Or: How Google changed the face of modern advertising

There was a “dirty little secret” in internet advertising for years. That secret was, every effective advertising campaign was modeled after an effective ad campaign for pornography.

And then came Google.

Google served up relevant advertising based on your current search, search history, or content in pages you sought. It was ground breaking. They used actual data to give you an ad you may be interested in rather than assuming because a user was on a computer they wanted to see raunchy pictures.

And it worked.

It worked so well that Google is capable of doing pretty much anything in the way of research and development with unlimited funding for their pet projects. All of which have been cleverly manipulated to be cool, user friendly, desirable, and deliver relevant advertising content.

Such as:

• 

  Google's Android - outperforms Windows Mobile and provides relevant advertising based on location - genius.

  Android Phones - I link directly to Droid X as it is what I use and is clearly superior.

• Maps
• E-mail
• Television
• Astronomy
• Robot cars
• Financial Prediction
• Alternative Energy

So here is the new development in advertising that may help to save the music industry. They are placing relevant products in content (songs and videos) for cash. If nothing else it will be an opportunity for recording executives to work for their living rather than profiting on artists dreams and hard work.

In this article we see that a dating website has a paid placement in a Lady Gaga video. And that company saw a 20% traffic spike as a result.

Paid placement in a premium position: Google may not have done it first. Companies have paid to have their products featured in movies and television shows for years. However, Google was the first to intuitively and dynamically show advertising relevant to the audience based on more than just their age demographics.

O.K. So product placement in movies and television has been going on for quite sometime (and ruined the Matrix Trilogy) but as the article concludes the added income of product placement will help to increase production budgets.

Product placement has become a staple in television as more people use a DVR to skip through advertising on their favorite weekly sitcom or “reality” show.

Luckily for me, I’ve never been much for commercial music, and my television viewing is a little more PBS in an MTV world, however it will be interesting to see how much more targeted product placement will infiltrate our entertainment in the future.

Original Article

I wrote a couple weeks back about the introduction of DVR to my house and the fascination of just obliterating advertising from my network programming as long as I don’t have anyone ruin the outcome of whatever I taped (DVR’ed) off NatGeo…

Advertisers are getting hip to the DVR phenomenon and are making some strides to get their message in front of viewers even if they have the ubiquitous FF button at the ready.

One technique I noticed is the “Teaser” piece of a broadcast show. This is usually around the 45 minute mark of a program that comes out of commercial and has a 30 – 45 second piece of programming that has little to do with the storyline or character development, an aside if  you will. During this little piece you get disrupted from the FF and while backing up usually catch the tail end of the previous ad, and the beginning of the next.. additional commercial breaks will continue to add to the advertising mizx… I’m certain that ads leading out of the show and coming back into the show will be come prime real estate like cover positions in print ads.

However, the one I found seriously intriguing happened this weekend.

Let me first set the stage with, I was walking through the room where my girlfriend was watching TV. I was not, I repeat not watching the Rachael Zoe Project. Anyway as they were throwing to commercial, there was a short piece between Rachael and I assume her husband… In this piece they were arguing about going someplace, and he was trying to get all the information and tickets while using Microsoft’s Bing search engine… Well that certainly caught my eye… Why would they be using Bing?

Anyway I figured out, about the same time Kara did, that this was actually a commercial featuring the characters in the show.. well how cute is that? I would have fallen for the same thing had it been something I was watching… So I’m waiting for Michael Weston to begin pitching yogurt on Thursday nights during Burn Notice.

How Much is Too Much?

So I’ve dealt with a number of different web hosts in my day. Service is mediocre and you’re usually left on your own to figure out how to manage anything on their servers. However, I’ve recently been working with a  client who already had a hosting plan with GoDaddy.com.

GoDaddy, Smart marketing or nickel and Dime Whores?

Of course we’ve all seen the big titted spokes models yammering on about their “service” in superbowl ads, and what not. I never had a need to interface with their hosting services.

First off let me say that it is an absolute pleasure to speak with a tech support person who’s accent can be described as “midwestern” rather than “English is a third language” And they’ve been very helpful and patient with my impatient pleas for help.

Here’s the rub: I would like to just log into a control panel, find what I want and manipulate DNS, Name Forwarding, FTP logins, and hosting accounts, simply and cleanly. I do it with my host all the time. However I end up speaking with the GoDaddy techs a lot more than is necessary because I can’t find my way around the interface because it is littered with “Buy this,” “upgrade your hosting,” “purchase this add on,” & “For an additional fee…”

Now I understand cross selling, and I appreciate GoDaddy hiring domestic tech support people to listen to my issues, but it would be a lot easier for everyone involved if they weren’t trying to nickel and dime every web interaction. Personally, I am getting to the point of offended by the in your face, “upgrade to this after we got ya at $4.99 for a domain” BS. And it’s not even my money GoDaddy is trying to sucker out of me.

Just give me a clear explanation of how to connect via ftp already! I’d be more likely to recommend your service to my customers.

Digital Video Recorder

Not really, but the advent and proliferation of the DVR has made advertising messages challenged to get to viewers.

While the advent of the DVR is not new, mine is. And I must say that being able to watch a 60 minute show in 45 minutes is a time saver, the ability to skip past annoying commercials is spectacular.. there are other commercials and ad spots that are obviously hampered.

However, there has been progress in getting messages through the high speed forwarding of the DVR.

In a traditional advertising pause, you have 3 – 5, 30 – 60 second advertisements. The first ad in that block needs to get their name up as the opening of the ad. It may take 1 – 2 seconds for the viewer to get around to pushing the forward button and that provides and opportunity for the advertiser to get the name recognition in there.

On my ATT DVR when I tell it to go back to normal play it jumps backward some amount of time (haven’t figured the exact time yet and it appears to be dependent on the speed t which I was fast forwarding… ) and there is an opportunity for the DVR to catch the last half of the ad block if not the final ad of the block… These should become prime advertising spots as they are more likely to be seen in the DVR world… So far I’ve seen the majority of the final ads in a block being the promos for other shows on the network, however, these will become prime real estate like the inside front cover of magazines (remember magazines?)

There are some other innovative things I have seen in advertising as I speed through it on the DVR.. In Fast forward you catch a couple frames of every ad. If an advertiser keeps a consistent message such as their logo in one space throughout the ad their brand will have recognition.

A better example is an ad about car safety that features a car rolling over toward the camera in slow motion. In high speed it appears that the car is rolling right at me in regular speed. Unfortunately I cannot remember what brand that car was… (EDIT: Update it’s a Mercedes commercial, but cannot be found on the Mercedes website or youtube.com) I guess they should implement the branding solution previously mentioned.

While the DVR does not spell the end of broadcast advertising, it has created a challenge to advertisers and their creative agencies to develop innovative ways to brand their products and services in this new digital age.

Here in Detroit we have an annual event called the Woodward Dream Cruise (August 21 2010 this year) . The event started as a spontaneous cruise event over 10 years ago where classic car enthusiasts got together one weekend to show their passion for American muscle cars on Woodward Avenue, the first paved road in the United States.

Over the years this event has grown to be a nearly week long gathering of over 1 million cars and even more people to enjoy the show. While it is still a non profit event typically considered an impromptu gathering of car enthusiasts, many businesses have found this concentration of car enthusiasts is a great opportunity to advertise and build brand awareness. Most importantly our friends at Chevrolet who indirectly (along with Ford and Chrysler) have made the event possible put up billboards on Woodward Avenue. Below are some of those.

Here’s to American cars and the development of the middle class here in America. We here at Detroit Marketing Services would love to see that middle class continue.

It’s been a long season… It’s a story to be remembered, and congratulations to the New Orleans Saints!

As usual, the hype with the Super Bowl Ads reached a fevered pitch as advertising costs reached nearly the cost of two years ago. After the economic fallout, last years ads were reduced in price and many advertisers decided to skip the exorbitant cost of advertising during the Super Bowl.

Of course the Super Bowl is also the world championship of advertising, requiring many agencies to bring their “A” game for the ads are nearly as talked about as the game.

While there were many ads worth talking about the most timely and clearly the standout would be Oprah, Jay Leno and Dave Letterman sitting on a couch together doing a bit for the Letterman Show. Considering the animosity between the three the question I have is; which cost more, the advertising time, or paying the three of them to sit on a couch together.

With the economy struggling and the obvious cut in advertising dollars coming along with that, we have seen an interesting trend. The return of classic ads in, at least, the Detroit Market.

While it’s great to see the Dietrich Furs and Discount Tire brings back the memories. The Detroit Zoo revived the classic “animals” commercial in a campaign to create a new one as well.

We can only Hope that Faygo revives their classic ad, or they were to re-open Boblo Island so we could see those ads on TV again.

As more and more small businesses and brands are gobbled up by the larger competition it’s heartening to see a local favorite resurected.

The familiar logo

Here in Detroit we have a number of local products with a strong allegiance… Better Made Potato Chips, Grobbels Corned Beef, Faygo Soda, among other. We have brands that have suffered the assimilation into the larger companies such as Vernor’s Ginger Ale and Stroh’s Beer.

Recently, a couple decided to resurrect Velvet Peanut butter, a favorite for detroiters (and the nation) until the late 70′s. The original recipe has been revived and the familiar packaging has returned to local supermarkets! Velvet Peanut Butter is back, completely Michigan made!

Detroit Marketing Services salutes the return of Velvet Peanut Butter and Michigan made products. We also went and picked up a couple jars, and yes it’s still a great as ever!

News article about Velvet from WXYZ.com