Uncategorized · Jul 17, 2026
Why we stopped calling it digital marketing
The label survived the job. What clients buy now is a measurable change in a number they already track.
Digital marketing described a channel. In 2011 that was useful information — it told you where the work happened. Today every channel is digital, so the label tells a buyer nothing about what they get.
The job changed underneath the name
A performance team does three things a channel agency never had to: it decides where the next unit of budget goes, it produces the creative that makes that budget work, and it defends both against a number the client already reports to their board.
What to ask instead
- What metric are you accountable to, and who measures it?
- What happens in month one if the metric does not move?
- How many creative variants ship per week, and who makes them?
If those answers are vague, the label was doing the selling.