“The audience doesn’t really like how we do things,” states agency CMO

Cory Treffiletti, above, a contributor to Media Insider, wrote that “brands and agencies should be looking to innovate on new ways to deliver a message in a format that is less interruptive and more relevant.”

Treffiletti, Chief Marketing Officer at Rembrand in Austin, Texas, posted an insightful piece that, in part, stated: “According to a report I saw published last week, the advertising industry is forecast to grow more than 5% next year.  That’s a lot of growth for an already enormous business, but what I find most interesting is that the growth is happening despite us not listening to our most important customers.  It’s all happening without reading the signals and the data from the audience.

“The audience doesn’t really like how we do things.  Look at the data.  Click-through rates are at an all-time low.  Social media ad engagement is down.  People skip video ads by as much as +90% when given the chance.

“It even costs more to make an impact with search than it ever did before because people click less and there’s more competition, driving up prices.

“All this info provides a clear signal that consumers don’t appreciate the way we deliver messages in their current format. And yet the industry dramatically over-indexes on talking about itself and how much we rely on data and insights to prove performance.

“My suggestion to the ad industry is to follow our own advice.  Let’s stop navel-gazing and talking about ourselves long enough to hear what the audience is saying, so we can come up with some new ways to reach the audience in a more likeable format.”

More here.