“I read the article on advertising analytics product Adalyser in Fastline last week,” writes Graham Small, who runs a NZ business called Media Specialists in Onehunga (www.mediaspecialists.co.nz).

“Your readers may be interested to know that I have been running a similar service for the last five years [clients include Ogilvy].

“I suggest you visit our website and the data analysis page for a very top-level review on how I approach the challenge.

“For me the key points are that very seldom does one solution fit all scenarios and that it’s useful to have someone with experience in advertising and specifically advertising media involved in the analysis, the interpretation of the findings, and the presentation of the findings to the client.

“If the analysis is not done well media owners might be unfairly and unreasonably penalised.

“If, for instance, you were comparing response from a monthly magazine schedule and a radio schedule, you would need to allow for the different lags in response. Pass-on circulation exists for print media but not for radio so you would expect responses to carry on for some time after the issue date for the magazines, and less so for radio spots.

“If you didn’t allow for this, the analysis might conclude that magazines ‘didn’t work’ while radio ‘did’ which would be an injustice to magazines.

“I don’t know if Adalyser allows for a lag in response – I assume if it’s been as successful as it seems from the article, that it does.” Contact Graham Small at graham@mediaspecialists.co.nz.