madadprof-blog

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Method Fear No Mess Facebook post

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Method People Against Dirty Video

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Casey Neistat #MakeItCount #Nike #nativeadvertising #brandcontent

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This is an interesting take on content creation from the Pharma space.

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The Rise of Adblocking is Not a Media Agency Issue

                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                              In a recent @MediaVillageCom post, Brian Jacobs laid the fault of the rise of adblockers at the feet of media agencies. “Digital advertising is a huge hole created by over-enthusiastic media agencies, many of whom have forgotten that the best media buy in the world is worthless if there is no engaging idea at the end of it,” Jacobs ranted (http://bit.ly/1KgBqOQ). His statement is ludicrous for a number of reasons (which I will address in a moment), not the least of which is that the very first thing creative agencies did when the internet became an undeniable force in consumer content was to create their own digital agencies and bring the media function along with the creative. I’m not sure what his statement means for the likes of Razorfish, DigitasLBi and Moxie; is he saying they are creatively vapid as well? Regardless, coming from a 25-year career at said media agencies, let me remind Jacobs of a few facts: Media agencies evolved, in part, in reaction to the internet and the consumer increasingly taking control of their content. Given the plethora of content choices, clients recognized that churning out television and print ads and running them in the highest reaching media at the lowest price wasn’t going to be a winning strategy. Instead, they created media-only assignments (full disclosure, I worked on two of the earliest and largest media only assignments: Coca Cola and Kraft/Nabisco). We were tasked with uncovering a deeper understanding of how and why consumers were making the content and platform choices they were and to also find ways to reach them there. In so doing, the content and the placement of it began to merge. We became architects of connections strategies rather than mere negotiators of advertising space. It is what made the media agency a place so exciting, so vibrant and at the same time so challenging. What Jacobs imagines media planners do, I have no idea. I can only assume that the buzz around programmatic has spurred his opinion. What he, and I’m sure many others are missing, is that the promise of programmatic, for media agencies at least, is not to commoditize what we do and suck the creative life out of ads. The promise of programmatic is the exact opposite, it helps to automate rote processes leaving time and space to create engaging and innovative experiences for consumers. The challenge is to stop trying to push television and print ideas into a digital buy.

Adblocking is an advertising industry issue. Consumers are blocking ads for a number of reasons; they find them irrelevant, they suck up their data plans and the blocking of ads feeds their continued need to be in control of their content. So rather than lay blame, we need to be embracing creativity. Creativity in how we come to understand our consumers, creativity in how we seek to engage our consumers and creativity in how we create content that consumers will no longer want to block.

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Should Effective Frequency Planning Make a Comeback?

The media planning profession has been kneeling at the altar of Recency theory throughout the new millennia thanks to the ground-breaking work of John Philip Jones and Erwin Ephron in the ‘80s & 90’s. But does a model built in the era of push media remain relevant in the new world order of consumer control? Not according to a study published recently in Computers in Human Behavior from the Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University.

What the researchers found (full disclosure, I am a co-author on the article) was that regardless of the platform (television, internet or mobile) or platform sequencing, the multiplatform exposures resulted in more positive attitudes about the brand, resulted in higher message and advertiser crediblity and higher intent to purchase.

While Recency theory has long held that the exposure closest to the point of purchase generates the greatest impact, according to this study, consumers who viewed the ad in the same environment repeatedly had significantly lower reactions to the ad. Attitudes toward the brand were lower; the credibility of the message was damaged; and purchase intent fell off.

When Herb Krugman first introduced the idea of effective frequency in the 1960’s he studied consumers who were viewing television in a passive environment. He was right that a single exposure to an ad message would not likely deliver immediate impact. In fact, Jones and Ephron never disputed that finding. They simply said that a consumer who was in the mindset to purchase a category would respond after the exposure closest to the point of purchase.

What has changed significantly since then is that consumers are rarely consuming content in a passive environment. They are increasingly consuming content in multiple media, on demand and, simultaneously. The idea of reaching a consumer more than once in order to deliver optimal impact is still relevant and this research demonstrates that reach is most effective when delivered in different environments.

We continue to measure reach within each medium and combine them to measure campaign impact. It’s time we develop new reach models that will account for this multi-media effect and deliver true cross-channel frequency metrics.

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Methodological notes: The study looked at exposure to ads in linear television (42” TV), online video (19” monitor) and Direct Mobile Broadcast (3.5” screen). Study participants were shown two ads in a news program environment. Some saw the same ad in the same environment, others saw the ad in a paired environment with the pairs reversed (ie. some saw the ad on television first, then online; others saw the ad online first, then on television). The ads were tested for both high and low involvement products (a pain killer and a computer, respectively).

Link to full article: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/272891499_The_cross-platform_synergies_of_digital_video_advertising_Implications_for_cross-media_campaigns_in_television_Internet_and_mobile_TV

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AOL UK Infographic on Native

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What the NYTimes Memo says about Native Advertising

The debate about native advertising rages on. In fact, the debate about what native advertising is is probably louder. But the recent shakeup at the NYTimes has reinvigorated both sides to wrestle with a future without separation between church and state.

Andrew Sullivan, founder of "The Dish" spoke at Harvard's Nieman Lab and had some harsh criticism for those journalists engaged in native. “It used to be an axiom that the job of journalists was to be resistant to that and sustain the clear distinction between advertising and journalism. One side has effectively surrendered.” About those who engage in native articles, “That’s not journalism, that’s copywriting. It’s advertising!”

I'm going to make a bold statement here: it doesn't matter. Now wait, before the ad folks tell me I'm missing the point or the journalists decry my disregard for objectivity, allow me to explain.

The term "native advertising" can be traced back to an OMMA conference in 2011 when Fred Wilson, the founder of Union Square Ventures talked about "native monetization". The idea of native has always been about the money. Even Sullivan himself calls it "the complete transformation of the economics of journalism".

The traditional model has been the same for over a century: someone (ie. a publisher, a producer) has something to say, people (aka consumers) are willing to pay a fraction of the cost to hear/read it and advertisers are willing to pick up the rest of the tab for the chance that a consumer will listen to their message as well.

But then came fragmentation. Advertisers become less willing to pick up as much of the tab because at any given time, they were reaching fewer consumers. The model had to change. Is native the answer? We don't know yet. But the reality is that directly or indirectly advertising has always funded the conversation. Yes there is the opportunity for brands to deceive and journalists to sell out but historically the marketplace has been the system of checks and balances, and there is no reason to think it will fail us now.

Native advertising is continually evolving and one of the best examples yet is the recent Wired/Netflix article (seen here: http://www.wired.com/partners/netflix/). It is an interesting article that should be written with or without Netflix. Personally, I'm glad Netflix made it happen. I happen to currently be a Netflix subscriber, but if they take "Law and Order" off their streaming service, I'll cancel it again. With or without the Wired piece.

So all I ask for is a little bit of sanity in this debate. Debate is good but let's stop kidding ourselves. Why can't journalists tell interesting brand stories without objectivity? Why can't readers be entertained by content brands want to share? In the very memo that prompted this post, even the New York Times admits, "Increased collaboration, done right, does not present any threat to our values of journalistic independence".

Yes, the natives are getting restless, but why can't we all just get along?

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PubliCom or Bust

Well, the verdict is in, that was a bust!

In fact, what it really was was an exposition of the stunning hubris in the ad world. Two of what should be the smartest minds in the business making a decision based solely on ego with no concern for the ripples they would leave in the wake.

Anyone who gave the announcement any real thought could see that a mutual disdain of Sir Martin Sorrell and the legacy of their careers staring them in the face were the only rational reasons to propose such a stupid idea.

So what should the lesson be here?

When it comes to the agency business, the fox is guarding the hen house. The leaders in the industry have become caricatures of themselves. They have made themselves the brands, and clients are starting to notice. Everyday we read more and more about clients handing small shops pieces of their business without a review. They're tired of supporting the bloated salaries and the slow pace of the big agencies. They're turning to the folks who are getting it done, focused on the client's business, not their own.

There was always a mythology around the economic benefits of consolidation and client's are starting to call us out on it. Unless big agencies start becoming more humble and work for their client's success rather than their own, one day they'll turn around and the clients will be gone.

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Bridging the Great Divide

Walking into my first academic conference at the Crowne Plaza in Atlanta there would be no mistaking that I was entering a new society.  With my nametag flagged "first time attendee" it felt more like rush week.

The academic and professional worlds have always kept each other at arm's length.  In fact, bridging that gap is what drove my interest in entering academia one day.

So here I am (I made it through rush) and the task may be more daunting than I thought.  But now, more than ever, it is a necessity. 

As professionals we have largely been able to drive success by replicating the past.  That didn't mean we weren't constantly innovating, we were just able to rely on the fact that for the most part, what worked in the past will work in the future.  Now much of what we've done in the past doesn't even exist anymore and the consumer continues to constantly change the dialogue.

That's where the academics come in. Journal after journal is filled with theories that help to explain why things worked. There is plenty of brilliant thinking that can help the industry understand how to react to the new tactics. 

But until we as practitioners are willing to change the dialogue, never the twain shall meet.

What do I mean by that? While the academics put great rigor around the pre-testing of their concepts, they spend much less time talking to the industry to understand what questions need to be answered.  An understanding of how the question at hand will inform campaign strategy development now will make the research more than a purely academic exercise.  And the industry would do well to turn to institutions to help them analyze the varying questions they tackle with every day. Institutions have the statistical prowess, the sweat equity (lots of students looking for research opportunities) and the time and space to put real thought behind the problem without the daily realities of a client breathing down their neck.

Consider this my invitation - to academic institutions to look to industry to help frame the questions and to the industry to allow academics help find answers to our problems. There is no better time than the present.