Larger brands invest in local

There is a marked difference between the ability of national brands to track their local business marketing efforts compared to their return on investment from national campaigns, according to a recent Balihoo study.

The National Brand Use of Local Marketing and ROI Metric found that just over two-thirds of national brands invest in local marketing, but a mere 42 percent of those measure ROI, compared to 56 percent that measure national campaign success.

However, expectations of national brands differ when it comes to national versus local. Specifically, 24 percent of those polled expect ROI on national campaigns, while 36 percent believe local campaigns will return profits.

This illustrates the importance of breaking down campaigns to a local level.

The largest of national brands feel greater pressure to hit local markets, and researchers revealed brands that see more than $1 billion in revenue are 49 percent more likely to invest in local marketing compared to small national brands. Larger brands' ability to spend more to hit local markets also has a lot to do with it.

To further break down the national interest in local marketing, 21 percent of such companies invest more than 25 percent of their marketing budget on localized campaigns. Among that total, about 9 percent say they're not able to track ROI.

It seems the less a company spends on local, the less likely it is to track return. Thirty-nine percent of national brands that used less than 5 percent of their budget for local marketing efforts weren't able to track ROI.

Brands that track ROI feel local campaigns can generate more returns. Specifically, 36 percent of those polled expected local campaigns to generate ROI of 4:1 or higher, compared to 24 percent of those who expected national campaigns to do the same.