Ad Fed | BirminghamSeptember 19, 2008

What’s the future of advertising?

Creative Commons Attribution & Non-Commercial License

Presented by Tim Brunelle

Thank you

Ad Fed: Mason Guttery, Rhonda Bower, Jeff Roe, Dale Brakhage

Birmingham Social Media Meetup: David Griner, Andre Natta, Angela Stewart, Stephen Curry

What’s the future of advertising?

What’s advertising?

“I define it as a conversation starter. Interruption doesn’t cut it anymore...you either get people talking...or nothing happens.”

—Marshall Ross, CCO, Cramer-Krasselt

“I still think it’s about finding a big idea. You just have more ways to (express) it now.”

—Woody Kay, Managing Partner,Chief Creative Officer, Arnold

“Seems like when it’s annoying it’s advertising, and when it’s not annoying it’s called something else.”

—Harvey Marco, CCO, JWT NY

What’s wrongwith advertising?

According to Adweek’s February 2008 coverage of a TNS Media Intelligence/Cymfony poll of more than 60 marketers in North America, France and the U.K.: “Agencies don’t get it.”

“You get the sense that agencies talk a good game,” said Jim Nail, chief marketing and strategy officer at TNS Media Intelligence/Cymfony. “But...(agencies’) day-to-day management skills are not meeting marketers’ expectations.”

“The quid pro quo between the marketer and the audience, for several centuries, has been free or subsidized media in exchange for inundation with ad messages. In the Brave New World, the value proposition will be similar but the barter items very different. A marketer needn’t pay for episodes of ‘24’; it need only provide value—whether in entertainment, information, discount or utility.”

—Bob Garfield, AdAge

Sapient’s September 2008 survey of more than 200 chief marketing officers (CMOs) and senior marketingprofessionals tells us:

“Ninety-two percent of respondents said it was ‘somewhat’ or ‘very’ important that agency employees use the technologies that they are recommending.”

Sapient’s September 2008 survey of more than 200 chief marketing officers (CMOs) and senior marketingprofessionals tells us:

“...agencies need to have a greater knowledge of the digital space in order to thrive. 45% of respondents have switched agencies (or plan to switch) for one with greater digital knowledge. 79% of respondents rated ‘interactive/digital’ functions as ‘important/very important.’”

Now what?

“The possibilities for this industry are limitless if we stop focusing on making ads—and bring big, bold, game-changing business ideas to our clients.”

—Jeff Graham, Account DirectorCrispin Porter + Bogusky

My approach: Start not one, but three new companies.

bannerpalooza.com gravyrevenue.com helloviking.com

And teach.

What’s advertising?

“Advertising going forward is about turning big ideas into personal experiences that change/reinforce both perceptions and behavior.”

—Jan Leth, Vice Chairman/Global Digital Creative Ogilvy & Mather

“An encounter (that includes messages, experiences, etc.) created by a brand in order to generate awareness or build preference.”

—Edward Boches, CCO, Mullen

“Nonlinear idea design, a.k.a. Controlled chaos.”—Peter Nicholson, CCO, Deutsch

“...It’s still about creating ideas that people respond to. But...brands have to work a lot harder. More than ever, brands have to offer something of value.”

—Albert Kelly, ECD, Fallon

+It’s all that +

1. Inter-action

Marketing then

Marketing now

Inter-action is...

An expectationReciprocityCourtesyConversationResponseMeasurementResearchUnderstandingDynamicInvolving(Above all) Human

Inter-action takes form as...

Sharing Crowd sourcingBloggingMicro bloggingCommentingEmbeddingLinkingTaggingRating(Above all) Participation

Advertising should strive for inter-action.

Facilitating inter-action involves the audience. It says, “your role/opinion is necessary.”

1. Inter-action2. Empowerment

Business Week (Mar 3, 2008)“Consumer Vigilantes”

“Callaway (left) put his Cingular complaint to music and posted it on YouTube. Comcast customer Salup (middle) has decided blogs are the best bet for getting action. Dee (right) started firing off e-mails to US Airways brass while waiting for hours on a runway.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CvVp7b5gzqU

(So many options empowering = so many opportunities to listen and understand)

1

2

(Never mind brand-sponsored opportunities to empower consumers)

“...the number of blog readers has jumped to 57 million American adults, or 39% of the online pop-ulation,” according to a July 2006 Pew Internet Study.

Technorati currently states it is tracking over 112.8 million blogs (April, 2007) and, “120,000 new blogs are created every day.”

“YouTube reports serving over 100 million videos per day,” according to TechCrunch, July 2006.

1. Inter-action2. Empowerment3. Customer Service

Listening = Customer Service = Marketing

Listening is a positive, useful reaction to Consumer Empowerment.

“Beyond being able to pay our bills and make our financial goals, we're not actually that focused on getting customers to shop and purchase from us whenever possible. Instead, we’re interested in forming lifelong, meaningful relationships with our customers, so the more engaged our customers are, the more likely that will happen.”

—Tony Hsieh, CEO, Zappos

(Tony practices what he preaches)

(Estimated to be 40% of all Zappos employees)

(Google “Dell Hell” to see why this is important)

(12,000+ updates says something’s worthwhile here)

(Try other venues to get a pulse on your client or industry)

(Ogilvy employed customer service to solve a client’s challenge)

Now it’s your turn.

How do you succeed in the future of advertising?

1. Participate*ListenAcknowledge/Measure/AnalyzeShare

*And by the way, this is everyone’s responsibility—from the CEO down to the Junior Account Executive in Training

(Tracking more than your name, right?)

(Try tracking ideas and cultural or industry terms)

(Listen actively, and broadly)

(Make life easier: Aggregate)

(Research ideas, memes, culture and locations)

(Understand and track the digital base)

(Sharing doesn’t just mean blogging. Commenting works, too)

1. Participate2.“Always in beta”

(A philosophic and practical approach)

“Always-in-Beta”

Less polishing. More releasing.Less asking permission. More begging forgiveness.Less big. More small.Less slow. More fast.Less agency. More audience.Less you. More them.

“The Web has shown us that there’s no minimum standard that must be achieved to capture the hearts and minds of the masses.”

—Jeff Roe

This idea...

Started here.

1. Participate2.“Always in beta”3. Diversify

3. Diversify*BudgetingStaffingProcessLeadership

*As in “expand, test, try, explore, alter, mutate or evolve.”

“Most agencies don’t know how to price (digital marketing and social media) because they don't really understand how much time is needed to execute the programs well.”

—Caryl Capeci, VP MarketingHearts On Fire Diamonds

(Succeed by teaching people how to measure their work)

(Succeed by funding experimentation: Prove your relevance)

(Fund experimentation: Prove expertise)

(Fund experimentation: Learn some things)

(Succeed by analyzing different kinds of competition)

(Listen to different points of view)

http://andrewchenblog.com/

(Appreciate alternate paths to success)

(Succeed by hiring multi-dimensional talent)

Creative Director?Copywriter?Blogger?Podcaster?Tradigitalist?All of the above?

http://alanwolk.com/

(Succeed by enabling and encouraging collaborative innovation)

“Discovery more often waits upon those who conceive of achievement as part of a communal effort... The best kept secret about real achievement is that it is synonymous with contribution.”

(Succeed by embracing fearlessness)

“Defensive, paranoidcompanies can’t think ahead, they can only think behind. They don’t lead, they follow.”

http://gettingreal.37signals.com/

(Succeed by inspiring the belief that your agency can)

“The difference betweenpeople who crackle withideas and those who don’t has little to do with some innate ability to come upwith ideas. It has to do withthe belief that they cancome up with ideas.”

What’s the future of advertising?

It’s up to all of us.

Thanks.

timbrunelle.com

Creative Commons Attribution & Non-Commercial License

Appendix

What’s advertising?(Original quotes)

*Note: All quotes belong to their sources. Please use attribution in re-publishing. Thank you.

“I define it as a conversation starter. Interruption doesn’t cut it anymore. In the opt-in world, you either get people talking, to each other or to themselves, or nothing happens.”

—Marshall Ross, CCO, Cramer-Krasselt

“The definition of advertising has not changed. It still comes down to telling a story about a brand, it’s still about creating ideas that people respond to. But the consumer has changed. They have the power to avoid marketing, and they know it. Brands have to work a lot harder. More than ever, brands have to offer something of value – something truly entertaining, or surprising, thought-provoking or useful. They have to be more generous.”

—Albert Kelly, ECD, Fallon

“Advertising going forward is about turning big ideas into personal experiences that change/reinforce both perceptions and behavior.”

—Jan Leth, Vice Chairman/Global Digital Creative, Ogilvy & Mather

“First there was a shift away from advertising towards talking about ‘content’ – brand content so good people want to engage with, make their own, share with others, maybe even pay for. And at the time, that felt like a new, fresh definition for what we do – but it’s still fundamentally about making stuff. It’s describing the same old production mentality in a new way, and expanding the palette a bit.

Now I prefer to define advertising more simply—just as ‘ideas.’ The currency of our business is, and always has been, great ideas. The strength of our thinking. But now the definition of those ideas is so much broader – and holds more opportunity for agencies than ever before. ‘Ideas’ goes beyond making creative deliverables A, B, C & D to being go-to business counsel to clients at the highest levels.  Getting knee-deep in every facet of their business. Bringing ideas for new products and services, opening new selling channels, industrial design and packaging; agencies creating their own products/brands, or taking a financial stake in others.  

The possibilities for this industry are limitless if we stop focusing on making ads – and get ninja-like at bringing big, bold, game-changing business ideas to our clients at such a relentless pace, they might just cry uncle.”

—Jeff Graham, Account Director, Crispin Porter + Bogusky

“Make the truth appealing. You just have more ways to do it now. I still think it’s about finding a big idea based on a fundamental truth about a brand that’s meaningful to the target audience, and expressing it appropriately across multiple platforms.”

—Woody Kay, Managing Partner,Chief Creative Officer, Arnold

“An encounter (that includes messages, experiences, etc.) created by a brand in order to generate awareness or build preference.”™

That’s the fundamental purpose. May include experiences, a means of stimulating dialog and social media, an invitation to create user generated content. May appear on TV, the web, mobile or embedded in a blood transfusion (coming soon).  But the initiation still is created or stimulated or inspired by the brand advertiser and exists to generate awareness and preference. The purpose and objective have not changed. Just the technology, channels of distribution, options for content and the role of the consumer.”

—Edward Boches, CCO, Mullen

“Nonlinear idea design, a.k.a. Controlled chaos.”—Peter Nicholson, CCO, Deutsch

“You can call it content, long-form, non-traditional, marketing...whatever. No matter how we spin it, most people see through it and call it advertising. We’re reaching out to say we’ve got something to show you, sell you, tell you about, or make you think about. Less sell more tell. Less screaming to the masses and more intimate one on ones. This is good. What’s not so good is that there’s simply too much of it. It’s in the sky, in the urinals, in-between your news clips and inducing a seizure on your favorite blogs. Seems like when it’s annoying it’s advertising, and when it’s not annoying it’s called something else. To me it is what it is and we have a social responsibility to not make it annoying.”

—Harvey Marco, CCO, JWT NY

“I think strictly speaking, the true dictionary definition of advertising is anything that calls public attention to a product or service. This can be directed towards new customers, lapsed customers, or customers with whom you would like to see more often.

While there are now many more forms that advertising can take, the area that has truly exploded is what was once called ‘loyalty marketing.’ Under this banner I think you can put a lot of cutting edge new wave thinking: Zeus Jones’ “Marketing as A Service™,” social media, blogger outreach, etc.

One calls attention. The other retains attention.

Another way to think of it might be in a related field for agencies. We’ve always known that the best source of ‘new’ business is existing business.”

—Dion Hughes, Founder, Creative DirectorPersuasion Arts & Sciences

“I think advertising can now be defined as any way that a brand touches a consumer—everything from the design of the napkins in a chain restaurant to the store layout in the mall to the design of the price tags and receipts to websites and TV commercials and print ads.”

—Alan Wolk

“Advertising really should be termed ‘brand expression.’ Not because it’s no longer advertising but because we have a very narrow definition of the term ‘advertising.’ Be it conventional advertising, or branded entertainment, or citizen marketing, or the consumer’s brand experience, advertising today is any purposeful communication between a brand and its market.”

—Bart Cleveland, CCOMcKee Wallwork Cleveland

“Advertising has not changed since the dawn of time, only the media. I’m sure someone must have written ‘Buy this fine reed basket.’ on a clay tablet.”

—Mark Johnson, Chief Innovation OfficerPersuasion Arts & Sciences

“Story telling is king.

Problem is we sit around like a bunch of dorks talking about which theatre this story is playing in. How many seats. How big the screen is. Whether someone will copy the links and send it to their friends.  

The Internet is a venue. Not a fucking message.

If you can’t express yourself, all you’ve got is a failure of imagination.”

—Bill Heater