09 Jan Why Do Giants Spend Millions on Ads They Can’t Track?
Here’s a question that reveals whether a brand is playing checkers or chess:
Why do the biggest brands in the world still spend hundreds of millions on advertising they can’t track?
Nike doesn’t buy billboards, Olympic sponsorships, or global TV expecting a direct conversion tomorrow.
Apple doesn’t run “Shot on iPhone” because it needs a pixel to fire.
Coca-Cola doesn’t dominate out-of-home because it’s chasing a ROAS report.
They do it because they understand how growth actually works.
Brand advertising creates demand before anyone clicks.
It builds memory, familiarity, and trust, so when a customer is ready, the brand already feels like the obvious choice.
That impact shows up later:
- search lift
- direct traffic
- conversion efficiency
- market share
Not neatly inside a last-click dashboard.
Last-click attribution is a tool.
It’s not a strategy.
And if you only invest in what’s immediately measurable, you’ll always underinvest in what actually makes brands big.
That’s part of the dimension I help leaders add: not abandoning performance, but building the upstream conditions that make performance cheaper and stronger.
BJ