Insights and Opinions

With great challenge or struggle always comes opportunity.

Writing for Marketing Profs, Paul Dunay discourages marketers from interrupting what interests people, and suggests that campaigns become the content that interests them. Says Dunay, “that’s really the goal of new media – create the nexus for your brand and the media it takes to make that brand experiential.”

The very nature of the mobile phone makes it a powerful advertising medium. It is always there and always on. This means that mobile is also a brilliant way of engaging customers from other offline channels: billboards, press and direct mail, for example.

Writing for ClickZ, consumer-generated media expert Pete Capshaw took a stab at forecasting the top Web 2.0 buzzwords for next year. This is funny stuff, all the more so because he makes valid points. He nominates, for instance, "Search moptimization" -- the art of cleaning up negative organic search results generated by cranky consumers' reviews, blog posts, and videos. Or how about "Shamsparency," the state of ease in uncovering phony social networking on behalf of your brand -- and the inevitable backlash. Well worth the look!

An excellent TechCrunch piece by Erick Schonfeld explores the latest Google rumor. Now that it has started the ball rolling on its mobile software platform Android, the underground buzz is that Google may look to duplicate this strategy with TV set-top boxes. Schonfeld reminds us that our favorite TV interface is basically an underused computer with the same capabilities to do what the internet does. Assuming, of course, that somebody programs the boxes to do it. In-video AdWords, remote-over hotspots, and click-to-buy applications are all bound to happen. Who better than Google to help it along?

In December 2006, Perspectiv CEO Jere Doyle ditched the Interactive Advertising Bureau's Lead Generation Committee and joined the lesser-known Online Lead Generation Association, which plans to vote this week on new board member nominees, including Doyle. He was fed up with the IAB's "lack of movement" on developing standards for the growing industry sector. Considering the continued advertiser interest in lead generation, and an ongoing Federal Trade Commission investigation into lead gen firms, the sector could use a little unity.

My problem with behavioral targeting is that it seems to sidestep one of the most important viewer behaviors. To see if you agree or not, I’ll need you to answer a simple question. When you skip commercials at home, are you actually skipping commercials, or, are you skipping the interruption to the program you are watching?

Just about every platform on which it is possible to present video content is currently hosting different levels of experimental activity aimed at either establishing best practice for the first time (streaming ad-supported video, cell phones and mobile devices, many place-based media, games etc.), or reengineering formats and ad pods to deal with threats to existing practices of changing behaviors and new technologies (TV looking to deal with DVRs, the opportunities of addressable advertising and others afforded by digital TV and, of course, the old bugbear of ad avoidance).

Some media veterans worry that expectations for online advertising may be getting out-sized. Increasingly, they say, too much media depends on advertising as the only source of revenue. With new players from software makers to cable operators also trying to cash in, the dollars simply may not stretch far enough.

Nigel Hollis presents an interesting argument: "Doesn't it seem odd that a marketing world that is apparently shifting from 'show and tell' communication offline to 'engage and interact' communication online should focus so much attention on video? After all, most online video content still offers a passive viewing experience that fails to capitalize on the interactive nature of the Web. I believe it is exactly this more passive experience that makes video an effective brand-builder online, now and for years to come."