The ROI of Branded Entertainment

One of the main reasons branded entertainment is making such inroads in marketing today is because it can potentially generate a higher Return On Investment (ROI) for a much lower initial investment than any traditional advertising. The problem is, you can hardly measure that ROI by traditional means.

Measuring Creative Impact

Why? Because in a way, in branded entertainment, good creative can replace expensive media buying.

In other words, a fun/engaging/entertaining program will be bought and aired repeatedly by TV Networks (for its own entertainment value), and a good article or sound track is likely to be read/listened to and/or shared by thousands online, potentially by millions, without any significant media buy budget (if any)… which is literally impossible with traditional advertising, where reach is a direct function of cost.

Yet, how do you measure the impact of “good creative”?

There are still few models that enable the precise measurement of Return On Investment for branded entertainment marketing, and that is probably the main barrier to the real development of such a discipline in mainstream marketing.

A couple notable exceptions though that I feel should be mentioned (that’s the point of this article ;-):

BEAM® by Ogilvy

A few years ago Ogilvy introduced its Branded Entertainment Assessment Model (‘BEAM’) a method for evaluating and calculating the efficiency of a branded entertainment campaign. While it calls for the use of many (potentially) pricey opinion surveys, that methodology has the merit of laying out a logical and step-by-step approach of evaluating the efficiency of a campaign, both qualitatively and quantitatively.

BEAM® first asks for brands to determine:

- The main objective of the Program? (sales increase? Brand reach? …)

- The most significant result sought in relation with the above key objective? (Whether reach, preference, or specific action…)

- The intermediate results we are looking to leverage (entertainment, exposure, brand creation/devpt…)

- What success metrics will look like? (KPIs we’ll use to measure success: views, posts, articles, downloads…)

While the above may seem obvious, in my experience, it is rarely done systematically by most brands and agencies. The scoring system is based on an index methodology and on the availability of pre (i.e., benchmark) and post data. Each of the above items/objectives being measured before and after the campaign. Post data is divided by pre data and multiplied by 100; the final score is then applied based on where the index number lies within the BEAM® range. [(Post-data / Pre-data) x 100] applied to BEAM index.

The following Example measures the “Entertainment” assessment of a specific campaign:

Intermediate measure: “Consumer enjoyment”

– Benchmark: “Norm” data (Regional norm or Bench data Vs. “Campaign” performance or post-data)

– 80% of consumers “enjoyed watching a lot,” compared to 60% Regional/bench norm: 80 / 60 = 1.33

– 1.33 x 100 = 133

– 133 = BEAM Index score of 6 (out of a max of 10)

The methodology is applied across the board to the different objectives, intermediate measures and KPIs and each progress/variations data is then applied through the BEAM® index, which in turn delivers a relative score rated over 10. When applied to an entire campaign, BEAM allows for a somehow logical and consistent way of measuring the results of a campaign, from a qualitative and somehow quantitative standpoint. You can get the detail of the index and the complete methodology here.

CAID Advertising Value of Exposure

Less expensive and a bit simpler to apply, I (while working at Caid Digital) had developed a measurement system to put a Dollar (or Euro) value on the exposure generated by our films/programs/campaigns for the brands featured in them. This implies that the program has been distributed through one or several channels, such as TV, VOD, Theatrical, online, in print… Please note that this is not a complete qualitative and quantitative method of evaluating ROI: it is only a method to put a monetary value on the “earned media” generated by the branded entertainment, and to compare it to the initial investment. It is a straight financial (investment amount/exposure value) method of calculating ROI though.

The method of valuation we adopted was (with the example of TV): to first calculate the time each brand was featured in the film (for example 1mn of screen-time for brand A); next, we used the cost of a 30 seconds spot on TV as a measurement unit for TV exposure. So, for brand A, 1mn of screen time was equivalent to two 30 seconds TV spots (or an “exposure index” of 2). By gathering the cost of advertising on each TV channels and market where the film was aired, multiplied by the number of broadcasts, times the exposure index of each brand, we obtained an actual Euro/Dollar value of exposure for each brand in the film. Interestingly that “value” is based on the same financial measure a brand would use to buy ad space (rate cards). The same is applied to online exposure (with an average Cost Per View — CPV — per market), VOD (based on the number of streams), press mentions (based on rate cards), etc…

In the case of our branded feature documentary, titled God Save My Shoes (which was distributed in the US and in 15+ foreign countries across media channels), the total aggregated value summed up to more than $43 million dollars in earned media for all brands featured in God Save My Shoes. If you factor in the cost of production & distribution of the film (about $1 million+) you get a ROI of 43X (cost/exposure value) in earned media value! This is something few traditional advertising campaign can achieve (with media buy, what you buy is what you get).

Now, to be thorough, it is true that this method leaves out the “qualitative” measurement element for the brands in the film. In other words, “what is the top-of-mind” impact of the film for my brand? Or does the audience naturally remembers my brand after having seen the film? This aspect can be covered by post-broadcast or post-campaign surveys within a specific population — one that matches the distribution of the film of course.

Overall, I understand this is not a perfect model, yet it does put an actual dollar value on the exposure generated, one that allows apple-to-apple comparison with the initial investment. If measuring the efficiency (or qualitative impact) of the campaign is in order, then the use of qualitative surveys is required. In that case, depending on your budget, BEAM® may be your best bet.