Brand Performance

Measuring the absolute impact of branding is difficult, as the brand is inexorably tied to the company. So instead this term usually refers to the impact of specific events or actions related to the brand and how they impacted performance. For example if a brand advertising campaign ran via TV ads, the company would hope to establish the return on investment this activity generated. There are different methods for estimating the impact of branding on sales, including pixel tracking, social listening, panel surveys, marketing mix modeling, and a/b testing.

The value of branding can be measured by proxy in terms of the impact on various metrics and KPIs (Key Performance Indicators). Brand share of voice (SoV) is one common term amongst large-scale advertisers, as excess share of voice been shown to correlate with gains in market share. Other brand awareness related metrics include unaided brand recall, brand sentiment and purchase intent. Within a digital context, the clickthrough rate on your ads and conversion rate after clicking are common measures of brand performance.

Brand performance may also refer to the testing of individual elements or distinctive assets of a brand, before the product is live in the market. Market research like this can be done to establish the brand is being built on a firm foundation, using the right combination creative and adcopy memes to elicit the desired response from consumers. With the advent of digital ads, it’s now possible to actually split test brand elements live in the market to see which gets the most clicks.

Say you were an Airbnb host in Miami looking to advertise your listing. Your apartment is 5 minutes away from Miami beach, so the location is a big draw. You’ve also invested in stylish, modern furniture because many of your guests appreciate good design. One element often mentioned in reviews is that guests enjoy that the building is set back from the street and therefore more private than alternative accommodations. You’ve sourced three photos you think will work: a photo of the building, an image of the beach, and an interior shot.

There’s only space for one feature and one photo in each ad, but you can run multiple ad variations to test different combinations. You aren’t sure if copy that mentions “5 mins from the beach” should be paired with a photo of the beach, or if it’s better to show the apartment interior. The outside of the building looks secluded but old fashioned: should you mention the modern stylish interior? You decide to be scientific and A/B test every combination of creative and copy – 9 variations total – to see what combination works best.

You calculate how long to run the experiment with a test duration calculator:

= 35 days, or 175k impressions

With a $5 CPM (Cost per 1,000 Impressions) you’re looking at $875 to reach statistical significance.

So you run the rest, and tally the results:

The photo of the interior was the clear winner, working well with all copy variations. Mentioning the location near the beach worked well, but not when paired with the photo of the building. Copy that talked about the stylish décor held it’s own, but it fell flat when paired with a photo of it. You decide to go with the Interior photo plus the beach location.

Of course it doesn’t end there: you can take more photos of the interior, and source more photos of the beach. There are other features that guests might want to know about, like your super-fast WiFi. You can also rewrite some of the copy to be more appealing: maybe your first attempt could be improved upon? Doing the math, you realize that even testing 5 photos x 5 copy routes is 25 variations, which would take over 100 days and cost over $2.5 thousand dollars. You realize how important it is to have a system for deciding what to test.

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