The World Café sessions at Digital BrainFest provided the opportunity for digital executives to come together and discuss the top of mind issues in their field. Here are key insights from the Digital Media Ad Solutions session.

1. Digital BrainFest 2013
World Café – DIGITAL Media Ad Solutions Session
The Digital Media World Café sessions were full of lively conversation, debate, and new and
interesting ideas. Everyone walked away with a fresh perspective of how to look at performance
measurement and attracting and retaining strong, talented team members.
When presented with the question “How would you measure ad effectiveness?” it was very hard
for the group to think freely without applying the constraints and challenges they are faced with
day to day. Many of the suggestions were met with knee-jerk “that would never work, because…”
reactions. Once people started removing those limitations, the ideas really started flowing. But,
at the end of the day, it turned out there’s not one cookie-cutter solution for all Publishers. The
general consensus was the answer was really “It depends.” It depends on what we’re selling.
It depends on the mission of the site. There are a lot of different factors that would turn into
meaningful measurement criteria. But what’s meaningful for one site may be useless to another. In
the end, the group gained some valuable insight into different ways to define and measure success,
and it all boils down to your site, your audience, and your goals.
One of the most interesting aspects of the discussion around attracting talent was the predominant
opinion that culture fit was a key driver in whether or not an employee will have “staying power”.
The traditional way of approaching recruiting – “skills and experience” – was replaced with
discussion of the importance of culture fit and people who were self-starters. Attitude and the
ability to take initiative were character traits we’re looking for in our recruits. Making sure you give
your employees things they can own and take pride in was another prevailing theme.
Overall, the World Café sessions were an opportunity to think about things in
a new way. It removed the barriers we face in real life and gave us a chance
to think about how we’d like to approach these situations in ideal conditions.
While not everything we discussed was practical, there were definitely some
key-takeaways that many in the group were eager to apply.
Overview:
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2. • Monetary compensation is clearly important, but is
it the most important? Some felt quality of life was
more important than compensation
• Having a strong culture and making sure new hires
fit the culture. Are we hiring based on personality?
It seems to be working…
• Identifying a clear career path and providing
realistic job descriptions
• Providing employees with tools and training
for success
• Encouraging internal promotion and hiring from within
• Having a clear company objective that can be
articulated by all employees
• Learn to value individualism and curiosity; focus on
individualistic talents
• Talent must be flexible
• Having a strong product tends to attract the best people
• Leverage personal contacts
• Better to invest in culture than higher pay
• Transparency and honesty throughout the
organization
• It’s important employees take pride in what they do
• Provide an avenue to pursue outside interests
• Bureaucracy bad – internal mobility good
• INTERESTING WORK!!
• Give them something to reach for…
• Self-starters!!
• Industry experience not as critical anymore
• Ensuring the right culture fit, and that resources
have the attitude and passion for the job
• Team players are critical; no one’s working alone
• Problem solvers with strong analytical skills
• Focus should be on audience first
• Measure based on completion rate
• Bundle metrics
• Use 1st party numbers
• Ensure transparency in metrics
• NO MORE CLICKS!
• Align Agency RFPs to strategy and KPIs
• Most measurable KPIs win
• Reach and frequency across audience
• Industry education is critical
• What is the likelihood of buying
• Online and offline contributions to purchase
behavior
• Measure above the fold
• Cost of acquisition should be the common
denominator
• Close the gap between buyer-seller messaging
• What’s being shared? – social metrics
• Views – they could make a comeback!
• The impact to my site should be balanced with the
ROI for the advertiser
• More customization enables more measurement
options
• “CTR is a terrible metric” – except @ Buzzfeed
Question 1: Our industry demands
extremely unique talent; an uncommon
combination of industry experience,
business acumen, and technical
expertise. What are the best ways to
attract, develop and retain such talent
in such a high-demand age?
Question 2: Typically agencies have
defined campaign success metrics.
This can pigeon-hole publishers due
to technology gaps or unrealistic
expectations. If you had the power to
establish standard ad-effectiveness
measurements what would they look like?
Follow-up: What are the critical skills
and traits that most contribute to an
indispensable digital media professional?
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