How Short Should Ads Be?

Ads keep getting shorter, but not subliminal.

Way back in TV advertising history, there were 60-second ads. Some people still remember those; there was even an article in The Atlantic looking back on them, wistfully.

Ads used to be longer

Like most GenXers, I grew up with :30s and :15s on TV. Conventional wisdom, after I joined the industry but before bandwidth permitted online video, was to run :30s until awareness reached some level when :15s could take over as reminders or reinforcement.

Miller High Life ran 1-second ads in
the 2009 Super Bowl, featuring
the late, great Windell Middlebrooks

During my international career, I became familiar with :20s and even :10s. In Argentina, where I lived and worked for three years, ads could be any length client and agency wanted, because media time was bought and sold on a second-by-second basis. So, we made :17s, :36s, :52s, etc.

Maybe that Argentine flexibility is going global. 30-second units are still common on linear TV, but audiences can be reached on other platforms that allow for all sorts of possibilities. Bandwidth has improved and the shift to mobile devices and mobile-friendly formats, like YouTube and TikTok, permits shorter ads and new rules for what makes effective communication. The six-second format is common.

But does the six-second format work?

Shorter ads can work, but...

Magna Global, the IPG media research hub, has studied ad lengths across different video platforms. Their 2015 study found that even 5-second ads could build awareness, but it took :15s or :30s to drive brand favorability and purchase intent.

A lot changed in Magna's more recent study, just published in the last few weeks. This time, they found :06s and :15s to be similar in their ability to drive search intent, brand preference, and purchase intent. Why would that be?

One reason may be the platforms on which they ran the test: Snapchat, a video aggregator (i.e., YouTube) and a Full Episode Player (FEP, perhaps a streaming app like Hulu). Audiences are already accustomed to short ad lengths in these environments, and there were no :30s tested for comparison.

The Snapchat part of the test was interesting because more people watched :15s all the way through, but they were all placed mid-roll, about ten seconds into the content, so perhaps viewers were really staying for the content, which might explain the other finding that these ads were slightly less convincing.

YouTube was different. Viewers didn’t like the :15s, which were skippable after six seconds, but keep in mind that all of these were pre-roll ads, meaning that they were a barrier to the selected content. On the FEPs, :15s were better-received, but may also have been more expected during a 20-minute TV program.

None of these findings should surprise us, especially when you consider:

• Linear TV wasn’t part of the test and neither were 30-second ads. It would be instructive to have these points of comparison.

• The three viewing platforms in the test give individualized watching experiences, which may improve the ability of short copy to get across its messages, and also lead to less patience for longer ads.

• We don’t know the quality of the ad creative shown. There were four brands included (Clinique, Mini, Lego and a “major CPG brand”) but we can only assume their ads were adequately memorable and persuasive.

On that last point, not only do we not know the quality of the ad creative, we don't know if it took full advantage of the format. Traditionally, :15s were (mostly) just shorter versions of :30s, both seen on linear TV. Newer formats, like a six-second pre-roll on YouTube, are seen by an individual person watching a very small screen. That calls for a different creative approach, and opens creative avenues instead of closing them.

It's always nice to have more time to get your message across, and :30s will continue to run on TV. But newer formats may prove to be a useful piece of your overall plan.

Ad Spending: Pixels are Up, Ink & Paper are Down

U.S. ad spending went up slightly in 2014 because pixels increased more than ink & paper declined.

That's my analysis of fresh data from Kantar Media summarized in this chart:

The pixels were TV (+5.5%) and Internet Display (+0.9%).  Representing ink & paper were Magazines (-5.1%), Newspapers (-10%), Outdoor (-0.2%) and FSIs (-2.8%).  Radio was also down -3.9%.

Like everything in modern media, though, it's never this simple.

Two Questions to Think About

Please consider the environment
before printing this billboard

The "pixels" category above only seems to represent the "First Screen" (TV) and the "Second Screen" (personal computers).  We don't see the Third Screen (mobile devices) and Fourth Screen (digital out of home).  That leaves us with a couple of questions.

What is TV?  As posted recently, TV isn't dead, it's just morphing into a more personalized experience.  If anything is dying, it's Cable TV.  Now, Cable ad spend actually grew +6.8% last year, a big reason for TV growing +5.5% overall, thanks to sports and political campaigns.  But viewers are cutting the cord, or at least shaving it, in favor of new OTT options.  The thing is, it's harder to track the ad revenue, which is there if you're watching The Flash online at CWtv.com, but not if you're watching House of Cards on Netflix.  Kantar says their data doesn't track online and mobile video ad spend.

What is Outdoor?  The vast majority of OOH (Out of Home) inventory is still ink & paper, although many media companies continue investing in DOOH (Digital Out of Home) and Digital Place-based Media.  Kantar pointed out "digital outdoor ad spending has grown six times faster than the overall medium".  So it's reasonable to say that Outdoor's -0.2% decline is probably a mix of pixels being up and ink & paper being down.

The State of TV Advertising Now That the Super Bowl Is Over

On Sunday, millions of people watched 4-1/2 hours of Live TV.

Today, millions of people will do the same.

As covered in my previous post, despite the popular reporting that TV is Dead, the medium is actually alive, well — and changing.  Live TV viewing is holding steady at 4-1/2 hours per day.  Much of that viewing happens on an actual TV.  At the same time, audiences are adopting new ways to watch TV, like DVRs, OTT, Online and Mobile.  It seems like we have video everywhere.

It's all TV

In the same way this blog says "it's all advertising" I'd say "it's all TV" when it comes to these new ways of delivering video.  Maybe we should say "it's all Video".  Either way, it's part of a trend as illustrated below in Twenty Years of TV Innovation.

What Social Media Taught Me on Super Bowl Sunday

My last post led to some enlightening discussions on Twitter and LinkedIn about the so-called Death of TV.  One insight was that when many people say "Death of TV" they actually mean "Death of Cable".  Much of the press on this subject talks about the cord cutters, and who can blame them?  Cable TV's delivery model forces you to buy up to 200 channels when most people watch no more than 17.

The Future of TV is Personalization

Which is a good reason to cheer for SlingTV, HBO Go, Google Chromecast and the other services starting to become available along with Hulu, Amazon Prime and Netflix.  All of these allow audiences to choose exactly what they want, which is why we said the other day that the future of TV is Personalization.  There's one day a year when 114.5 million people all watch one event, but during the rest of the year they all watch various programs that interest or entertain them.

It's all TV.  As the chart below illustrates, technology is meeting the demand for new ways to see what we want, when we want it.  TV's not dead.  It's innovating, growing and continuing to be a part of our lives.

The State of TV Advertising on the Eve of the Super Bowl

The Super Bowl has always symbolized the power of TV advertising.  Is that power waning?

Many business journalists seem to think the Super Bowl is the last bastion of TV advertising.  Just this morning as I was writing this post, The Economist daily news digest arrived, calling the Super Bowl "something increasingly rare in television: a programme that people watch live and in large numbers."

Surprise! Most TV Viewing is Still Done on a TV

Now let me explain
"Programmatic" to you

Actually, Live TV viewing is holding steady at about 4-1/2 hours per day.  Yes, 66.8% of Broadband Users Under 35 watch TV on a combination of these devices, but for all age groups most TV viewing is still done on a TV.  

This will shock Upper West Siders who binge-watch Orange Is The New Black on Netflix.  But regular people are watching live sports, NCIS, Dancing With The Stars, American Idol, Judge Judy and Big Bang Theory.  Bazinga!  

But Fragmentation Will Continue

TV was never dying; it was just following audiences to new platforms.  Cable supplanted Broadcast and new devices emerged like DVRs, OTT, Online and Mobile.  There will always be big audiences, but they will continue fragmenting.  In Ye Olde Marketing buying and selling TV was relatively straightforward and audience delivery was measured by Nielsen.  But now audiences are fragmented and sometimes not even measured.  Only Netflix knows how big the audience for Orange or House of Cards really is.  (A Los Angeles Times reporter tried thinking it through.)

The Super Bowl doesn't have this problem.  The marquee advertising will air during NBC's broadcast, and people will see it on TVs, tablets and other places.  The audiences will be big enough that few advertisers will worry about under-delivery against their $4.5 million (unless they're spending that money in the 4th quarter of a one-sided blowout).

The Revolution May Not Be Televised, but TV Will Be Personalized

But even in a big event that almost everyone watches or knows about, we see the future of TV:  Personalization.  For the Super Bowl it takes the form of second- and third-screen programming, i.e. game analysis, ad analysis and social media traffic.  Little of this is driven from broadcaster to audience; it's more of a conversation where both participate.  The famous Oreo dunk-in-the-dark tweet generated very small response:  15,000 Retweets and 20,000 Likes.  (In fact they probably generated more blog posts than that, but I digress.)  But it's OK because they learned how be part of people's conversations.  

In the same way, Oreo's latest stunt -- yes, it's a stunt -- using programmatic methods to buy a :15 in the Erie (Pennsylvania) DMA is a harbinger of things to come.  "Programmatic" is one of those words that's taken on too many meanings, but it's generally associated with media buying, just like the online ad world from which it came.  Its real value will be as a pathway to addressable TV, a way for audiences to customize the programs they see -- and advertisers to customize the messages that make them possible.

Enjoy the game -- and the ads -- and know that you'll always have plenty of company watching that first screen.  Keep one eye on those other screens, too, because they're a window to the future.

Automatic Advertising: We Take Spotomate for a Test Drive

Software can make your 30-second TV commercial.

You knew this would happen.  Not just because technology makes the software possible, but because newly-available media makes it necessary.

There's the first screen (TV), second screen (computer), third screen (mobile), fourth screen (digital signage) and all of them are hungry for content -- and advertising.

Technology has been busy democratizing the science of advertising.  Small business is able to do SEO, SEM and Social Media without an agency, as did my friend the garage door expert.  So why not video advertising creative?

Along comes Spotomate, which via its partner Shakr, offers a service allowing small- and medium-sized businesses to make "your own agency-quality video advertising spots".  They're targeting operators of digital signage networks (see industry coverage here and here), but I decided to experiment with it myself during a free trial open until Thursday.

Voilà… Ad Majorem's First Ads

How it works:  You pick one of their pre-set templates, it runs you through the places where you must write copy or provide a visual asset, and automatically sequences these with graphics and a music bed.  So here were two attempts using our masthead copy and experimenting with different visuals.

Here's What I Thought About Spotomate

Agencies, for the most part, shouldn't worry.  True, I did once have a colleague who believed in "campaign construction", i.e., every 30-second TV commercial for a brand had to have the same sequence of scenes, but most big advertisers want customized treatment.

Small- and Medium-sized businesses will love Spotomate, though.  In fact the templates may help inexperienced advertisers to organize their thoughts and force decisions as to what should or shouldn't go in the ad.

In other words, one still needs a smart brief, and I'm not sure that will ever be automatic.

What do you think of Spotomate?  What did you think of my, uh, "ads"?  Go ahead, hit me with your best shot in the comments section below.

Adobe's Pre-Roll Ad Mocks Unwise Super Bowl Investments

My Monday morning quarterbacking of Super Bowl XLVII advertising asked whether all the advertisers remembered that they were selling something, and if not, whether their media investment was wise.

"Spend wisely" is the advice given by Adobe in a pre-roll ad they're running on trade websites this week.  It comes wrapped in an amusing send-up of Super Bowl attention-grabbing tricks.

Click the video below.  It's a fun 30 seconds.

Related posts:

"Oh -- were we supposed to prove the results of what we did?"

How to know "which half of my advertising budget is wasted"

"I don't know which half of my ad budget I'm wasting -- and I don't WANT to know!"

Super Bowl XLVII Advertising: What Worked

How did a Super Bowl advertiser know if she spent $4 million of her media budget wisely yesterday?  And what about that production budget?

The answer doesn’t depend on popular opinion surveys, like the USA Today Ad Meter declaring Budweiser’s Clydesdales the winner.  In the end, clients want results, and while some seek popularity, all advertisers look for sales, share and brand equity.

We can’t share any internal documents stating those goals and whether the ads achieved them.  But the universal laws of strong communication still apply.  Based on those, we can pick some winners.

Universal Laws of Advertising Still Apply on Super Bowl Sunday

Every commercial has to be memorable, persuasive and well-executed.  Most Super Bowl commercials are memorable, even if it’s a memorable failure, and even if it resorts to stupid attention-getting tricks like featuring babies, animals and/or celebrities.  And most are well-executed.  Or at least well-funded.

No, really. Where's the
copy strategy for this?

It’s the persuasive part that many Super Bowl commercials miss.  In many cases that’s due to a lack of clear objective.  In most it’s because the brand, product and story aren’t all present or linked together. 

I’m not prescribing a claim or product feature, although those are far and few between during any Super Bowl.  It’s more simple:  Did you remember the advertiser?  Did you remember what they told you?

Super Bowl Advertising Also Has to be Epic

There’s one more rule that applies to big events like the Super Bowl:  Advertising has to be epic.  That could mean making a special emotional connection, launching a (truly) revolutionary product, or even a celebrity.  Think of the Super Bowl as a premiere.  It would be silly to run an ad everyone has already seen.  (Oh.  Wait….)

The problem is, epic falls flat if there’s no story being told – not just the story on the screen, but the advertiser’s story.

Super Bowl XLVII Advertising: What Worked

Based only on the above thoughts, here were three that worked well.

“Morning Run” (Milk).  Milk’s marketing works best when it focuses on the “healthy body” claim.  In this case they turned the “Got Milk?” storyline into the promise of  “Protein to start your day.”  Dwayne Johnson’s role reinforces the product benefit.  And it was epic.

“Farmer” (Dodge Ram).  I admit that the Paul Harvey speech drew me in.  Which was necessary because I’m not in the market for a pickup truck.  Doubly necessary because of Dodge Ram advertising’s sophomoric track record.  Yes, it amounts to a product usage suggestion (“great for farming!”) but they effectively used the brand to herald a cause.

“Miracle Stain” (Tide).  I had to go back and watch it again this morning because I apparently missed the “Go Ravens” line while feeding tortilla chips to the children.  Kudos to Procter & Gamble for resisting the urge to feature a claim and/or a demo until the very end.

What didn’t work so well?

None of these spots had all four ingredients (memorable, persuasive, well-executed and epic).

“Crackin’ Style” (Wonderful Pistachios).  Even the star of the most viral video ever can’t compensate for lack of a point or an unmemorable brand name.  In fairness, salty snacks is a tricky category.  Past Super Bowl nut-vertising offers a cautionary tale.  The billionaire Resnicks should heed it.

“Effect” (Sodastream).  My in-game tweet on #AdHuddle:  “SodaStream verdict: The pre-game controversy did way more for them than the in-game #Advertising.”  They could have made a much more clear connection to saving the environment, or even saving money, than this botched attempt at a side-by-side comparison.

“Party” (Pepsi Next).  At first glance this is classic Pepsi: a situation comedy where young people raise Cain and get away with it.  But wait, it’s not classic Pepsi, it’s a line extension, and they don’t get away with it.  The entire situation is contrived to fit around a product usage occasion where the dad recites the brief:  “This is real cola taste.”

What about you?

I’ve only chosen a few commercials here, so please put your own reviews in the comments section below.  Which commercials did you think were memorable, persuasive, well-executed and epic?

Advertising Jumps the Shark, Gets Back on Track

Does content deliver advertising or does advertising deliver content?

Joe Mandese at MediaPost has the answer for you, in a piece headlined “Advertising Jumps The Shark: Becomes Conduit For Content”.  

But first let’s get through that headline.

Jumping the Shark

Numerous readers pointed out in the comments section that the headline misused the term “jump the shark”.  Any student of pop culture knows the story:  On the 1970s sitcom Happy Days, Fonzie water skis over a shark, a moment now seen as the point where the show lost its original purpose – a fond look back at the 1950s – and got just plain silly.

Let’s first admit that the advertising industry has jumped the shark many more times than Fonzie, before or since.  We’ve jumped the shark via pointless line extensions, bad strategies, failed campaigns and poor planning.  Mea culpa.

Conduit for Content

In this case, the alleged shark jump is the launch of a new digital advertising platform that pulls existing Internet content into online ads.  It seems like a simple concept – link ads and content – but there’s a bit more involved.

The platform’s purveyor, Kontera, claims to be able to identify the most relevant content and serve it in web display, social and mobile ads.  That’s a bit more complicated than a shark jump – and more revolutionary.

3 Reasons Why it Matters

Mandese’s right, this is an important development the entire advertising industry should watch.

1.  It makes advertising useful, informative and/or entertaining.  These are the three things audiences seek in any medium.  For some reason we’ve been relearning that lesson the hard way in the digital advertising world.  In this case, Kontera claims to be supplying content that’s already popular, and hence should make ads more relevant.

 
2.     It adds sanity to online advertising.  Most web display advertising is the opposite of shooting fish in a barrel – more a minnow in the ocean.  You run ads that get clicked at infinitesimally low rates, paying only for those very small results.  Matching truly relevant content to truly relevant ads could significantly shift the equation of supply and demand.
 
3.     It challenges the distribution model.  Whether on TV, online or in-store, content normally is a means of distributing advertising.  That is, a :30-spot interrupts the program you were watching.  Kontera allows advertisers to buy ad space and use it to distribute all kinds of content.  Extrapolating that beyond web display ads, you can see how it would change journalism, entertainment and information in general.

Fond Look Back at the 1950s

If you read further down in the comments section of Mandese’s article, you’ll see an arcane conversation between him and me about whether it was also true in the 1950s that “advertising (was) a means for distributing content,” much like Kontera.  My point is that Radio and TV shows of the period, like soap operas and Texaco Star Theater, were also examples of brands delivering content.  (Mandese disagreed.)

It doesn’t really matter.  The only thing it proves is that for the past fifty years we’ve been force-feeding audiences our advertising when they wanted to see their content.  Up to now web display ads have followed that same model.

If, as an industry, we succeed in reversing that, and make advertising a means for distributing content, we won’t be jumping the shark.  We’ll be back on track.

When Plural is Really Anti-Social

Today's post is brought to you by the letter "S"

Just like 70 million other people, we watched the U.S. presidential debate this past Wednesday night.  I caught the first half hour on NPR while driving home, and joined Mrs. Ad Majorem watching the rest on ABC News.  Before leaving work I checked Twitter to see what hashtags would be in circulation, because of course I expected to participate in the national conversation. 

A #debate about #debates

My unscientific sample of tweeps, political consultants and other citizens led me to believe that #debate would be the default hashtag for most people.  Some put #Debate2012 or some variation.  Others with an agenda put hashtags supporting their candidate.  But #debate seemed like a good one.

Watching on TV, however, I noticed that ABC was encouraging the hashtag #debates – the plural.  Why not just #debate?  You’ve only got 140 characters, why use one of them on a vestigial “S”? 

Look at that S-car go!

It turns out that ABC News was following Twitter's lead.  According to a Twitter blog post, they declared #debates as the official hashtag.

It had never occurred to me to check and see what Twitter was pushing.  My normal procedure is to check and see what people are doing.  

It's not hard to imagine that Twitter has an internal team working on this series of debates:  producers, editors, journalists and social media experts.  They may be “the debates group” or they may just tell people, “We work on coverage of the debates.”  Sitting around the conference room table, it would be easy to agree on #debates as a hashtag.  

The Twitterverse looked at it differently, however.  No one watching at home was thinking about a series of debates.  This was the big night everyone in the U.S. had anticipated for weeks.  The social media commentary was about what happened that very night.

Put another way, I don't think anyone imagined #SaveBigBird.  

Maybe Twitter wanted something trackable.  I give them credit for not using #TwitterDebates -- you know, something “branded”.  Still, pushing an "official" hashtag reflects the mindset of an Old Media company used to broadcasting and big numbers.  Social Media works differently.  The relevant measure might be share of conversation, or the number of conversations in which they participated.

Watch and Learn

In the end this is a mental exercise.  Watch what is happening around you, and game it out.  Learn from what others do.  In this case the lesson is:  Not even Twitter can control its own conversation.  Try to swim with the tide, perhaps influence it, but don't imagine you can control or measure it according to some standard of Ye Olde Marketing.

"DON'T Follow Us on Twitter"

Old Media meets New Media

You see it everywhere.  Advertisers invite you to "Follow us on Twitter".  It’s all too easy to add this short message to traditional ad executions. 

So Why Not?

The problem is that Twitter in this way is treated as a mass medium just like the ads themselves.  They might as well say “Follow us on Twitter so we can send you more messages just like this one.”  Sadly, this is exactly how many marketers use Twitter.  You can just hear the conference room chatter:  We’ve got to surround the consumer at all brand contact points!  Or:  This is a lead generator!

You’ve read about companies who inadvertently start public relations disasters on Twitter, or practice poor customer service.  Those things happen.  I’m pointing out here that many companies never run that risk because they only tweet lawyer-approved ad copy 140 characters at a time.

Twitter and Traditional Ads CAN Mix

Maybe you or your clients are more enlightened and use Twitter properly, to engage with or listen to your customers.  In that case, maybe you can use ads to invite new followers more creatively, and in line with what they can expect.  Here are some examples.

“Tell @Moleskine what you’re writing”

“How hot is your @TacoBell #SaucePacket?”

“Suggest ideas to @SomePublicServant”

“What flavor should @Lays make?  #DoUsAFlavor”

“We update you on train delays @Metra on Twitter"

Don’t Close a Sale, Start a Relationship

The point is, you’ve got to give people a reason to follow or at least engage.  Just don’t expect someone to follow you just because they saw your ad.

What other ideas do you have for companies to engage with their customers on Twitter?  What really bad examples have you seen?  Put your responses in the comments section below.

Don Pegler's True Legacy

Don Pegler was known in advertising for drawing animated characters. He was known to everyone else in his life as a man of character.

Don, an advertising legend, died last Monday after a battle with cancer. During his career as an illustrator and art director at Foote, Cone & Belding he created the Raid Bugs for S.C. Johnson. I had the pleasure of working with him near the end of his career and in his so-called retirement.

His personal story is right out of the Greatest Generation. An Army veteran, he seemed to have lived the classic Post-war American story. Don and his wife, Bridie, raised seven children in an impossibly modest (read: small) house in Park Ridge, Illinois. The photos on display at his wake showed the progression of time measured in children, grandchildren, confirmations and weddings. And of course many of his illustrations were on display.

It sounds quaint, almost cliché, to say he was a family man, active in his community. Don’t let cynicism lead you astray, because he was both of those things. The last two times I saw him were at a Park Ridge City Council meeting and at his house when my children and I stopped in to check on him. We didn’t have to check on him, of course; while we there his daughter Laurie arrived to do just that. It was clear from their easy rapport that Don had been a tremendous husband and father.

As I talked to his family, friends and neighbors this week, the memories told a tale of a man who not only treated other people well, but gave people a good feeling about themselves. We could all emulate Don’s character because it was based on simple things. A kind word. A ready smile or a good joke. A willingness to step up and do something positive rather than just complain. There was also a charming irreverence about Don (and his work). Chicago art rep Tom Maloney summed up Don well in a tweet: "Decent, humble and fun." You took him seriously because he never took himself seriously. Don inspired good things in others.

At FCB, many of Don’s friends worked on the S.C. Johnson account, which officially left the agency one month ago today. To the people who worked on SCJ, Don meant something. He symbolized our achievements: Just as the Raid Bugs is the longest-running, most-global ad campaign in history, many other accomplishments helped SCJ grow into a multibillion dollar enterprise.

More than that, Don’s example should inspire us on a personal level. That’s really his true legacy. Not what he did, but who he was.

(Please click here to read a wonderful tribute to Don written by Karen I. Hirsch, a Chicago-based photographer and former FCB colleague. Karen gets the credit for the above image of Don and his bugs.)

TV Keeps Rising from the Dead

Today's business news brings the latest examples of why the death of TV is greatly exaggerated.

Apple, to no one's surprise, has been briefing media companies on the next evolution of its Internet-based TV services. Among the innovations: Wireless streaming of video content from TVs to mobile devices, and using devices like the iPhone as a remote control. Among the questions: Will Apple evolve its current set-top box, or actually manufacture what we now call TV sets? You can read the original reporting in today's Wall Street Journal.

Hulu, meanwhile, saw an audience increase of +23% in November vs. the same month last year. Adweek points out that the data, via comScore, comes on the heels of Hulu's fresh supply of content from The CW, Sony Pictures Television, and Univision. Greg Jarboe lists some other reasons in a good post today over on Search Engine Watch.

Social Television

In a post last week on the HBR Blog, one of David Armano's social media trends to watch in 2012 was Social Television. As predictions go, this one doesn't go very far out on a limb. We've already observed the intense cross-over between Social Media and TV in consumer media multitasking. Armano does point out new services such as Get Glue, which allows audiences to check in to TV shows much like Foursquare lets you check in to actual locations. (Or not.)

No More Zombies Wandering in the Vast Wasteland

Digital delivery of TV by the likes of Apple and Hulu makes TV Social -- and Social Television may make TV more of a connected experience. TV in its infancy was a family activity: one TV set per household meant everyone gathered for Ed Sullivan or Bonanza. Later, TV became more of an individual activity: multiple TV sets per household allowed each person to watch programs tailored to their own tastes. Could it be that Social Television brings back TV as a way to connect?

Not only does TV keep rising from the dead, it may wind up curing some zombies.

Previous posts on this subject:
The Changing Role of TV
TV is Dead – Long Live TV

The Role of Creative Production

Exploding Growth in Media Formats Puts More Demand on Creative Production

It’s a cruel quirk of advertising lingo when financial terms creep into normal business practices and hijack their identity.

One such example is “below the line.” In the days of Ye Olde Marketing most agency invoices were simple calculations of a 15% commission. An accountant, faced with expenses that had to be billed as one-time fees, drew a line on the invoices and listed the non-commissionable items below it. The commission structure hardly exists anymore, but the important work of Digital and Promotion gets stuck with a moniker that connotes second-class status.

Production: "Non-Working?"

In a similar way, Media and Production expenses are defined on some budget documents as “Working” and “Non-Working.” Production is said to be “Non-Working.” More than a few agency producers have complained about this term, especially in an era of tight budgets. Anything called “Non-Working” is just begging to be reduced.

At the very same time in history that Production budgets are squeezed, its role is more important than ever. As a colleague succinctly put it the other day: Exploding growth in media formats puts more demand on creative production.

Production costs were predictable in the past. Each discipline, be it Advertising, Promotion or Direct Marketing, knew what kind of programs they could expect to do. The biggest variable was a higher cost for a more elaborate TV commercial, in-store display or mailer.

Two Kinds of Complexity

In modern times you see two kinds of added complexity. One is that there are many new channels of communication, or as my colleague put it, “media formats.” As we’ve posted before, even “TV” isn’t that simple because it entails various online versions on top of the standard broadcast :30.

The second kind of complexity is that if we truly start a project with a channel-neutral or media-neutral approach, we won’t know ahead of time what mix of old and new formats we’ll be producing.

How to Cope with Exploding Growth in Media Formats

Here are a couple of suggestions on how to cope with this new dynamic.

Consistent Brand Voice. If your brand reinvents itself every year or every quarter, you not only risk confusing your consumer, you make creative production less efficient. Even the most routine IMC program these days has many moving parts across Advertising, Retail and Digital. A consistent approach will make it easier to produce things on the fly. To be clear, the goal is not cookie-cutter creative, it’s running a tight strategic ship.

Plan ahead. A digital agency creative director joked to me once that IMC stands for “I already Made the Commercial.” Too often, TV artificially drives the process. Instead, use to your advantage the long lead times demanded by retailers. A good client-agency partnership will plan one year ahead of time for best synchronization of efforts.

Media neutral production. Starting a project with a consistent brand voice and one year of lead time is useless if you then just assign production silo by silo. How can the various specialists help one another? At some point each one has to tend to her own work, but starting everyone from the same place makes it easier to synchronize.

Be a cost-control maniac. Yes, I know what you’re thinking: That’s why God created Procurement. As marketers, however, we have a responsibility to deliver great work at a reasonable budget. Challenge yourself and your colleagues to find new ways to save money. (At some point in the near future we’ll elaborate on this point.)

Any other experiences, suggestions or questions?

What is Klout Perks?

I feel so dirty.

A couple of weeks ago, Klout contacted me via Twitter, asking if I would accept a package from TNT promoting their new series, Franklin & Bash.

Sure, why not? It was a leather folio with a legal pad inside (pictured above), plus a DVD of the show. What was I going to do, blog about it?

Oh. Wait…

What is Klout Perks?

Klout is a social media analytics company that has popularized the Klout Score, a measure of overall online influence. They recently launched a new version which you can see here. My own Klout Score currently stands at 55, and I’m influential about retail, social media, advertising, and six other topics.

Klout Perks is a program where marketers can send swag to influential social media users, hoping they’ll tell the rest of their network about a product, service, or – in this case – TV show.

No, really, this blog post is about Klout Perks, not Franklin & Bash. Honest!

Do Klout Perks work?

It’s a little early to declare whether Klout Perks are an effective marketing tool because the program started a year ago, and just recently was featured on Klout's blog. One early result is that a lot of bloggers are writing about their experience. Will it take hold?

Here’s what Klout needs to do to ensure the success of Perks:

Think like a direct marketer. The first batch of clients is pretty diverse, including an automaker, a QSR, and of course Franklin & Bash. (Darn! There I go again.) Each client will have a different experience based on what they’re promoting and possibly the way they’re promoting it. The quality of the swag will matter in how much buzz they generate. Klout is a sophisticated analytics company, but some old-school direct mail techniques may help them diagnose what works and what doesn’t, such as comparing Offer A and Offer B, testing and tweaking their messages, etc.

Make it easy for influencers to influence. Blogger Mack Collier points out that his Klout Perks package contained no digital content to promote the TV show they sent him. All we got were souvenirs. He and I both had to take pictures of what we got in order to write our blog posts. Other than that, all I can do is direct you to the website for Franklin & Bash. (Grrr…)

Worry about acceptability as much as ethics. Klout provides an Influencer Code of Ethics and Disclosure. That’s helpful, but influencers are influential because they’re on solid social ground, not solid legal ground. Would I be embarrassed to shamelessly promote Franklin & Bash on TNT? Would you be embarrassed to receive a tweet from me about it?

I’ll be honest: I didn’t even watch the DVD they sent me, because Franklin & Bash doesn’t look like my kind of TV show. Nevertheless I appreciated the opportunity to participate in another attempt to mix marketing with word-of-mouth.





Hat tip: Thanks to Josh Brusin of Chicago Foodies for taking today's photo.

Hulu, dancing

Last week we met with some people from Hulu and in this post I’d like to share a couple of thoughts. Some of these musings continue the point that Digital didn’t kill TV, it propelled it.

Hulu’s competition is a Gigantic Venn Diagram

At first you might imagine that Hulu’s main competition is Netflix. Indeed, Hulu recently closed a deal with Miramax to compete more directly with VOD providers. But as their presentation continued, names came up like YouTube (duh) and Facebook (where you can watch The Dark Knight). Additionally Hulu competed on the turf of traditional TV during the recently concluded upfront negotiations.

This list of direct and adjacent competitors adds up to a Gigantic Venn Diagram, which makes sense because while the delivery methods differ, all provide video programming (and video advertising).

Screens everywhere

Hulu recognizes this proliferation of screens and the fact that it’s probably impossible to keep up with every single new screen or device. So their mission statement is screen-neutral and consumer focused. They’re not about online video but “helping people find, discover and consume media.”

Said another way, they’re in the entertainment business just as much as they’re in technology, distribution or programming.

Choose your ad

Hulu is testing a new option for video advertising, which is to give consumers the choice of which ad to see. If you’ve used Hulu, you know that commercials interrupt programming at certain intervals. If you see an automobile ad but you’re not in the market, you can click one of the other images and watch a different message from another advertiser.

Ostensibly this helps advertisers put messages with the most receptive consumers. I predict there will be another effect: Consumers choosing ads they want to see, purely for entertainment value.

Will Hulu survive?

None of the above guarantees Hulu’s future. Originally a joint venture among NBC Universal, News Corporation, Walt Disney and some venture capitalists, it may or may not be turning a profit. This past week Hulu received a takeover offer. Some speculated the whole thing was a ruse.

Whether Hulu dives, survives or thrives, it will be only one chapter in the continuing proliferation of TV programming – and yes, TV advertising.