Ms. Adverthinker

My friend over at Monkey Bulb found this spot and I love it so much, I am posting it here too.

I don’t watch the Discovery Channel, but I am inspired to after watching this spot. Genius and beautiful. Enjoy.

At the first of May, Levi’s released the first of 10 viral videos to kick off its global brand campaign for its 501 jeans. Two videos have been released so far, and they have been so popular that Levi’s is looking to integrate the viral campaign into the larger brand campaign. It is about time that online started influencing offline media. Check out the videos here:

Jumpin’ In

“Hollywood Jungle”

Focus groups feel so old-school.  Marketers have been doing them forever and the methodology really hasn’t changed all that much since that “Mad Men” era.   With the crazy amounts of consumer-generated media available to marketers, it is odd that we would even bother convene focus groups to tell us what consumers think about the brands we represent: people are telling us–and the world–without our asking.  It seems that some companies are latching on to this new media better than others and using blog communities to gather relevant insights.  As reported in AdWeek:

“Now firms with expertise ranging from research and word of mouth to digital media are setting up closed communities for clients to tap into the nuances, the spontaneity and the language of consumers engaging in a leisurely change, a different dynamic to one where they sit face-to-face in a focus group for a prescribed period of time.  Some of the initiatives focus on a specific topic for a couple of weeks; others create a longer, ongoing conversation.

“‘…when you are a running a qualitative blog: You have people for 10 to 15 days, which is a huge  amount of time for them to think about their answers and to challenge your own questions, which makes a big difference in results.  What people say when they talk together is more interesting than what they say when they talk to us.  What they say peer to peer is more sincere and sometimes very intimate.”

How do we combat that pesky DVR fast-forward button that zips our consumers right through our commercials?  Product placement in the show!  But is it too much?  According to an article in BusinessWeek:

“…American Idol has become as much a marketing showcase as musical slugfest.  Contestants cavort in rock videos to pitch Fords, troop off to Apple to record iTunes tracks, and answer questions brought to you by AT&T.”

“Three years ago, Idol scaled back its sponsors from five to three to limit ad clutter.  But this year it added Apple, figuring it fit the show’s demographic. Meanwhile, advertisers like Ford Motor, which on May 14 unveiled a sportier Focus in a weekly 45-second rock video, became omnipresent.  It’s a lot of plugs to get through.  Idol showed 4,151 product placements in its first 38 episodes this year according to Nielsen Media Research.  That’s up just 4% from ‘07, but the time on screen jumped nearly 19%, to a total of 545 minutes.”

The result?  An aging audience for American Idol.  Those skeptical youngsters are tuning out the product plugs and moms are tuning in instead: the median age of Idol viewers is now 43.

Over the past several years, there has been much speculation that television advertising will eventually go away.  Ratings are down, it is cheaper to buy online advertising–not to mention more targeted–and who watches commercials anyway since the introduction of DVR?  BusinessWeek reported on this year’s upfronts:

“A digitized world has crushed the music industry and is not crushing just about every other medium, too.  But at least when it comes to the hearts and dollars of advertisers, TV remains the tallest tree in the forest….This is America, and even today nothing announces status quite like being on TV.”

“In reality, many top advertisers are moving dollars away from TV very slowly, if at all.”

Even with all the talk of a coming decline in television advertising, the spending doesn’t seem to reflect the movement yet.  What will happen?

Last week I ordered a “large coffee” from Starbucks. It was an interesting experience for me: usually my order is very complicated. But, just as the new, massive ad campaign promised, I received a venti Pike’s Roast in the brand new Starbucks cup.

The best part about my order however was that my cup came with this little green tab in the sip hole. I actually commented to my co-workers about it: “this is brilliant! I am so tired of spilling coffee on myself and in my car.” As it turns out, this “splash stick” was the result of customer feedback. BusinessWeek this week reports that

“this is corporate democracy in action: At the month-old MyStarbucksIdea.com, customers can make suggestions, other customers can vote on and discuss them and Starbucks can see which ideas gain support. It’s key to Howard Schultz’s plan to reinvigorate his company, to which he returned as chief executive in January.”

Starbucks is not the first company to try this–the company is actually following the lead of Dell.  Both companies are using software that acts “like a live focus group that never closes.”  Customers want to feel like they are being heard, and this is a great way to do that.  Additionally, Starbucks is using “idea partners” to moderate the conversations and tell customers what things have already been tried or why things won’t work.  And the ideas that gain traction on the site, actually get implemented–like the splash stick.  Fantastic example of engaging in conversations with consumers.

I will admit that I am in the market for a new car, so maybe I am especially susceptible to car advertising at the moment. Two car commercials have recently caught my attention and made me pause to watch them: one for the Honda CR-V and one for the Kia Spectra.

First up, the Honda CR-V. Last year Honda launched the CRAVE campaign - cute idea that plays on the CR-V name and is a bit reminiscent of the Toyata Camry’s “My Car” campaign. Clever. There is one “Crave” commercial that is different from the others in the campaign: it transforms cookie dough into the CR-V. All the other spots “fill” the car with the “craved” food or drink. I was watching this commercial without the sound on the television and the cookie dough drew my eye to the screen, away from my conversation. I wonder if they were targeting me? I was watching “My Big Fat Greek Wedding,” it was 8 PM and a cookie sounded good to me. All of the sudden, the CR-V looks like a cute car for me. Creative execution combined with strategic media buy, and now I am a potential CR-V driver. Check out the spot.

Second, the Kia Spectra. This spot uses two things to make it stand out: music and a current event. The song is catchy and ties perfectly to the story the spot is telling. The spot shows Kia drivers pulling up to the gas station and always ending up on the wrong side of the gas tank. Obviously, the idea is that you have to fuel up so infrequently in a Kia Spectra, that you forget on which side your gas tank is located. Even my dad got it and it sparked a conversation about the monthly cost of gas. The spot works. Here it is:

BMW, already known for being on the forefront of new media opportunities–evident by their introduction of BMW Films several years ago–is again proving itself to be a brand that can differentiate itself through digital media, with the launch of a campaign for the new 1-Series. Because the new vehicle is targeted at younger audience, BMW smartly chose to spend almost half their marketing budget online.

Reported in the NY Times:

“Almost half the spending for the campaign, estimated at $15 million to $25 million, is being devoted to online media. By comparison, executives at BMW of North America say, Internet ad spending for other models ranges from 1 percent to 15 percent of the total ad budgets.

“The online elements of the 1-Series campaign include letting members of Facebook…design virtual cars and send them to Facebook friends; buying dominant positions, known as take-overs, on the home pages of msn.com and yahoo.com; posting video clips on YouTube; and developing a microsite devoted to the 1-Series (bmwusa.com/new1).

“The campaign is indicative of efforts by mainstream marketers to alter their media mixes as consumers change their media habits. A recent survey by PQ Media projected that by 2012, advertisers will increase spending by 82 percent from 2008 in areas like search-engine marketing, online video and e-mail messages.”

However, while it seems like I would be in the target market (identified as 20-somethings and 30-somethings) for this new car, I can’t find the Facebook app or the YouTube videos. And, the microsite is hardly a microsite. It looks like any other car website where you can customize and price your vehicle. Am I missing something here? Someone, please tell me.

Well, maybe I will be able to find the traditional ads, which seem pretty cool too:

“There are some unconventional approaches for the traditional media, too. Three magazines — City, Dwell and Paste — are printing pure-white covers that are glued over the actual front covers of the issues; there are ads for the 1-Series on the other sides of the extra covers.

“And magazines like City and AutoWeek are running tiny ads for the 1-Series with numerical themes at the bottom of editorial pages, which double as page-number identifications.

“For example, there is an itsy-bitsy white car on page 26 of the April issue of the magazine City next to this sentence: ‘26: number of bones in right foot you’ll use to crush the gas pedal on the all-new BMW 1-Series.’

“At the bottom of page 60, there is a miniature red car and this sentence: ‘60: m.p.h. you can reach in 5.1 seconds with the all-new BMW 135i coupe.’

A few weeks ago I opened my front door to find a bag with my new phone book in it sitting on my porch. I picked it up and walked the entire bag straight to my recycling bin, dropped it in, and walked away. I have no use for a phone book. My computer is almost always on and if it is not, my cell phones are, and it is easier and faster to look up information online. In fact, most of the time, I can find the information I need online without actually having to make a phone call! It is brilliant - I don’t ever have to have a human interaction or worry about being disappointed by poor customer service and terrible phone etiquette. Which begs the question: why are phone books still printed AND distributed it at all? Why can’t I at least opt out of this waste?

Slate.com is thinking about this to–check it out for a history on phone books. Phone book usage really comes down to generational differences:

“Ask anyone under 30 about phone books, though, and you might as well inquire about Victrola needles. The Yellow Pages Association claims that even young households use them when the occasion—a wedding, for instance—demands reliable listings. But printed phone books are a maturing industry, with only about six in 10 businesses and individuals still regularly relying on them. Yet even as directories hemorrhage content to the Web and to unlisted cell numbers, enough oldsters—those, say, who still recall physically dialing numbers in a rotary motion—continue using them enough to keep profits rolling in. In other words, you remaining four in 10 recipients can expect a lot more doorstops and spider-smashers in your future.”

“The phone book’s most fervent users these days are the cult of young YouTubers who, left with piles of directories that only their parents and professors could want, demonstrate the old parlor trick of ripping a phone book in half. (It’s harder than tearing an apple but probably easier than rolling up frying pans.) A fat Yellow Book is also perfect for punking dorm mates—this video by Tufts students has achieved phone-book infamy—or just for pummeling them. But it’s a throwaway comment in the Tufts prank that deals the most punishing blow of all: ‘They must not have gotten the memo about phone books not being useful anymore.’”

Check out some of the more entertaining phone book uses:

• Tearing Two Apart
• Ripping it in Half
• General Fun with Phone Books (my favorite)
• Phone Book Dodging

Reported in Ad Age.

I love research: usually there is a nugget of information that is revealed and gives us an “a-ha” moment.  But I also love research because it always confirms things we instinctively know, but provides the data to support those instincts.  That is what an article in today’s WSJ does for me.  The article is all about recall of commercials watched through fast forward on a DVR.  Some key findings reported that the most successful ads:

• Concentrated the action and the brand’s logo in the middle of the screen.
• Didn’t rely on multiple scene changes, audio or text to tell the story.
• Often used familiar characters.
• Were more likely to have been seen once before live.

Duh.  But the implications are interesting:

• Advertisers may want to unveil new campaigns during live events like sports games and then re-run spots during programs likely to be recorded.
• Advertisers may want to test multiple edits of a spot to see how it performs when it is fast forwarded.

As reported in BusinessWeek, social network users are spending less time on sites like MySpace and Facebook in an effort to avoid advertising.  “The average amount of time each user spends on social networking sites has fallen by 14% over the last four months, according to market researcher ComScore.  MySpace, the largest social network, has slipped from a peak of 72 million users in October to 68.9 million in December, ComScore says.  The total number of people on such sites is still increasing at an 11.5% rate, but that’s down sharply from past growth rates.”

“MySpace and Facebook recognize the issue but say increased targeting and other innovations will spur users to pay more attention.”

We will see what happens, but maybe online games are the new social networking sites when it comes to hot places to advertise.

More on the influence and importance of design: this week the NY Times had an article contrasting and comparing the websites of Obama and Clinton as if one were a Mac and one a PC.  This further illustrates the point made earlier this week in the comparison of font use by the different presidential candidates–never underestimate the power of good design.  According to the NY Times article:

“The differences between hillaryclinton.com and barackobama.com can be summed up this way: Barack Obama is a Mac, and Hillary Clinton is a PC.

That is, Mr. Obama’s site is more harmonious, with plenty of white space and a soft blue palette. Its task bar is reminiscent of the one used at Apple’s iTunes site. It signals in myriad ways that it was designed with a younger, more tech-savvy audience in mind — using branding techniques similar to the ones that have made the iPod so popular.”

“In contrast to barackobama.com, Mrs. Clinton’s site uses a more traditional color scheme of dark blue, has sharper lines dividing content and employs cookie-cutter icons next to its buttons for volunteering, and the like.”

The article does question, however, if this “being a Mac” is good politics:

“While Apple’s ad campaign maligns the PC by using an annoying man in a plain suit as its personification, it is not clear that aligning with the trendy Mac aesthetic is good politics. The iPod may be a dominant music player, but the Mac is still a niche computer. PC, no doubt, would win the Electoral College by historic proportions (with Mac perhaps carrying Vermont).”

Coming off the Super Bowl surge of popularity for advertising (when commercials get higher audience than the game thanks to DVR devices), a NY Times had an article today noting the importance of the web for additional viewing of popular commercials. In fact, marketers should be thinking about ways to post all spots on the Internet on various sites:

“The ‘torture test’ for brands beyond their Super Bowl ads is how to make it easy for consumers to find the ads and engage with them, whether you put them on Web sites, on YouTube or make them easy to search for on Google,” said Pete Blackshaw, executive vice president at the Nielsen Online Strategic Services division of the Nielsen Company.

With broadcast production costs rising and media placement costs continuing to rise, it just makes sense to take the spots that have been produced for the paid media placement and use them in free media outlets that consumers actually seek out. As an advertising agency and strategic partner to our clients, we should be recommending that all produced spots are placed on the web.