MediaPost Publications - iPerceptions: 'Old School' Ad Units Fare Better Than Emerging Media - 10/06/2008

"I think the biggest takeaway from the data is that the current ad formats aren't very effective," said Jonathan Levitt, iPerceptions' vice president of marketing. "Brands are going to have to start looking at things like direct content integration and product placement. There's still a place for things like banners and skyscrapers, but it's much more about brand awareness than inducing conversions."

MediaPost Publications - iPerceptions: 'Old School' Ad Units Fare Better Than Emerging Media - 10/06/2008

It's not that banner ads (or as I'd prefer we call them, display ads) are ineffective. In fact, their presence increases brand awareness, recall and perception. The problem is that agencies and clients rely on display ads for clicks, a task they're less and less capable of performing.

The problem I encounter every day is that so many marketing professionals are just embracing foundational interactive tactics - such as banners - at a time in which the interactive sector is undergoing rapid change. So you've got agency people advising their clients to jump in with a mix of tactics - banners and microsites, usually - that don't fit the business problems and marketing outcomes the clients wants to address.

The game of catch up is no fun to play.

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The Future Of Media: The Internet

"People go online to do many things," says early Internet pioneer Esther Dyson. "One of the reasons they go online is to create a presence. With Geo Cities, you had your presence in one place. With Facebook, you are distributing your presence to anyone who is your friend."

Dyson says this extends well beyond the cross-linking aspect of Facebook pages to include widgets and even real-time applications such as Twitter.

"With Twitter, people are distributing their presence incessantly. Personally, I think that is a little obsessive, but what people are really doing is collecting social interactions," she explains. "If we had a biological urge to spread our genes, now people have the means to spread their presence."
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So what's the future of the Internet? Well, technology, regulation, business models will surely be important factors, but if you look at what has really been shaping the Internet - both past and present - it is people. And some day, we may even send one over the Internet.

MediaPost Publications - The Future Of Media: The Internet - 09/23/2008

Sometimes I like to post an article just because it's good. This one's awfully good.

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Porn passed over as Web users become social

Social networking sites are the hottest attraction on the Internet, dethroning pornography and highlighting a major change in how people communicate, according to a web guru.

Porn passed over as Web users become social: author | Technology | Internet | Reuters

Pop the cork and pass the bubbly. I suppose it's safe to say the Web 2.0 era has officially arrived. When they write the history books, Web 1.0 will be remembered for spam, porn and phishing schemes. Yuck. With social media taking the Web 2.0 crown, what does Web 3.0 portend? Video? *.* on Demand?

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Bob Garfield: Your Data With Destiny

Assume that, in the near future, connections between marketers and consumers will not be principally forged via display advertising but will be otherwise cultivated online. Assume that technology will offer more and more highly refined means for the marketer to learn about the consumer and the consumer to enjoy a real benefit in exchange -- search and widgets being exhibits A and B.

Thank you for so stipulating. But if the lingua franca of our online future is indeed personal information, where will that come from?

Your Data With Destiny - Advertising Age - Digital

I assume most people who see this will be reading Garfield's Ad Age column. That's why I don't repost it here. But every now and then, Bob's got something big and important to say. Today's column fits that bill.

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BannerBlog : Where Banners Click

BannerBlog : Where Banners Click

Um. It's a blog. About banners. And it's one of the most useful sites to show people how far online advertising has come.

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Will New Media Save Television Ads? - Mashable

So what might be a strategy going forward? As an avid watcher of television, particularly political news, complex dramas, and reality shows, I could imagine many scenarios in which incentives are created to watch shows in real time – viewers pose questions for the guest, guide alternative dramatic scenes, or decide what challenge the players have to perform. How cool would it be to watch Donald Trump, Sr. using Twitter on a BlackBerry in the middle of the live Apprentice finale? And the advertising underbelly is that you are statistically more likely to purchase paper towels, basketball sneakers, or a dream vacation cruise.

Will New Media Save Television Ads? - Mashable

What a great, original thought. In order to remain competitive in an increasingly time-shifted environment, TV content developers and the networks themselves will adapt. Of course they will. The audience can be given incentives to watch live. Only some formats will stick. But it's adaptation that drives innovation. Or vice versa.

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Zune Goes Wireless, Sells Music on FM Radio - MarketingVOX

When a Zune owner hears a song on the radio that s/he likes, the user can immediately tag and download that song, or — if not connected to the internet at that moment — queue it for later purchase.

Zune Goes Wireless, Sells Music on FM Radio - MarketingVOX

Clearly the Zune is destined to play second fiddle to iPod for ... well ... forever. But this story along with another recent article about how online TV viewership is working for both more viewership and more-better promotion of viewership on - jeez - the TV itself show that the medium is looking very much like the message.

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Marketers Love Conversation, Unless the Consumer Starts It - Advertising Age - Digital: Columns

I dare you to find a feedback form that winks even a quasi-friendly smile. And if you find one that allows consumers to truly communicate in their native voices -- complete with links, photos, audio clips or videos -- I'll eat my just-published book.

Marketers Love Conversation, Unless the Consumer Starts It - Advertising Age - Digital: Columns

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New Ads on Last.fm Respond to Music - ClickZ

A redesign of Last.fm, the CBS-owned free online music platform, is giving advertisers the ability to create "smart ads" that can, among other things, move to the beat of whatever music a user is listening to.

New Ads on Last.fm Respond to Music - ClickZ

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Big Idea ... for a Milkshake Beverage?!?!

Last week we brought you a teaser of milkshake brand Frijj’s sinister web campaign, which featured sinister little girl Martha explaining that the town of ‘Four Ridges’ (a pun, we think) must be destroyed. Contagious caught up with creative team Ed Kaye and Alex Mavor, planner Ollie Gilmore and chief creative officer Jon Williams from Grey, London, to find out how…www.fourridgesmustbedestroyed.com

Contagious News Article

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Digitas is on a Roll. First Holiday Inn, now Gummi Burst

A new digital campaign for Gummi Burst, the latest addition to Mars' Starburst candy line, has Digitas flexing its creative muscle in a number of ways.

Using the premise that the individually-wrapped candies are ideal for sharing, the "Share Something Juicy" features Starburst in a new animated Web series, a Starburst channel on YouTube featuring videos made by Digitas's brand content unit The Third Act, and partnerships with several popular video bloggers.

"It really is a fresh look at their digital strategy," said Digitas Senior VP of Marketing Todd Stanley. "It's targeting a very fickle and hard-to-reach...audience for Starburst."

Care to Share? Digitas Launches Campaign for New Mars Candy - ClickZ

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RA DIOHEA_D / HOU SE OF_C ARDS - Google Code

In Radiohead's new video for "House of Cards" from the album "In Rainbows", no cameras or lights were used. Just data.

RA DIOHEA_D / HOU SE OF_C ARDS - Google Code

How exactly this admittedly stunning visualization technique can be used in marketing is an open question. I can see it appropriated by filmmakers for commercials or features. No sweat. It holds promise for banner ads, too.

But it's a treatment, not an idea. And the difference between the two is monumental.

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Big-name brands booking ads on Facebook

With millions of users riveted to social networking sites like MySpace and Facebook, big-name brands are venturing into the newly charted territory of social media advertising, seeking to unravel the real opportunities from the flurry of hype."They are reading about it a lot, their children are using it," said Ian Schafer, CEO and founder of Deep Focus, an ad agency that created Facebook campaigns for HBO, Coca-Cola and New Line Cinema. "And they are finding that the social media networks are too big to ignore."

Big-name brands booking ads on Facebook

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Skype Laughter Chain

Skype Laughter Chain

Here is another brilliant experiment in social media marketing. It's a smart twist on an idea we've seen used by Nike and Cuervo, for soccer and tequila shots respectively. However, by tying laughter to the Skype brand it raises the relevance of the Skype brand and brings the core product -- online telephony -- into sharper focus. The Viral Factory had a hand in this one. And it's an apt example of viral marketing.

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Springwise: Zero cents per minute: 100,000 takers so far

Blyk targets 16- to 24-year-olds with its free mobile phone service, which includes 217 texts and 43 minutes every month. In exchange, of course, they get advertising—up to 6 messages sent to their phones each day. Britain's youth don't seem to mind, though—Blyk reached that 100,000-member target six months ahead of schedule. Response rates to the ads in question have also achieved a whopping average of 29 percent—far surpassing the norm, which tends to hover in the single digits.

Springwise: Zero cents per minute: 100,000 takers so far

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Shops Strive for a New Formula

Without interactive experts to bring ideas to life, he adds, the big ideas are like "a fart in the wind."

Shops Strive for a New Formula

Now that's the quote of the decade!

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Tracking Video: How Audience Behavior Measurement Works

How It Works
Our patent-pending data collection approach captures every video interaction in every video from every viewer, from play to pause to rewind to forward-to-a-friend and more. When you're planning online video marketing and advertising strategies, Visible Measures VisibleSuite provides precise performance measurements including how audiences find, view, interact with, and share each online video.

Tracking Video: How Audience Behavior Measurement Works

I may have blogged this before. The URL is cached in my Flock browser. So ... pardon the redundancy. But this company has new news. And they're the only one I've seen that promise (at least) to track the impact of online video beyond counting views.

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Advertising - Shows Created by Brands Walk Tightrope With Viewers - NYTimes.com

Dos Equis beer will present a reality series on the Mojo HD cable network that will chronicle the search for an assistant to a character who is featured in the brand’s advertising campaign, a person of wealth and taste known as the Most Interesting Man in the World.

Advertising - Shows Created by Brands Walk Tightrope With Viewers - NYTimes.com

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Gaming The System - Forbes.com

Justin Hall, chief executive at GameLayers, is busy turning Web surfing into a game. PMOG (Passively Multiplayer Online Game) layers game mechanics--via a Firefox extension--on top of daily browsing activities. Players can scatter booby traps and rewards across the Web, stumble across Web pages annotated with links and notes, or construct trails to favorite sites that entertain or inform the PMOG masses.

Gaming The System - Forbes.com

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Dynamic Logic: Beyond the Click

Analysis from Dynamic Logic's MarketNorms® database shows that advertising on Games & Contest (Gaming) Web sites¹ can be highly effective in increasing brand metrics for various brand sectors and demographics. In particular, CPG advertisements on Gaming sites tend to perform much better among women ages 45+ compared with younger females. And this is not a small audience — in fact, 8.3 million women ages 45+ say they access the Internet to play online games, according to Focalyst².

Dynamic Logic: Beyond the Click

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