I've been harping about "message match" for what seems like forever. To
me, message match is one of the most important post-click marketing
techniques a marketer can utilize. Match your post-click message
(landing page, conversion path, whatever...) to the message (ad) that
got the user to click in the first place.
Today, I clicked a link that wasn't message matched, and just have to
rant. I read this text ad from Yahoo in one of my favorite
e-newsletters (IAB SmartBrief):
Take Your Brand to the Next Level -- Yahoo! offers mass reach as
well as the ability to serve targeted ads to relevant audiences. Plus
we provide actionable pre- and post-promotion insights. Add our
creative planning and rich media capabilities and you can't go wrong.
See what the Yahoo! Marketing Engine can do for you.
If you click the link to "See what the Yahoo! Marketing Engine can do
for you.", you might think you are going to page to learn about the
Marketing Engine and what it can do for you. But instead you will go to
a Yahoo ad gallery page with a bunch of case studies. Ack! I don't want
case studies. I wanted to know what the Marketing Engine could do for
me. I can't even find that information anywhere on this page! I call
this a Big Disconnect. Yahoo paid for an ad about what the Marketing
Engine could do for me, enticed me to click, and then put up a page
that isn't particularly relevant to the ad. Not a great post-click
experience.
I first wrote about message mismatch in 1999 in an article called The Big Disconnect. Check it out. And let me know what you think. Tell me about the message mismatches that drive you crazy.
-Anna Talerico