Awareness. Lead Generation. DOD Has Coordinated Some Advertising Activities among Its Components, but Has Not Developed a Formal Process for Coordination

		DOD Has Taken Steps to Coordinate Some Advertising Activities

DOD has taken steps to coordinate some advertising activities among the  military service components. For example, DOD established the JAMRS office in 2002 to create a  centralized program for joint market research and communication. In the absence of a formal process for coordination, we found examples  of possible unnecessary duplication, overlap, and fragmentation within  DOD’s advertising activities. Three Advertising Programs within the Air Force. Officials could not provide any further rationale for  requiring separate programs or for why further efforts for consolidation  were not pursued. DOD Has Generally Followed Commercial Best Practices for Assessing the Effectiveness of Advertising, but Components Vary in Their Ability to Determine Whether Their Activities Are Generating Recruitment Leads

With some exceptions, DOD—through its military service components  and together with their contracted advertising agencies—generally follows  commercial best practices that we identified for assessing the  effectiveness of advertising, shown in table 1. As a result, the responsibility for measuring the  performance of locally executed lead generation advertising activities is  carried out, in part, at the local level, and some components do not obtain  or measure the performance data needed to assess the effectiveness of  these activities. The Army National Guard does not routinely require state units to  provide headquarters with performance data related to advertising,  including lead generation. Without processes in place to facilitate the measurement and  monitoring of advertising performance across all levels—especially at the  local level—the military service components may be unable to ensure  advertising dollars are used efficiently to help meet stated recruiting goals  could result in inefficient use of advertising dollars. In the Absence of Policy, DOD Does Not Have Comprehensive Oversight of Its Components’ Advertising Activities

DOD does not have comprehensive oversight of the military service  components’ advertising activities, as it does not have a policy that  defines its oversight role as well as procedures to guide the components’  respective advertising activities. DOD’s Components Oversee Their Own Programs, Which May Have Led to Negative Effects in Some Instances

As there is no department-wide policy that defines DOD’s role in  overseeing advertising activities or the procedures that should be  followed when the components carry out their advertising activities, the  department’s advertising activities are overseen at the military service  level and in some cases, within a service’s individual active, reserve, or  guard components. Digital Advertising. As such, in our discussions with service officials responsible for  carrying out local level advertising, we observed discrepancies in how the  guidance was being interpreted. Conclusions

Advertising activities provide information and seek to influence the beliefs  and understanding of potential recruits about each military service, and  the services conduct advertising to help meet their recruitment goals. Lastly, the  absence of a department-wide policy that clearly defines DOD oversight  of and procedures to guide the advertising activities has allowed for  activities of questionable appropriateness to occur in some instances. DOD concurred with our first recommendation that the department  develop a formal process for coordination on crosscutting issues to  facilitate better leveraging of resources. GAO staff who made key  contributions to this report are listed in appendix V.

Appendix I: Objectives, Scope, and Methodology

The objectives of our review were to examine the extent to which the  Department of Defense (DOD) (1) has coordinated its advertising  activities among the military service components, (2) has followed  commercial best practices to assess the effectiveness of advertising  activities, and (3) has oversight of the components ‘advertising activities.
Why GAO Did This Study

As part of its efforts to meet yearly recruitment goals for the military, DOD requested almost $575 million in fiscal year 2017 to conduct advertising intended to increase awareness of military service and ultimately generate leads for potential recruits.
Senate Report 114-49 included a provision for GAO to assess DOD's advertising activities. This report examines the extent to which DOD (1) has coordinated advertising activities among the military service components, (2) has followed commercial best practices to assess the effectiveness of advertising activities, and (3) has oversight of its components' advertising activities.
GAO identified best practices for assessing the effectiveness of advertising in consultation with advertising industry experts and reviewed DOD and service policies and the most recent version of each military service components' advertising plans, from fiscal years 2014-16.

What GAO Found

The Department of Defense (DOD) has taken steps to coordinate some advertising activities among the military service components, but it has not developed a formal process for coordination. DOD conducts joint market research and service officials responsible for advertising at times share some information about lessons learned. However, there is no formal process for addressing inefficiencies and to ensure information sharing among the services. GAO found examples of possible unnecessary duplication, overlap, and fragmentation that may result from the absence of coordination. For example, the Air Force has three advertising programs that contract with three advertising agencies, but officials could not provide a rationale for requiring separate programs. In the absence of a formal process for coordination, the services may be missing opportunities to effectively leverage advertising resources.
While DOD has generally followed commercial best practices GAO identified to assess the effectiveness of advertising, DOD's components vary in their ability to determine whether their activities are generating leads for potential recruits. For example, while the Marine Corps has developed a framework to assess the effectiveness of its advertising including leads generated from advertising activities at the local level, Army officials stated they do not have reliable data to evaluate whether locally executed advertising activities are generating leads, and the Army National Guard does not require state units to report on the performance of their advertising activities. Without fully measuring advertising performance, especially at the local levels, DOD may be unable to ensure advertising dollars are used efficiently to help meet recruiting goals.
DOD does not have comprehensive oversight of the components' advertising activities; instead, DOD's components oversee their own programs. However, examples identified by GAO and others of some components paying sport teams to provide recognition ceremonies for servicemembers—a practice later deemed unacceptable by DOD—suggest that the absence of DOD oversight may have contributed to some activities of questionable appropriateness. Further, GAO observed discrepancies in how recent sports advertising guidance was being interpreted and in service officials' understanding of regulations that direct digital advertising. Without a department-wide policy that clearly defines its oversight role, DOD lacks reasonable assurance that advertising is carried out in an appropriate manner.

What GAO Recommends

GAO recommends that DOD develop a formal process for coordination among its components on crosscutting advertising issues; ensure that the components fully measure the performance of advertising activities; and issue department-wide policy that, among other things, defines DOD's oversight role in advertising. DOD generally agreed with GAO's recommendations.