“[…] in most circumstances advertising is only one of a whole host of important determinants of sales levels (such as product quality, prices, customer service levels, the competence of the sales force, and so on).” (Wilson & McDonald, 2016)

“[…] views, clicks, likes and shares can be counted […] Of course, these numbers do not correspond to sales, market share or revenue, but they are often used as a proxy simply because they can easily be measured.” (Hackley & Hackley, 2018)

We are seriously damaging businesses because of ignorance in this matter. Business owners throw money away on advertising and complain about marketers. Marketers in turn cannot perform well and are obsessive about the proxy measures. It must stop.

Business owners, put your business and marketing strategy in order before investing in promotion. Marketers, educate the customer and be more careful about claims on your impact on ROI. We all need to become better in business, particularly in current economic situation.

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