Terrence,
Behavior has its flaws also. As a matter of fact all advertising does. You are right, Its not just about traffic to the site. Its about engagement. I'm suggesting that you look at your bounce rate to see if you are getting quality traffic. Find out where the visitors are leaving your site from and why. It could be the site, not the visitor. Hold your advertising reps accountable to the traffic they do bring you.
Lets dig into behavioral targeting a bit more. If everyone who is reading about automotive or on auto sites is in the market for a new car, that would be perfect. Now lets just take my habits or online behaviors for example. I love cars. I read 2 to 3 articles a day about autos. I work with dealers so I am on a variety of automotive related sites. With that my browser now has cookies which Yahoo or other Ad networks will look at and suggest that I am "in Market". I am not. I have the car(s) that I have always wanted and love to drive. So I am a waste of an inflated CPM for a dealer. Now I am not the norm, I am the exception. The "Behavior" is acquired by the sites people visit and articles they are reading...
Lets look at the norm. Lets say that 2% of the people are "In Market" for a vehicle at any given time. Should you only target people who's online behavior is of shopping or researching vehicles? Or should you spend less on a CPM and build awareness about your brand? If I can work with a company like ReachLocal and get less then $2 CPM to help build my brand, build awareness, and capture visitors on any website plus remarketing back to them once they have visited my site. I think that is a win because of the lower investment I should be able to get greater returns. If I am getting quality traffic - that converts. I could also look at the Adready, Colbalt, Yahoo, or ad networks available that do the exact same or close to ReachLocal. I dont know if I need to know what sites my ads are being placed on if the company I am working is doing actual engagement based optimization and moving my budget to sites that are producing results. This is where I have to be involved to make sure my results are not just clicks to my site but clicks that are driving request/leads/contacts/sales.
Now if I went with something like Vehix Local Ad Network or other Automotive related Ad Network where my CPM's are $12-$25. I could only get a fraction of the impressions for a similar investment. Are the impressions a higher quality because they are on Automotive Websites? Maybe, but are the driving sales, results, RO's? I guess there is only one way to find out - try it all out - who has the budget to do that?
My personal option is that Adverting is about reach and frequency. Yes, the more targeted I can be and get better ROI for my clients will always be better, but at the same time 2% is not a large number. That 2% is already in the funnel. I need to make sure I am filling the funnel with the budget also. I might need to do a mix.
Behavioral targeting is cool, I'm all for it, but I have to look at all opportunity for my clients and manage expectations. At the end of the day its about results vs investment. Honestly I do a mix of Awarness campaigns and Behavioral when there is enough budget.
