January 15, 2007
No Blank Left Unfilled by Ads
Space abhors a vacuum and evidently marketers have similar sentiments about blank spaces without some sort of commercial message.
Today, brand marketers are looking to find a way to break through the clutter of thousands of ad messages that deluge consumers daily. The result is ads are everywhere including cell phones, the insides of elevators, on the drop-down dining trays in airplanes, on eggs, digital billboard signs, video screens in taxi cabs, etc.
According to Yankelovich, a person living in a U.S. city today sees more than two and a half times the number of ad messages a day than someone living in the same place 30 years earlier.
Marketers know that consumers would like some relief from the constant barrage but that isn’t likely to change anything.
"We never know where the consumer is going to be at any point in time, so we have to find a way to be everywhere," Linda Kaplan Thaler, chief executive at the Kaplan Thaler Group, told The New York Times. "Ubiquity is the new exclusivity."
Marketers are starting to get some pushback from communities. In Houston, Barbara Thomason, president of the Houston Northwest Chamber of Commerce, expressed concerns over billboards being converted to digital screens that are capable of having messages changed frequently. "They’re making our community look like Las Vegas," she said. "The word ‘trashy’ has been used."
Some marketers contend the problem isn’t about the number of messages but the quality. If an ad is entertaining, they say, then consumers welcome them.
"No one wants to annoy the consumer," said Bill Bean, director of trade insight at Miller Brewing Company. "However, there are many annoying ads that sell products, and it’s very difficult to tell what annoys one consumer and what pleases another."
Discussion Questions: Are consumers more or less receptive to advertising messages today than in the past? Which of the many ad vehicles do you think holds the greatest promise for marketers to actually break through the clutter?
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Someone wise once said, “Advertising is to consumers what pesticide is to bugs…the more you spray, the more immune to it they become…”
Consumers are deluged with advertising to the point where the vast majority of it doesn’t resonate. Low-cost channels have made advertisers lazy (and as someone above pointed out) sloppy. You can cover every available space with a brand name and/or logo, but if they pass from memory quickly, or are ignored all together, what use are they? Before long we will see targeting and relevance become the coin of the realm in this new age of advertising.
What is interesting is that all of these new mediums have little (if any) means by which to measure their impact. They are new, untested and hold the promise of great things. Over time, however, the novelty will wear off and advertisers will cluster around those channels that are targeted and measurable.
I’m surprised at the statistic showing the average consumer exposed to more than twice as many marketing messages than 30 years ago. I would have assumed the number is much higher, based on the sheer number of cable TV channels, the proliferation of 15-second (and shorter) TV spots and the massive amount of ad messages on the Internet. These ad vehicles (and other “new media” we’ve discussed recently on RetailWire) would more than offset declines in traditional print media like newspapers and magazines.
In the future, as technologies like TiVo continue to spread, the most effective advertising will be the message targeted very precisely to a receptive user. (Not just the “targeting” that matches advertising to the audience on a cable TV show, for example.) Amazon uses advanced software to put appropriate recommendations in front of its members based on past history, and other marketers would be smart to follow suit.
If the ad messages you see on your cell phone, laptop, iPod or other “new media” device are tailored to your own interest, the marketer is going to find a receptive audience. Otherwise, the trend toward “advertising everywhere” (such as the example in the article of using tray tables on an airplane!) is more likely to get tuned out.
I like the ClearChannel “Less is More” idea. Putting ads on plane tray tables and eggs and the like may be a one-hit wonder (the first time you see them, you look), but do they motivate you to check out the brand or avoid it? I think more is more, in all cases, is the easy way out. The brands that step back, pause and reflect before making their next media buys and promotional plans, will more likely come up with more creative efforts that are relevant and feel non-intrusive. Remember, today’s consumer is a LOT more savvy about advertising than she was 30 years ago — so she can pick and choose and decide on a brand using a very wide array of criteria. One of those criteria might be — does this brand seem desperate for new customers? Or, can I please just have some white space on my flight (“white space” brought to you by Brand Y)….
If we mark time from post the “electronic media novelty era” (i.e. the time when radio/TV ads were interesting based purely on their novelty value), I don’t think consumers are any more or less receptive to relevant messages than we ever were. The problem characterized as “clutter” is the relative ease with which advertisers can now assault us with IRrelevant messaging.
Low cost delivery technologies have made advertisers sloppy and lazy. It is cheaper and easier to buy thousands of “impressions” especially online, than it is to do the targeting work that enables delivery to a more select — and interested — audience. Even though the best marketers still invest in targeted campaigns because of their effectiveness, most media planners live and die on efficiency measures.
This trend won’t change in general, but consumers will increasingly blunt the flow of irrelevant messaging themselves as technology moves beyond simply allowing advertisers to deliver messages and enables consumers to determine how, when and from whom they choose to receive messages. The golden age of permission marketing is not that far away (we pray) and that will force marketers to concentrate on delivering relevant messages to interested targets as never before.
Here’s to the day when “mobile marketers” will no longer wake me at 3am with text message alerts announcing their unique offer for selling my timeshare — which I don’t even own.
My bet, and it is more by default than anything else, would be digital signs because of their subliminal value. Seeing them often enough might imprint a message on the viewer’s brain. There are too many ads that may be memorable for their entertainment or irritation value that still leave those who see them without a clear recollection of what was being advertised. There are also far too many instances of products not delivering. On the rare occasions when I have tried something because of an ad, I have inevitably been disappointed when it fails to do what was promised. Then again, the human population continues to grow as does the circulation of tabloid newspapers and magazines so perhaps the old adage about a sucker being born every minute holds true. The big question is whether there are enough of them to justify the vast amounts of money spent on advertising.
A few days ago I read about airport security areas selling ad space – maybe putting decals on the rubber bins, or posters on the walls, just as we see everywhere else in an airport.
My first thought was it would be just one more area of our lives junked up with a cacophony of irrelevant messages.
But those areas are pretty drab.
So, what if one advertiser were to take the entire space and really design it well as an environment both visually and maybe even functionally, to genuinely improve travelers’ experience of the whole security process? I don’t think I mean walls of video screens – I’d go for more of an art-exhibit/guided-tour feel, to calm people down rather than rev them up.
You’d create a total-immersion experience for the brand in a way that generates some goodwill just by relieving some stress and boredom. And if the underlying brand messages happened to be properly targeted and therefore relevant to the audience . . .?
Icing on the cake.
50 years ago, people were almost fascinated by commercials and advertising – definitely NOT SO now. Consumers have become experts at tuning out. Clutter is at an all-time high and has created an annoying advertising wasteland.
Point of sale media can be an answer but I fail to see how this or any “new media vehicle” including mobile marketing, will catch the consumers attention. Some say 80% of advertising is squandered away, well I believe it’s worst than that.
Targeted advertising through creative marketing will be essentially the only way to positively attract the attention of the public. A strategy of engagement that involves a marketing presence WHEN THE CONSUMER WANTS IT, be it cause marketing where you are supporting the same institution or charity that the consumer is concerned with or the same instance in motor sports where they have enviable brand loyalty factors (both these medias have great fan loyalty).
Some combination that disrupts the norm such as a branded race car and/or in-store POP rooting out a real reason why they should pay attention, will in the end be the beginning of the future in marketing.
I once wrote somewhere that advertisers would tattoo their messages on the inside of people’s eyelids given the chance. Airline tray tables and ads pushed to cell phones come eerily close to that. Like my colleagues above, I believe the marketplace for this kind of ad activity is under-measured and therefore underestimated. Shopper media alone account for more than $1.5 billion in annual spending. Other mobile, outdoor and transit hub programs layer on hundreds of millions more.
Is all this activity healthy or even tasteful? Strong arguments could be made to the contrary. But advertisers understand all too well that they cannot count on influencing consumers solely with conventional media. This is the elephant in the room for agencies and networks: the old CPM model is badly broken and under threat due to changing media habits and alternative media channels that seek out consumers where they live, work, play and shop.
Low-value impressions are a dime a thousand. The real deal is in learning to assign ROI value to interactions, not impressions.
I think advertisers are missing the point. The question to ask is “why are current advertising techniques ineffective?” I believe the answer lies in the gradual shift in advertising from informative to manipulative. Long ago, one of the only ways the consumer had to become informed about new product choices was advertising. The dynamic was built around consumers learning from ads, and trusting retailers to carry the right assortment for them. Those two things no longer take place. Today’s consumers know that ads are intended to manipulate, not inform. How many times does the consumer ask “what was that ad for…?” having watched because of the sex appeal or the production values, but cynically resistant to the subliminal messages.
Consumers use TiVo and ad-blockers for one reason: they find no value in the ads.
Memo to advertisers: in the information age, it is extraordinarily easy for consumers to educate themselves. Businesses are proliferating offering price comparatives, feature comparatives, and unbiased ratings. One of the most relevant internet trends are consumer ratings and reviews. We trust each other, rather than traditional sources of information. What’s the answer? Re-establish your relevance as a source of empowerment to the consumer. I know this is heresy, but selling the wrong thing to the wrong person is counterproductive. Really! Forget the comparative lifestyle approach, forget the “sex sells.” Empower the consumer by effectively communicating product benefits and consumer needs. If your product has no benefits, then shame on you. The consumer of the future will vote you off the island soon anyway…you’ve fooled too many for too long. This generation of consumers doesn’t need your sizzle.
True, there are many more ads, but most are making fewer impressions than before. The beauty of today’s landscape is that there is a greater ability to advertise effectively and economically to niche markets, and the results of these campaigns can often be measured accurately.
Focused, precision advertising to meet specific, known needs of an individual consumer are much more likely to be noticed and responded to than typical “mass marketing” messages, no matter what the communication vehicle. This is where the truly successful advertisers will live going forward.
Two areas with the fastest growth, it seems to me, are in-store media and mobile messaging. The latter still has enough novelty to be effective, and while the former seems to be maturing faster, the quality of the displays and the ads has been rising fast enough to keep folks interested.
At some point a few years down the road, I imagine consumers will begin to tune out in-store media, at which point someone will figure out a way to make it 3D or interactive or whatever, or come up with a whole new medium. Or, of course, there could be an actual consumer revolt against too much advertising, but I doubt that.
Advertising media have life cycles, just like products. New media tend to have peak productivity because of their novelty. As a medium ages and shows its productivity, clutter increases, reducing productivity. 1950’s network TV shows often had individual sponsors, who prevented competing products from advertising on the same show. Nowadays, a single 30 minute show can broadcast 5 competing car ads, 3 competing deodorants, 3 different cellular networks, 3 travel web sites, and 4 different investment firms. Some commercial property owners may dislike restrictive zoning, but in many localities, the zoning prevents excessive construction, which could lead to a decline in rents. ClearChannel’s decision to cut back radio ads improved the quality of their stations. But many ad media look like NASCAR vehicles, with messages and logos pasted all over.
50 years ago, people were almost fascinated by commercials and advertising–definitely NOT SO now. Consumers have become experts at tuning out. Clutter is at an all-time high and has created an annoying advertising wasteland.
I’m not so sure I agree with this statement. We would all like to think we can “tune out” unwanted messages, but think about the relaxing effect the background music in the dentist’s office has, or the lively beat in the night club has, even if you aren’t actively trying to listen to it. It gets into your head whether you want it to or not. As much as we are now able to use on line advertising, (a simple point and click can delete an unwanted ad), mass mailings (throw away that junk mail), we are still captivated by our televisions. Granted, we can step away during commercial breaks for a bathroom run, to raid the fridge, or take out the trash, but the background voice telling us about this weekend’s special sales event, closeout sale, or new arrivals will still be playing whether we want to hear it or not. With hundreds of TV channels captivating audiences wanting to view anything imaginable 24/7, what better place to advertise?
Regarding the idea of 3-D ads for in-store media, Doug Robinson wrote to say that his company is already doing this. “…No need to wait for 3D Ads. It actually does capture an audience in the store, so much so that we had to reposition the displays to reduce the traffic bottlenecks.” The link to their site is http://www.promodriver.com. According to a press release on their site, they have very recently signed a deal to deploy their kiosks in 12 Giant Food Market stores in the Binghamton, NY area. The items advertised on the kiosks apparently appear to “jump out” of the screen about 10 inches towards the shopper, although it is an illusion. Wow.
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Someone wise once said, “Advertising is to consumers what pesticide is to bugs…the more you spray, the more immune to it they become…”
Consumers are deluged with advertising to the point where the vast majority of it doesn’t resonate. Low-cost channels have made advertisers lazy (and as someone above pointed out) sloppy. You can cover every available space with a brand name and/or logo, but if they pass from memory quickly, or are ignored all together, what use are they? Before long we will see targeting and relevance become the coin of the realm in this new age of advertising.
What is interesting is that all of these new mediums have little (if any) means by which to measure their impact. They are new, untested and hold the promise of great things. Over time, however, the novelty will wear off and advertisers will cluster around those channels that are targeted and measurable.
I’m surprised at the statistic showing the average consumer exposed to more than twice as many marketing messages than 30 years ago. I would have assumed the number is much higher, based on the sheer number of cable TV channels, the proliferation of 15-second (and shorter) TV spots and the massive amount of ad messages on the Internet. These ad vehicles (and other “new media” we’ve discussed recently on RetailWire) would more than offset declines in traditional print media like newspapers and magazines.
In the future, as technologies like TiVo continue to spread, the most effective advertising will be the message targeted very precisely to a receptive user. (Not just the “targeting” that matches advertising to the audience on a cable TV show, for example.) Amazon uses advanced software to put appropriate recommendations in front of its members based on past history, and other marketers would be smart to follow suit.
If the ad messages you see on your cell phone, laptop, iPod or other “new media” device are tailored to your own interest, the marketer is going to find a receptive audience. Otherwise, the trend toward “advertising everywhere” (such as the example in the article of using tray tables on an airplane!) is more likely to get tuned out.
I like the ClearChannel “Less is More” idea. Putting ads on plane tray tables and eggs and the like may be a one-hit wonder (the first time you see them, you look), but do they motivate you to check out the brand or avoid it? I think more is more, in all cases, is the easy way out. The brands that step back, pause and reflect before making their next media buys and promotional plans, will more likely come up with more creative efforts that are relevant and feel non-intrusive. Remember, today’s consumer is a LOT more savvy about advertising than she was 30 years ago — so she can pick and choose and decide on a brand using a very wide array of criteria. One of those criteria might be — does this brand seem desperate for new customers? Or, can I please just have some white space on my flight (“white space” brought to you by Brand Y)….
If we mark time from post the “electronic media novelty era” (i.e. the time when radio/TV ads were interesting based purely on their novelty value), I don’t think consumers are any more or less receptive to relevant messages than we ever were. The problem characterized as “clutter” is the relative ease with which advertisers can now assault us with IRrelevant messaging.
Low cost delivery technologies have made advertisers sloppy and lazy. It is cheaper and easier to buy thousands of “impressions” especially online, than it is to do the targeting work that enables delivery to a more select — and interested — audience. Even though the best marketers still invest in targeted campaigns because of their effectiveness, most media planners live and die on efficiency measures.
This trend won’t change in general, but consumers will increasingly blunt the flow of irrelevant messaging themselves as technology moves beyond simply allowing advertisers to deliver messages and enables consumers to determine how, when and from whom they choose to receive messages. The golden age of permission marketing is not that far away (we pray) and that will force marketers to concentrate on delivering relevant messages to interested targets as never before.
Here’s to the day when “mobile marketers” will no longer wake me at 3am with text message alerts announcing their unique offer for selling my timeshare — which I don’t even own.
My bet, and it is more by default than anything else, would be digital signs because of their subliminal value. Seeing them often enough might imprint a message on the viewer’s brain. There are too many ads that may be memorable for their entertainment or irritation value that still leave those who see them without a clear recollection of what was being advertised. There are also far too many instances of products not delivering. On the rare occasions when I have tried something because of an ad, I have inevitably been disappointed when it fails to do what was promised. Then again, the human population continues to grow as does the circulation of tabloid newspapers and magazines so perhaps the old adage about a sucker being born every minute holds true. The big question is whether there are enough of them to justify the vast amounts of money spent on advertising.
A few days ago I read about airport security areas selling ad space – maybe putting decals on the rubber bins, or posters on the walls, just as we see everywhere else in an airport.
My first thought was it would be just one more area of our lives junked up with a cacophony of irrelevant messages.
But those areas are pretty drab.
So, what if one advertiser were to take the entire space and really design it well as an environment both visually and maybe even functionally, to genuinely improve travelers’ experience of the whole security process? I don’t think I mean walls of video screens – I’d go for more of an art-exhibit/guided-tour feel, to calm people down rather than rev them up.
You’d create a total-immersion experience for the brand in a way that generates some goodwill just by relieving some stress and boredom. And if the underlying brand messages happened to be properly targeted and therefore relevant to the audience . . .?
Icing on the cake.
50 years ago, people were almost fascinated by commercials and advertising – definitely NOT SO now. Consumers have become experts at tuning out. Clutter is at an all-time high and has created an annoying advertising wasteland.
Point of sale media can be an answer but I fail to see how this or any “new media vehicle” including mobile marketing, will catch the consumers attention. Some say 80% of advertising is squandered away, well I believe it’s worst than that.
Targeted advertising through creative marketing will be essentially the only way to positively attract the attention of the public. A strategy of engagement that involves a marketing presence WHEN THE CONSUMER WANTS IT, be it cause marketing where you are supporting the same institution or charity that the consumer is concerned with or the same instance in motor sports where they have enviable brand loyalty factors (both these medias have great fan loyalty).
Some combination that disrupts the norm such as a branded race car and/or in-store POP rooting out a real reason why they should pay attention, will in the end be the beginning of the future in marketing.
I once wrote somewhere that advertisers would tattoo their messages on the inside of people’s eyelids given the chance. Airline tray tables and ads pushed to cell phones come eerily close to that. Like my colleagues above, I believe the marketplace for this kind of ad activity is under-measured and therefore underestimated. Shopper media alone account for more than $1.5 billion in annual spending. Other mobile, outdoor and transit hub programs layer on hundreds of millions more.
Is all this activity healthy or even tasteful? Strong arguments could be made to the contrary. But advertisers understand all too well that they cannot count on influencing consumers solely with conventional media. This is the elephant in the room for agencies and networks: the old CPM model is badly broken and under threat due to changing media habits and alternative media channels that seek out consumers where they live, work, play and shop.
Low-value impressions are a dime a thousand. The real deal is in learning to assign ROI value to interactions, not impressions.
I think advertisers are missing the point. The question to ask is “why are current advertising techniques ineffective?” I believe the answer lies in the gradual shift in advertising from informative to manipulative. Long ago, one of the only ways the consumer had to become informed about new product choices was advertising. The dynamic was built around consumers learning from ads, and trusting retailers to carry the right assortment for them. Those two things no longer take place. Today’s consumers know that ads are intended to manipulate, not inform. How many times does the consumer ask “what was that ad for…?” having watched because of the sex appeal or the production values, but cynically resistant to the subliminal messages.
Consumers use TiVo and ad-blockers for one reason: they find no value in the ads.
Memo to advertisers: in the information age, it is extraordinarily easy for consumers to educate themselves. Businesses are proliferating offering price comparatives, feature comparatives, and unbiased ratings. One of the most relevant internet trends are consumer ratings and reviews. We trust each other, rather than traditional sources of information. What’s the answer? Re-establish your relevance as a source of empowerment to the consumer. I know this is heresy, but selling the wrong thing to the wrong person is counterproductive. Really! Forget the comparative lifestyle approach, forget the “sex sells.” Empower the consumer by effectively communicating product benefits and consumer needs. If your product has no benefits, then shame on you. The consumer of the future will vote you off the island soon anyway…you’ve fooled too many for too long. This generation of consumers doesn’t need your sizzle.
True, there are many more ads, but most are making fewer impressions than before. The beauty of today’s landscape is that there is a greater ability to advertise effectively and economically to niche markets, and the results of these campaigns can often be measured accurately.
Focused, precision advertising to meet specific, known needs of an individual consumer are much more likely to be noticed and responded to than typical “mass marketing” messages, no matter what the communication vehicle. This is where the truly successful advertisers will live going forward.
Two areas with the fastest growth, it seems to me, are in-store media and mobile messaging. The latter still has enough novelty to be effective, and while the former seems to be maturing faster, the quality of the displays and the ads has been rising fast enough to keep folks interested.
At some point a few years down the road, I imagine consumers will begin to tune out in-store media, at which point someone will figure out a way to make it 3D or interactive or whatever, or come up with a whole new medium. Or, of course, there could be an actual consumer revolt against too much advertising, but I doubt that.
Advertising media have life cycles, just like products. New media tend to have peak productivity because of their novelty. As a medium ages and shows its productivity, clutter increases, reducing productivity. 1950’s network TV shows often had individual sponsors, who prevented competing products from advertising on the same show. Nowadays, a single 30 minute show can broadcast 5 competing car ads, 3 competing deodorants, 3 different cellular networks, 3 travel web sites, and 4 different investment firms. Some commercial property owners may dislike restrictive zoning, but in many localities, the zoning prevents excessive construction, which could lead to a decline in rents. ClearChannel’s decision to cut back radio ads improved the quality of their stations. But many ad media look like NASCAR vehicles, with messages and logos pasted all over.
50 years ago, people were almost fascinated by commercials and advertising–definitely NOT SO now. Consumers have become experts at tuning out. Clutter is at an all-time high and has created an annoying advertising wasteland.
I’m not so sure I agree with this statement. We would all like to think we can “tune out” unwanted messages, but think about the relaxing effect the background music in the dentist’s office has, or the lively beat in the night club has, even if you aren’t actively trying to listen to it. It gets into your head whether you want it to or not. As much as we are now able to use on line advertising, (a simple point and click can delete an unwanted ad), mass mailings (throw away that junk mail), we are still captivated by our televisions. Granted, we can step away during commercial breaks for a bathroom run, to raid the fridge, or take out the trash, but the background voice telling us about this weekend’s special sales event, closeout sale, or new arrivals will still be playing whether we want to hear it or not. With hundreds of TV channels captivating audiences wanting to view anything imaginable 24/7, what better place to advertise?
Regarding the idea of 3-D ads for in-store media, Doug Robinson wrote to say that his company is already doing this. “…No need to wait for 3D Ads. It actually does capture an audience in the store, so much so that we had to reposition the displays to reduce the traffic bottlenecks.” The link to their site is http://www.promodriver.com. According to a press release on their site, they have very recently signed a deal to deploy their kiosks in 12 Giant Food Market stores in the Binghamton, NY area. The items advertised on the kiosks apparently appear to “jump out” of the screen about 10 inches towards the shopper, although it is an illusion. Wow.