Dive Brief:
- Fractl researched the costs of advertising across traditional advertising, digital ads, social media ads and content marketing. With a CPM of $583 for a standard sized envelope, a 180% premium even over primetime TV spots, the study found that direct mail is one of the most expensive tactics for marketers. As a comparison, the most expensive digital tactic was video ads, at a CPM of $24.60.
- For advertising involving keywords, Google AdWords outpaced Yahoo Bing in CPC $2.15 to $1.25, a larger than 50% difference.
- Among social media ads, LinkedIn ads are the most expensive CPM at $27.90, a 180% premium over Facebook ads, which were the least expensive at $1.54.
Dive Insight:
"With the wide variety of tools and platforms available to consumers, low-value, high-noise marketing simply isn't going to cut it,” Andrea Lehr, brand relationship strategist at Fractl, told Marketing Dive. "Marketing has become a conversation, and more brands are flexing their creative abilities in an effort to provide valuable content – particularly when it comes to promotion."
In terms of spending, she explained that digital avenues such as paid social and content marketing tend to be more appealing to brands because they are more cost effective and also provide an organic channel for target audiences to view brands' messages.
"This builds trust, an invaluable asset to any brand," Lehr said.
Fractl also calculated the reach of a $10,000 campaign across different channels within the categories of traditional, digital, social and content marketing. The comparison across the top tactics include: 1.3 million views on non-primetime TV, 5.3 million views on general display ads, 6.5 million impressions on Facebook ads, and three million views-plus with content marketing.
