Category: Online Advertising

The Wrong Thing

Posted by Chris Tran 07 Dec 2011 No Comments »

While I was running New Media Edge, a continuing frustration for me was that we always had to turn out compromised work. Advertising’s conceit is that it gets to turn out quick, high impact ideas with a good-sized media budget. Advertising people strut around saying ‘we know what people like’ and ‘we know what people respond to.’ And for the most part, they do.

Clients on the other hand make decisions on what agency to work with based upon experience. Heck, they make the decision TO work with an agency with the clear understanding that there are things they (client) do not know, and need someone else (agency) to explain for them. This is the way the world should work.

However, anyone in advertising has to realize that the client will always override the decisions of the agency. This is not an exception. This is one of the core rules of engagement, and anyone who thinks differently is in for a rude awakening.

Advertising is a services industry, which ultimately means that we are not in control of the work that puts out. We have a lot of input, but the responsibility of what comes out is the client’s. It is their brand that is printed on the advertising, and ultimately, good or bad advertising is confirmed or driven by them.

And there are many times where the client and the agency disagree. The client will say that the agency doesn’t understand the brand, or the point of the campaign. The agency might say the client is being too blunt with their message, or worse, just boring. But at the end of the day, the client will always win.

It is not the client’s job to try and convince the agency, but instead the agency’s job to try to convince the client. The client’s duty is to give the agency enough time to explain its position, and to try and convince the client. If the agency manages to convince the client, then everyone is happy. However, most conflict ends with the agency unable to convince the client, and the agency walks away feeling ill-used and frustrated.

Which is probably the unhealthy way to look at it. It’s something that has affected me a lot, and I have tried to convince client’s to do the right thing. Of course, the “right thing” is “my thing,” which establishes that the client POV is the “wrong thing.”

Both sides ultimately want what’s best for the campaign, but I often think the way we go about these discussions is fundamentally flawed.

The Evolution of Agencies (Part 2)

Posted by Chris Tran 15 Oct 2011 1 Comment »

CRM to the forefront

Traditional marketing activities are very front-loaded. Advertisers and agencies spend the majority of their time trying to get sales, and to convince customers to try (trial) or convert to their brand. There has not been a lot of attention until late in creating real relationships with customers. The only industry segments that have paid much attention to fostering long term connections with consumers include:

Airlines/Travel
Finance
Ecommerce

For everything else, it just did not make fiscal sense for brands to put their customers into CRM programs. It simply was too expensive to manage as Cost per User, or even Cost per Customer. This has changed as two shifts have taken place:

Technology has made CRM programs much cheaper and scalable (i.e. lower Cost per Customer)
Social media gives each customer the chance to become a brand advocate/champion.

Or as Pete Blackshaw from Nielsen writes:

Customer service is the new media department.

When you look at the most successful brands on Twitter or Facebook (Zappos, Southwest), the story is very much centered around great customer service. A focused social media strategy is the easiest way to build Word of Mouth, and a cornerstone of that strategy needs to be a CRM program.

The CRM program identifies :

Customers with influence
What their problems are
How to deliver great customer service

Advertising agencies will start working in hand with customer service programs. Imagine websites, full of testimonials to be spread out via social media. And operations departments structured to deliver fantastic service, to give people real, credible reasons to believe in a service.

Online buzz will become a barometer of a brand’s health. And this buzz will be driven increasingly by great customer service.

Utility not Persuasion

The rise of branded mobile applications has shown that consumers are willing to interact with brands as long as they have something to gain. ”What’s in it for me” will continue to drive the conversation, as despite their best delusions, people will not become fans of Pantene or Head and Shoulders without either showing tangibly, how the brands make consumers’ lives better.

After all, isn’t the foundation of any advertising is the promise, “use our product, and your life will improve?”

Huggies had a great application for tourists in New York City, which showed on a map (and GPS) where the closest public bathrooms are. Mini Cooper has MiniMiles, which is a live loyalty system for their car owners. It also updates them with their maintenance schedules.

Nike Plus is a fantastic example, where a simple USB device tracks how much I run, and how often. Using that, I can track my progress (distance, speed, frequency and calories burned) and challenge friends. Running is a very solitary activity, and Nike has turned it around, and made it into a social one. Nike had been losing traction to other brands in its positioning, and Nike Plus has helped it regain its market leader position.

Digital Departments will disappear

I wrote about Digital Manifest Destiny, a concept liberally borrowed from people smarter than me. Essentially, it states:

All content will eventually be digital.

And as a result, all advertising will be digital also. Right now, there is an artificial divide between digital and traditional agencies, when really, ideas should be platform agnostic (and scalable!). And in so doing, every creative and account person should understand digital and how it operates in today’s world.

This is what we have done at Edge, where our combined Creative and Account management departments can handle both online and offline media. No campaign will ever be only digital, and similarly, the number of campaigns that are totally offline will decline to zero.

Agencies will start having creative technologists, essentially people who understand how technology can be used to deliver advertising ideas.

Big agencies will acquire digital agencies, and those digital agencies that survive will either die or become internet startups.

The Evolution of Agencies (Part 1)

Posted by Chris Tran 14 Oct 2011 No Comments »

Advertising agencies are at an inflection point.

Viral marketing is forcing creatives to act as both content and advertising.
Media fragmentation is breaking traditional media and PR models.
Creativity is being democratized. Agencies are no longer the sole source of ideas, and the Internet has made it simple to borrow concepts from other markets.
Everything is becoming digital, which redefines the role of Research companies. Creative agencies will need to understand technology.
Too many providers are creating intense price pressure.

These are all things that I saw first hand at Edge.

The fundamentals of advertising are changing. In the past years, and in the coming years, we will see a massive change in how advertising takes place. Already, creative directors work hand in hand with digital producers to ensure that what is proposed is executable. Real-time A/B testing is replacing focus groups.

The world is becoming a faster, leaner place. The lines between publishers, agencies and advertisers is blurring.

And this blurring allows many other types of companies to enter in the advertising agency’s domain. That domain traditionally consists of:

Strategy (understand consumer insights)
Creative (develop ideas to connect consumer insights with brand)
Media (deliver these ideas to consumers where they are most receptive)
Research (understanding consumers and how they react to advertising)
Production (building and bringing ideas to life)

And for each of these core services, a raft of competitors are appearing.

In Strategy:

Management consulting firms (BCG, McKinsey)
Brand consultancy firms

In Creative:

Publishers
Crowdsourcing

In Media:

Search companies
Social media companies
Advertising networks

In Research:

Online panels
Digital measurement

In Production:

Off-shore Freelancers
Publishers
Client in-house IT departments

And in this age of economic recession, advertisers are looking for ways to save on costs. And these boutique services can claim that they deliver quality and a lower price point. Publishers are throwing in creative and production services in gratis as part of a large media buy. According to the IAB, 52% of advertisers expect to do more creative with publishers, versus 27% more creative with agencies. These should be good trends for advertisers.

What is great for advertisers is not always great for agencies.

Agencies are getting disconnected. More and more, advertisers are taking on the role of general contractor in an advertising campaign, going direct to suppliers and leaving agencies in the cold. Luckily, agencies are nimble creatures – small, and full of smart, social and creative people. There is no question that agencies will survive into the digital age – the only question is “what will they turn into?”

It was not so long ago that every agency had its own internal media department. Bulk discounts forced agencies to re-evaluate their organizational structures, resulting in independent media agencies. Media agencies that were later consolidated and acquired – media agencies like GroupM and Vivaki.

So, will digital agencies become:

Media brand owners?
Content collaborators?
Program producers?
Brand guardians?
Social community managers?

Engage, not interrupt

The agency model of the past was all about interrupting media consumption habits. It is all about finding content (TV, print) that consumers are loyal to, and interrupting it. For example, TVCs will always air just before a big cliffhanger. Scriptwriters actually have processes in place to ensure they hit the correct commercial breaks.

And the agency of the future will have to engage with consumers. ”Brands need to become social” is already a cliche, yet few brands have succeeded in coming alive online. Old Spice was social a couple of years ago, but has largely become irrelevant. Agencies are probably the only organization structure with the critical mass necessary to crack the engagement problem.

And in engagement (vs. interruption), a whole new set of metrics are being developed. In addition to exposure metrics like, Reach, Frequency and CPM, engagement metrics will have to measure attentiveness (CTR and Interaction Rate), Receptivity (dwell time, conversion rates), and buzz potential (shares, likes). And these metrics need to be fed back into the strategic and creative processes.

Reach, frequency and CPM are good measures of efficiency.
Attentiveness, Receptivity and Buzz Potential are good measures of effectiveness.

And ultimately, agencies will probably learn how to engage many small audiences for a long time (participation platform), instead of engaging a large audience for a short time (TVC).

Scalable Ideas

Ideas will need to work on a variety of different platforms. No longer will a strategy be just “TVC adapted to OOH and print,” but instead follow consumers and work wherever they consume content. An idea will have to work at minimum on:

TVC
Print
Banner
OOH
Social

Essentially, you’ll want your idea to be effective on TV, in magazines, on web portals, out on the streets and while you are on Facebook or instant messenger. Right now, few ideas are able to meet this standard. All agencies believe that the scalability ideas will have to evolve. Big ideas will have to truly become Big.

Media is evolving.

Over the last year, the Paid/Owned/Media model has been much discussed. The industry’s understanding here is still very shallow, but at its minimum, Paid Media will include:

Activations (in-store and external)
Traditional Media (OOH, TVC, Print, Radio)
POSM
Advertorials

Earned Media will include:

Public Relations
Blogs
Viral videos

Owned media will include:

Branded media properties
Packaging (absolut did it first)

And as we focus less on interruption, and more on engagement, our strategic planning will change.

The media story will change into the touch point story. Media agencies will figure out where best to touch their audiences. It will be less about the hammer, and more about the scalpel.

(to be continued)

Mimo – For Every Digital Campaign

Posted by Chris Tran 11 Oct 2011 1 Comment »

For once, I actually will write something related to advertising!

I just attended a press conference held for Mimo.vn. They describe themselves as Vietnam’s Twitter + SMS, and I imagine that in the hearts and minds of locals here, Mimo will evolve into some sort of group chat or event/community organizer. The way it is designed make it perfect for updating large numbers of people, simultaneously, via SMS.

Essentially, they are killing the SMS blast.

The way Mimo works is similar to Twitter. You send an SMS to 8405 with the syntax:

?theo <UserName>

For example this would follow me.

?theo ChrisTran

And whenever I update my status, it would send all of my followers a text message with my update. Pretty simple right?

So, how can advertisers use this?

At the moment, if an advertiser wants to capture any date from a user, they need to go onto the web. Microsites and banners can be used to capture information which can be used to target customers in the future. To be truly effective, digital often needs its own concept, a big idea tangentially related to the ATL campaign.

There are specific skills required to successfully execute a digital campaign. These include:

Ideation
User interface design
Content Generation
Online Media planning
Forum/Social seeding
Digital KPI measurement

All of which are foreign territory for traditional advertisers.

Let’s face it, digital advertising is very complicated. The brilliance of Mimo is that it can be a very light baby step for brands to go digital, without having to invest much in banners or microsites. They just need to update their ATL spends.

Mimo is a bit different from Twitter. Mimo is built for feature phones, especially those that lack any web support. Mimo is built specifically for non-web use.

Retailers can create a database to notify shoppers of sales should use this to generate a database, which can be leveraged for loyalty programs or discount promotions.
Event companies can manage quick/real-time updates to their audiences.
Brands can add @theo to billboards and posters to quickly generate a database of clean information. Fraud is minimized here.

Sure, a lot of this can be done via custom SMS systems or microsites. The beauty of Mimo is that all you need to do is add @theo to your marketing materials (print, OOH, TVC), and BAM, you have a database of phone numbers to work with. Without Mimo, you need to drive people to a website, get them to sign up, and confirm their email address.

Designing a website, and convincing visitors to sign up are very difficult things.

Brands are constantly looking for a real connection point for consumers. Email is the fall back position, and email’s problem is that it is exceedingly easy to generate new addresses, and thereby commit fraud.

Mimo helps brands manage number of attendees to an event and also uses phone numbers as a unique identifier.

Heck, I think NhomMua should just add @theo nhomMua to their materials, and they will be able to send deals to their customers daily via the phone. Right now, their focus is on mobile web (smartphones), while their really price-sensitive core audience is probably still on feature phones. And NhomMua are web experts.

—-

Now, event agencies are always looking for ways to drive the RIGHT number of people to an event – not too many, and not too few. Forecasting is a tricky business. Certainly, not getting enough people to an event is a failure, and too many attendees can cause problems for a brand’s health. And a channel to to remind guests of events is perfect.

—-

Imagine an event (i.e. Mobifone Rockstorm), where instead of sending a text or submitting an email, the user just sends:

@theo Rockstorm

They are automatically subscribed to the Mobifone feed, and Mobifone logs a user record into their system. Imagine that this generates a database of 100,000 rock fans. Somewhere down the line, Mobifone has a promotion for business people to use a specific VAS system, and blasts it out to its database. It can then use these two data points to segment their rock fans into business and non-business users.

Granted, that is a kludgy example.

Imagine a sponsored live chat with a famous pop star (i.e. Phuong Vy, spokesperson for Coca-Cola). Instead of interacting on a webpage, fans can send SMSes directly to Phuong Vy, and she responds directly via SMS. Online interviews (giao luu truc tuyen) are very popular with online communities, with speakers from businessmen and physicians to pop idols.

The feeling of SMSing with your favorite fan is something that would be wildly successful.

—-

Mimo is another signal of digital convergence. Quite simply, every campaign in Vietnam should consider adding Mimo to their communications strategy. It would cost absolutely nothing additional creatively, and it is a very effective first step in developing a digital CRM strategy.

Mimo – Making digital advertising less threatening.

Looking at the wrong metrics

Posted by Chris Tran 14 Apr 2011 No Comments »

A friend forwarded me this article from Forbes.com the other day. The article is part of the growing backlash against Facebook fanpages as a shortcut for doing actual marketing. Or as Adrian Chen writes “Nobody Actually Likes Your Brand’s Stupid Facebook Page.”

Fundamentally, the article hits the right notes, being controversial with just enough facts to make gentle readers (like yourselves) reevaluate current beliefs. However, my complaint is with this statement:

A social-network presence, she found, was less effective at customer acquisition and retention than e-mail and paid search. The study found that the average Facebook metrics are a 1% click-through rate and a 2% conversion rate. E-mail marketing, by comparison, has an 11% click-through rate and a 4% average conversion rate.

This statement alone, disappoints me. CTR and Conversion Rates alone do not matter, as the buying models for these various types of media are very different. Paid search and Facebook are largely CPC-based efforts, whereas Email is based on your current database. Performance metrics for rented databases are much lower than those developed by brands in-house. Fundamentally, Email is used for people who already have a relationship with your brand, whereas Search should be used to capture the segment of customers who need your product, but do not necesarily think of your brand first when trying to satisfy that need.

US Display Market Grew Twice as Fast As Search in 2010

Posted by Chris Tran 13 Apr 2011 No Comments »

Perfect timing. A day or so after I wrote that Display Marketing is not dead, the US Chapter of the IAB just released a report where Display Marketing in the US grew twice as fast as Search, or 24% versus Search’s growth rate of 12%. Still, Search totaled at 12m USD, whereas adex for Display came in at 9.9m USD.

For more information, visit this Techcrunch article.

Display Advertising Dead?

Posted by Chris Tran 13 Apr 2011 No Comments »

I met with a great creative agency from Singapore the other day to share experiences between our two markets and compare creative work. At New Media Edge, we do a lot of banners, and like to think that we lead the market for innovative banners. They liked our work, but made this comment which got me thinking:

In most parts of the world, display is dying. It is refreshing to see that it is alive and well in Vietnam.

Which of course got me thinking.

Globally, digital advertising is becoming classified as portions of:

Display
Search
Social

Or in other words:

Display – Reaching out to consumers who are not looking for your brand.
Search – Being placed so that consumers who are looking for your brand find you in the best possible light.
Social – Creating environments and reasons for your consumers to discuss your brand.

These three types of advertising are platform agnostic. There are aspects of all three on the web, mobile web and tablet web (someone needs to coin a term for this soon!).

Those who say that Display is dying are confused. Social is the new kid on the block, and with that receives more than its fair share of attention, but Display is fundamentally the easiest way for a new brand to get traction in a market. It is the only way you can make someone see your ad. It is the only true form of interruptive media online, and its results are the most scalable.

What people mislabel as the demise of Display is really its evolution. Right now in Vietnam, Display is seen as banners, but in other markets, Display is ads in iPhone applications, and on tablets, and as pre-roll advertising before videos, and interstitial ads. None of which are available yet in Vietnam, but are all very alive and effective in “mature markets.”

Mind you, digital advertising is the only industry where a 10 year old market can be called mature.

Further illustrations of Display Advertising’s evolution are:

Innovid’s launch of interactive pre-roll units for Youtube.
Google’s new campaign to educate agencies on display advertising
Apple’s trademarking of the term iAds

New Kindle – Is $25 worth watching ads?

Posted by Chris Tran 12 Apr 2011 1 Comment »

People who know me well, know that I am an avid reader. Many times when I am bored at a bar or a dance club, I am often caught reading on my phone or my kindle, despite the noisy environs, alcohol and pleasant company.

I am in love with my second Kindle, and still in mourning over my first (which was lost in a pool accident).

Anyways, Amazon has just announced a new Kindle for $119, $25 cheaper than the Kindle 2. The new Kindle 3 will be adsupported, with ads showing up as you load books, and on the screensaver. And as a compromise to consumers who do not want to carry a digital billboard in their pockets, they:

Amazon assures us that the screensavers are “attractive,” and is even trying to give consumers some agency by letting them vote on the screensavers they would like to appear on their devices.

It’s a smart move for Amazon, as they move to consolidate their domination in the ebook space. It makes sense, as most of their revenues come from selling books, and the Kindle is more of a distribution channel for them, rather than a profit center. Much as the iPod was more about selling music, Kindle is and always has been about selling books for Amazon.

Adding an adsupported model is smart for Amazon, as they can always use it to promote their own efforts/sales. I do not imagine Amazon will be selling much of this inventory to brands, but instead use it to promote their own internal campaigns. Certainly books is the obvious beginning, but I imagine that we will see special ads on the Kindle around Christmas (especially Black Friday and Cyber Monday), Mother/Father’s Day, Valentine’s Day etc.

It’s a smart move, and it further capitalizes on my own pet peeve, that it isn’t easy to customize my Kindle’s screensaver.

The only question I have is, why $119, and not $99?

Why brands should not use Search Engine Marketing (PPC)

Posted by Chris Tran 14 Dec 2010 4 Comments »

A friend, former colleague and current competitor of mine, Aryeh Sternberg and I disagree. (and yes, I am mentioning you by name, Aryeh. :) )

At a recent digital marketing conference, Aryeh stated that every brand should be using search marketing. During his presentation, he was asked for a show of hands of the people/brands/agencies that were using SEM for their campaigns. The only person who raised their hand was me, representing a couple clients of mine.

He was shocked to see that few brands in the audience were currently using SEM, and called them on it.

Dumb me, representing the masses of people who do not use search in their campaigns made my case.

My Case

Search is a direct response medium. It is good for driving traffic, but the ad unit itself is only four lines of text. A search ad for Apple looks much the same as an ad for Sony, which looks the same for Toyota, etc. Most of the money in advertising in Vietnam is for brands to get their message out.

Certainly, in a world where digital had large budgets, we would see search as part of every campaign. However, with small campaign budgets we focus mostly on display media, running on top publishers and ad networks. The next tier of our media plan is social marketing and online PR, to build buzz and trust. And the FINAL layer is search, and other forms of direct response.

Aryeh’s Case

“People who search for your brand are more likely to buy your brand,” Aryeh started. He stated that if people are searching for your brand, people SHOULD see your ad. ”The advantage of SEM over SEO is that you can decide what people will see with regards to your ad. SEO shows customers what Google believes they should see.” This is an iportant point.

Aryeh also went on to state that almost all of his clients use Search marketing. The hint is that since all of his clients are using it, what are they doing correctly that you and your clients are not?

My Rebuttal

I agree with Aryeh that controlling what people see when they search for your brand say “Apple” is an important point. However, SEM is primarily a traffic driving media. I use it NOT to get a brand message across, but to send traffic to a site. If you look at most markets in the world, brands do not use search media. They use Display media, mostly in the form of innovative rich media and videos (viral or otherwise). In other countries, it is the small and medium enterprises (SMEs) that drive search usage, especially for retailers.

I would argue that if your campaign has spent a lot of money on a good microsite, then use SEM. Otherwise, if you are looking to make a mass statement to a large target audience, please spend the majority of your budget on Display media.

Brands want reach, where as many of their audience can see their message. They especially want to reach NEW CUSTOMERS. If someone is already looking for “Apple,” chances are they will buy “Apple” anyway. And for that reason, Display Advertising will be used for a while longer to CREATE DEMAND.

Game Mechanics – Not for everything

Posted by Chris Tran 20 Oct 2010 No Comments »

I wrote a couple months ago I wrote a post on how advertising is not game design. Because of that, I was quite happy to see Dan Hon’s rail against the inclusion of game mechanics into advertising at the PSFK advertising conference in London.

http://www.psfk.com/2010/10/video-dan-hon-psfk-conference-london-2010.html

Similar to what I wrote, Dan argues that the inclusion of game mechanics do not make things fun. You can force people to play a game, and acquire points. When you do so, the focus is quickly moved from marketing to instead create a myriad of processes for point accumulation.

In fact, new up and coming location based startup Scvngr actually has a set of playing cards they use to develop their “games.”

http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/25/scvngr-game-mechanics/

The power and the challenge of internet advertising is the search for joy in messaging, and creating what JWT Creative Chairman Fernando Olmos calls “ideas that people want to spend time with.” Television , radio and print are largely interruptive mediums; you are forced to see this advertising. However, with Internet and mobile, you are always asked/invited to participate.

The audience is well empowered to ignore internet advertising. For that reason, quality of creative and depth of understanding of the target audience are the most important factors for campaign success.

You cannot just bolt on prizes and point gathering mechanics onto a campaign and call it advertising.