Forecast Your Return On Creative Spend

Experienced marketers seem to find the budget for creative. ROCS is the secret that enables the smartest decisions.

When talking about ROCS, for now, we are purposely ignoring the huge increase in brand awareness and consideration that can usually be achieved by using better creative, as these benefits are not measured or forecast using ROCS. We believe addressing brand awareness, and consideration can also be brought out of the dark ages, but that’s a focus for another day.

ROCS (Return On Creative Spend) is a ratio measurement, much like ROAS, that can be used once a campaign is live to determine the impact of the performance increase achieved by the creative. Using performance benchmarks, ROCS can be used to forecast the performance of future campaigns based on the creative strategy, as well as to validate the real performance during and after the campaign runs.

ROCS is a multiplier calculated using the available success signals that are not as credible as ROAS, yet they are the best signals we have available prior to conversion. Clicks and engagement (interactions) are the only signals we have, so we have to use them. Actually, viewability is another metric available - we believe that if a creative wasn’t in view, it can’t influence performance. This is why for ROCS we rely only on in-view metrics.

According to several sites, the industry average CTR (Click through Rate) for display is 0.06%. We can use that industry average or inventory-specific average CTRs combined with the cost of building and serving a standard creative as the base rate for ROCS.

Of course, a great ROCS forecast is not a guarantee of success. If the wrong audience is reached, a great creative will have little impact. If a poor creative strategy or low-quality design is used, the creative will also underperform. And of course, if the right format is combined with a great creative strategy and accurate audience and or context targeting, and the design focuses on achieving the desired KPIs, then you can expect to exceed the Benchmark ROCS.

This ROCS calculator can be used to predict how much impact, and value quality creative generates.