and evaluating new performance-based paid media opportunities in social & display as an extension of paid search. We already manage campaigns on self-service platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Digg and Twitter. Additionally, we manage audience and performance-based media buys (integrating client & 3rd party data) across 9+ US and global ad exchanges including the Google DoubleClick Ad Exchange, Yahoo! Right Media and Microsoft’s AdECN.
The obvious benefit of integration is to increase marketing efficiency and effectiveness and there is huge momentum for this in the market as every investment dollar counts. Clients who are generally interested in performance display and social are to reach niche audiences through profile or behavioral targeting to drive incremental revenue/leads; drive additional exposure for events, promotions or new product launches at an effective CPM; or want to support “owned” media initiatives like gaining social page fans or followers.
Where do you see potential areas for growth for Performics from both a PPC tactics perspective and client-side?
At Performics, we very much embrace the notion that brands to be found in more places on the Internet and on more devices. For those clients that may be the next wave of PPC marketers, we’re committed to the art and science of “being found” and continually evaluate new channels, products, processes, technologies, partners and talent.
Our performance experts take the principles of search and and apply it to other media forms. I believe you will see the overall media landscape begin to trend in this direction. We see ourselves as performance marketers are really business strategists who foster integration between search, display, social, affiliate, CRM, offline, merchandising, inventory, etc. Advertisers should have a set of performance levers at their fingertips that can be continually optimized to generate results. This sometimes means eliminating a media channel in the mix based on results.
As marketers move to understanding attribution models and how their ad spend works across their digital channels, how will Performics evolve?
Performics currently has two products that track cross-channel activity and bring a greater understanding of attribution for our clients. Clickstream tracks interaction across paid search, Facebook, mobile, sitelinks & Content Network; while Channelstream tracks interaction between paid search & display. Both of these solutions track behavior based on advertiser, user id, and defined time period, and apply an equal attribution model. The outcome is actionable bid strategy recommendations for our clients.
More specifically, Clickstream consists of 14 out-of-the box reports evaluating the series of paid search clicks and assigning values to each click. This helps us to evaluate the impact of an assist, increase conversions, uncover areas of waste, and identify opportunities to promote brand engagement. Channelstream evaluates the series of paid search clicks and display impressions. From there, we assign value to each unique event (click or impression) within a user’s stream and evaluate the interaction between paid search and display. Our teams then tie this to bid strategy or display recommendations and help define cross-channel budget allocation to cost-effectively drive conversions.
Using Clickstream & Channelstream, Performics has seen lifts in conversions ranging from 10-20% & cost savings of 5-10%. We will continue to evolve our tools in an effort to lead the market and ensuring our clients marketing dollars are delivering a return on investment.
What’s the plan for hiring SEM experts that will service the 72 countries? Or will you extend the responsibilities of the existing Performics team?
Today, we have close to 650 staff globally in the 14 markets and this is a growing business. Performics will hire based on talent and client needs in the regions.
By John Ebbert
