Despite years of effort and millions of dollars, the effectiveness of online advertising is still poorly understood. Now Google and WPP Group, a marketing and communication firm, have joined forces to promote science-based research on how traditional and online advertising affect consumer choices.

On Wednesday, the two companies announced that an initial round of 11 research proposals have been awarded "under the auspices of the Google and WPP Marketing Research Awards Program." More than 120 total proposals were submitted for consideration.

Better Advertising Investments

The Research Awards Program is a three-year initiative funded by $4.6 million in seed money from Google and WPP. The research proposals were selected by a committee of three academics with extensive experience in media, advertising, and consumer behavior: Professor John Quelch, senior associate dean of Harvard Business School and a non-executive director of WPP; Dr. Hal Varian, Google's chief economist; and Professor Glen Urban, former dean of the Sloan School of Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

"The winning projects offer convincing designs to explore how online and offline marketing influence consumer attitudes, decisions and purchase behavior," Varian said. "As marketing continues to become more digital and more measurable, the results of these studies would also advance our understanding of how advertising investment should be allocated among media channels."

Both of his fellow committee members agreed. "I was very impressed with the volume and quality of the submissions," said Urban, whose own research proposal was awarded a grant. "I think we have an exciting set of grants that are truly innovative, academically rigorous, and relevant to the practice of digital marketing."

"These awards," Quelch said, "promise to focus some of the best minds in the marketing academy on the marketing impacts of the digital revolution."

Diverse Research Projects

The initial round of research projects covers a wide range of advertising-related issues. Among...