????大品牌及其消費者之間存在脫節。人們在互聯網和各種數字設備上花費的時間越來越多，然而廣告主們仍對將錢花在數字領域心存疑慮。曾擔任互聯網分析師的風險資本家瑪麗?米克估計，應該投入互聯網，但最終卻投往別處的資金高達500億美元。

????盛世長城（Saatchi & Saatchi S）首席執行官猶達?席勒在參加關于廣告業現狀的一次頭腦風暴科技討論時稱：“我認為離線廣告和禁毒戰有點類似。過去數十年，我們花費了數千萬美元。我們知道這不會奏效，但至少我們知道自己能得到什么。”

????少數公司愿意冒險一試。惠普（Hewlett-Packard）目前已將廣告預算的40%投入數字領域。該公司負責數字營銷戰略的副總裁克里斯?科廷表示：“我們在交互廣告領域投入了很多錢，特別是社交和移動平臺上。假如必須要進行分配的話，我們希望能將更多的廣告預算投入交互廣告。”

????這一番推銷有些棘手，因為各公司還在努力界定“交互式[廣告]”成功的量化標準。微軟（Microsoft）去年進行了一項營銷活動，向成為必應（Bing）粉絲的Facebook用戶免費贈送“農場現金”——Zynga旗下熱門游戲FarmVille中的虛擬貨幣。

????必應全球市場部總經理維斯?尼科爾斯在談到關于此次營銷的內部討論時表示：“大家的看法兩極分化。”從表面上看，我們取得了巨大成功：必應迅速新增了50萬Facebook粉絲。不過，他們會一直力挺必應嗎？

????尼科爾斯表示：“爭論仍在繼續：這些粉絲會保持活躍、再度訪問必應嗎？還是說他們成為必應的粉絲，僅僅是為了免費獲得農場里的小豬？”

????There's a disconnect between big brands and their customers. People are spending more and more time online and on their gadgets, but advertisers remain wary about shifting their spending into the digital realm. Internet analyst turned venture capitalist Mary Meeker estimates that there's a $50 billion gap between where the money goes and where it should go.

????"I think there's something analogous to the war on drugs," Saatchi & Saatchi S CEO Judah Schiller declared Wednesday at a Brainstorm Tech discussion on the state of the advertising industry. "We're spending tens of millions of dollars over the decades. We know it doesn't work, but at least we know what we're getting!"

????A few companies are taking the plunge. Hewlett-Packard (HPQ) spends 40% of its ad budget on digital. "A lot of our dollars that are spent, particular in social and mobile, are on the engagement front," said Chris Curtin, HP's vice president of corporate marketing digital strategy. "If we had to split it, we'd like to see more of our advertising dollars go to engagement."

????That's a tricky sales pitch when companies are still struggling to quantify the success metrics for "engagement." Microsoft (MSFT) ran a promotion last year offering free "farm cash" -- the virtual currency of Zynga's hit FarmVille game -- to those who became Facebook fans of Bing.

????"It was very polarizing," Bing Worldwide Marketing General Manager Wes Nichols said of the internal discussion running the promotion. It was an apparent runaway success: Bing immediately gained 500,000 new Facebook fans. But are they staying engaged?

????"We still have the debate," Nichols said. "Are those friends active and coming back, or did they just friend Bing to get the free pig on the farm?"