Columbia, MD, June 21, 2022

Merkle Launches Q3 2022 Performance Media Report Highlighting the Importance of Meaningful Experiences for Customers

Merkle, dentsu’s leading technology-enabled, data-driven customer experience management (CXM) company, has released its Q3 Performance Media Report, a quarterly research report that analyzes and highlights trends within digital marketing. This report takes a fresh look at performance media channels and uncovers data around ad spend, marketers’ top priorities, business readiness, and the top challenges facing organizations. Using these trends, the report reveals significant opportunities for performance media innovation and a basis to create more meaningful experiences for customers.

“This report is a vital part of the conversation around current marketing challenges and provides a jumping off point for creating effective strategies,” said Patrick Hounsell, global activation lead at Merkle. “While everything from inflation to the pandemic has contributed to the current state of paid media channels, this report helps reveal significant opportunities to meet and exceed current customer expectations.”

Key trends revealed include:
 

• Creative, analytics, and measurement are becoming higher priorities.
  Organizations are looking at their internal marketing infrastructure, with 64% of marketers prioritizing creative, analytics, and measurement more than they did last year. Though analytics and measurement aren’t customer-facing, 55% of respondents still identified them as “very important” to their customer experience strategy.
• Privacy is important, but not all are positioned to adapt to the new regulations. 
  Businesses are facing more challenges in digital than ever before, with privacy regulations being the biggest hot topic – yet 24% of organizations are still early in their privacy journeys.
• Paid advertising finds value in machine learning and automation.
  Machine learning (ML) and automation are newer tools enabling marketers to more effectively reach audiences and optimize ads. Many organizations are actively figuring out their strategies for these tools, with 41% of respondents beginning to take action and 38% having made significant progress. Organizations with greater Y/Y prioritization of paid media channels are more likely to be taking action, potentially signaling recognition of the value of machine learning and automation in optimizing paid advertising.

To learn more about the findings, download the full report here.