We seem to be at an important part of a media cycle: the growth of mobile via smartphones. I was at a panel of CEOs where the subject was marketing. One of these leaders, who guides a jewelry manufacturer in B2B and B2C markets, said they are strictly digital now. The money quote was “It's so impossible to measure, it's just not worth it for us.” She was referring to print.

Print can be measured, of course, but not in the manner digital can. The catalog and direct marketing industries were the original developer of many of the analytic concepts that digital uses.

Did she really mean “impossible to measure”? Yes, she did, but I suspect it was in a context of comparison with current digital media. There, the feedback seems instant. Print takes time to measure effectiveness because it requires a physical distribution process to send the message and then to receive feedback. The idea of toll-free phone numbers was a big breakthrough because it changed the feedback cycle. It removed a time and cost barrier to measurement. It was an early form of multichannel communications, where one medium is used to encourage feedback (such as a transaction) using a different medium.