P&G is the largest advertiser in the world, sinking millions of dollars into virtually every ad medium available. Needless to say, when they talk about their intentions with any type of ads, the industry listens. When Chief Brand Officer Marc Prichard commented about digital advertising saying that they do not, “want to waste time and money on a crappy media supply chain” the digital industry better have cringed.
He went on to talk about how the industry largely lacks any type of standard definitions for key performance metrics, there is far too little transparency, most providers don’t do the necessary diligence when creating ad strategies, and much more. To put it simply, P&G is not impressed with the way the digital ad industry is operating.
He did not give any type of indication that P&G will be pulling their ad dollars immediately from digital, that is not likely going to happen. What is likely, however, is that P&G will become far more demanding in regards to who they work with.
When a company with the power and resources of P&G wants to get something, they usually do. For many ad agencies, P&G is the biggest client around, so they will have to bend over backwards to make sure they are happy. Of course, if P&G starts demanding higher standards, other companies will do the same.
It is still far too early to say, but this interview from Prichard could very well be seen as a turning point in the digital ad industry. If, of course, ad agencies and publishers are able to make the changes needed to satisfy the multi-billion dollar companies like P&G.
While P&G will undoubtedly still be pouring millions of dollars into Facebook ads, this announcement does present some problems for Facebook itself. Facebook’s biggest advantage over other ad options is the fact that they offer so much targeting data. If you want to display ads only to families with two dogs, a cat, and makes $30,000-$40,000 per year, you can certainly do that.