MediaPost: Industry Identifies $50 Billion Ad In Waste: Wrong Messages, Wrong Timing

The Advertising Research Foundation (ARF) took a hand at interpreting the dozen or so cross media studies conducted by the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB), and came to the conclusion that about 20 percent of media spending was wasted on buys that were predictably useless. It determined several factors that can be used to predict the relative utility of an incremental media buy that it claims, if applied, would allow advertisers to save about $50 billion a year.

ARF announced it will take over what has been the IAB's work on the ambitious XMOS studies and license the methodology to marketers. The methods were developed by Marketing Evolution, the firm of Rex Briggs, long-respected internet advertising researcher who pioneered some of the first ad effect studies in the early days at Hotwired.