As host and producer for The New American Landscape Channel, one of my goals has been to complete a series of short segment video format to show the possibilities with well designed outdoor living spaces.

The show format is the Outdoor Living Show at: www.thenewamericanlandscape.com     I also syndicate the show through Youtube and other channels online.    6 show segments have been completed and provides a good look at the quality and aim of the media.

Now i am seeking product sponsors for the show and the channel.   Our focus is in outdoor living, food / wine, travel and spa lifestyle.     The ideal sponsors and advertisers are the product suppliers that are often mentioned / embedded into the video segement itself.

We have the production skill to create short segment ads for individual companies, or can take streaming ads from an adserver.

As a businessman it is essential that you find ways to market your business. One should look for new techniques and method in order to keep up with the competitors. Today, most businessmen are making online business to increase the scope of their market. Almost all of them are using new media solution as an internet marketing tool.

New media is a general term used to define the technological developments of computers, digital media and the internet. If it is digital, dynamic and networkable then it is “new media”. Nowadays, most businesses are using new media to help them in their online marketing campaign. While some are advertising online by using Google AdWords.

Having an online business does not mean that people will automatically come and visit your website. Who will visit you website it if no knows that it even exists in the first place? Internet marketing is important so people will know that you have an existing online business. As a beginner in the field you must be able to learn the basics of marketing a website. This is where new media advertising will come in handy.

Social networking sites, like Facebook and Twitter, have been widely used for online marketing. You can have a wider market range if you place your business on social networking sites. These sites allow you to put different kind of contents, like blogs, podcasts, video and audio streaming and many other more. Though you will be exposed to both positive and negative comments, it is still the best way to know what most customers want. This is practically very important in marketing if you want to improve your brand or your services and find the best way to market them.

Using new media solution to market your business has clearly more efficient than the traditional ways of advertising. You can target customers with more precision and it will cost so much lesser than its counterpart. New media advertising will continue to evolve and businesses around the world will adapt to the changes it presents. So one must carry on and apply new methods in marketing as not to get left behind from the race.

The business of internet portals and online advertising are increasing on a large scale in the country. Internet advertising is expected to emerge as the fastest growing segment over the next five years, driven by the accelerating numbers of internet users. Internet advertising stood at approximately INR 1 billion in 2005. The growth of internet advertising is estimated to be atleast 50 % over the next five years.

The biggest advantage of new media advertising is that it is relatively cheaper in comparison to other media and can also be done in an attractive manner. Moreover, various small and upcoming businesses can easily go for new media advertising. In other words, it is very appealing in nature and simultaneously entices customers too. Going for new media advertising is the wisest choices as it gives the surfer both visual and graphic treat.

Also one can use new media advertising in any local language and customized message. Anyone irrespective of the place he resides can access the Internet from any corner of the globe which means that this medium provides great reach. Internet has emerged as one of the most convenient ways to promote any brand or company.

I spent a couple of days in Dubai at the Lynx Advertising festival.  I was not sure what to expect from Dubai but I can share my personal thoughts over a beer. If you like the sight of what seems like eternal building works, metro’s in the making, traffic detours every 200 meter and the utter lack of what gives cities their soul and reason of existence (simple things like people walking in a street for instance), you should go. The place being referred to as “the old city” is merely 24 months old… so all a matter of perspective really. Unless you want to tick your boxes on skiing in the desert and seeing the biggest shopping mall & biggest tower in the world - we all have our fetishes.  I admit I have not seen the fantastic white sand beaches annex 5 star hotels, and the pool of the great Sangri-La hotel was still a bit weird on the 4^th floor in the middle of the city traffic noises. But hee, I was there to attend the seminars, meet clients, do a keynote. So let’s move on.

A great line up of speakers.  Contagious editorial director Paul Kemp-Robertson examined how to make the most of mass communications whilst using digital technology to create deeper, more bespoke relationships with passionate groups of brand loyalists. ‘Traditional advertising still has a role to play, but by creating more targeted, granular, niche relationships with people, you start having much more fun as a brand,’ says Kemp-Robertson. ‘The interaction with consumers becomes more meaningful, because it’s now based on conversations with people who have elected to be part of the brand, and therefore expect deeper levels of service, helpful applications and exclusive content.’

Laura Desmond, the global CEO of Starcom MediaVest Group spoke about turning around the agency into a “human experience agency”. Where digital is at the centre, shaking up the traditional agency models. Media agencies need to create human experiences for the brands they serve. And looking at the crisis today as a “too good an opportunity to waste.”

And many many great conversations !  Once in a while business conversations bring more to the table than just business. Fortunately so. It’s why a simple coffee with Tham Khai Meng – the Worldwide creative director for Ogilvy & Mather and Jury President of the Dubai Lynx for TV, Print, Outdoor and Radio – becomes an inspiring talk about the ad industry, values in life, brand conversations and the endless advertising clutter in life. But we basically agreed to disagree. Khai sees “digital as one letter of the alphabet that translates a great idea into execution”. I thought that was very reductionist. For sure it starts with the Big Idea but in today’s world digital is the context for all consumer behaviour. It cannot be reduced to a single ‘channel’ that defines its audience simply through their use of it. Our presence in this digital environment doesn’t define us because it’s increasingly assumed. For the first time in advertising’s history, those practising it can no longer buy an audience; instead they have to find ways to connect to individuals. And second: you don’t know what you don’t know until someone tells you what you don’t know. The Big Idea might very well be inspired by great technology, because it enables us to do things that were unthought-of before.  Anyway – very charming guy and we agreed to connect. 

In my own keynote I talked about “Harnessing Digital Creativity To Connect Brands To Consumers”.  Digital has come a long way in the last five years, but for it to really start punching its weight, fundamental change is necessary. Brands need to place digital media at the heart of their marketing strategies; agencies need to get smart and ensure campaigns really connect with consumers.  Facilitating that conversation is technology.

I talked about Silverlight, a new platform that allows designers and developers to work across platforms and creates a rich, seamless experience for consumers. And Deepzoom, a Silverlight-enabled technology that can incorporate a terabyte of information on a single web page. It allows users to zoom in and out of high-definition web pages uncovering whole new layers of information. In the world of Deepzoom, you don’t need to surf from page to page to pursue links or find information; you just need to look more closely at the page you’re already on.

In this new consumer reality it has never been more important than before that media owners/publishers, advertisers and creative agencies have to work together to deliver new brand experiences. Partnerships are key. It’s not about us taking your money, going away and coming back with an audience ready to sit and listen to what you have to say. Such a compliant audience no longer exists. But we can introduce you to a quite staggering number of individuals ready and willing to communicate with and about you. And we can help you develop the best, simplest and most valued way of having that conversation. It’s what we’ll be calling advertising – from now on. We believe.

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

Over the summer, Dina posted here on the shift of power to the consumer (“Long Live the King“).  One campaign mentioned is the current “Do Us a Flavour” from Walkers crisps.  The campaign gives consumers a chance to suggest a new flavour for Walkers crisps and if chosen win £50,000 and 1% of future royalties for the flavour.  Walkers recently shared some of their results and amazingly have achieved four times the exceeded target of 250,000 entries with a total of 1.1 million so far!  Six of the top flavours will be produced beginning in January 2009 and the winner chosen in May.  What is staggering is not only the participation in this campaign (users spending an average of 9 minutes on the site!) but its longevity.  This campaign has fantastic staying power because it involves the consumer in so many ways - as a creator, a tester, and a selector.  Truly, these are the kind of results any marketer would be hungry for.

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

In preparing for a presentation I am making on video to a customer with a largely female target audience I was reminded that the explosion in online video viewing is not the same for all demographics.  In researching female online video viewers I came across Jupiter Research’s 2007 US Online Consumer Survey.  The survey showed that the percentage of online users watching video online is not the same for all segments of the online population.  Once we go beyond the core 18-24 year olds, the % of females watching video online is dramatically below the % of their male counterparts. Among 25-34 year olds, only 57% of online females watched video online compared to 78% of online males. 

For advertisers, this represents a golden opportunity to attract women to online video while at the same time participating in activity with their brands.  We’ve seen some female audiences served well – teens in particular (look at Bebo’s “Kate Modern” and “Sofia’s Diary“).  Some of the same learnings can be used to attract women in older audience segments.  Unilever has demonstrated this incredibly well with “In the Motherhood”. 

The first step is understanding how women are engaged with online video now.  Microsoft’s “3 Screens” qualitative research conducted earlier in the year provides some insight on this.  For example, we have the case of a working mum who watches one of her daughter’s favourite daytime television shows online in the evening. They can still have a bond over this programming despite it airing while she is at work.  Many mums look to online video for “me time” but as in this example also use it to facilitate shared experiences and family bonding. 

With all of the recent talk around growth factors for online video, it is worth pointing out once more that activating a currently underserved audience like this is unlocking a goldmine for brands.

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

Is anyone else wondering where the heck September went?  It certainly came and went like a tidal wave.  As for me, I was happily back on the road visiting customers and agencies around Europe.  In Spain, the topic on everyone’s minds was VIDEO.  What impressed me in my meetings in Spain was the enthusiasm of the online and offline agencies and their clients.  I didn’t have to press too hard when convincing them that online video viewing is now a mainstream activity.  This happily means we spent more time talking about capabilities and success! 

Emarketer’s latest Video Advertising Online report discusses video advertising specifically and how/when it will catch up with the growth of online video viewing.  (Check out excerpts on their site, but the full report is worth a thorough read.)  One factor that comes through loud and clear is QUALITY.  This same word came up repeatedly in my meetings with customers.  From a publisher’s perspective, premium/professional content can command a much higher CPM than user generated/uploaded.  In general the standard of the content is higher and so gives the advertiser a greater level of comfort in the audience it will attract and the environment it will provide for their brand. 

Still, we’re seeing advertisers take matters into their own hands and having a part in the creation of that premium content they are so excited to be associated with.  We recently released a case study from Color Line Cruises that does just that.  Color Line worked with MSN and our partner Control Room to stage a live A-ha concert that was streamed live on MSN and on demand post-event.  The new liner was featured as the back drop to the concert.  How is that for product placement?!  And the results were incredible – 123,000 people watched the concert (post-event) and 12,000 entered the competition to win a luxury cruise.  That’s a 10% conversion.  It’s worth noting that 22,000 people watched the event live online.  So the internet really gave the activity longevity as people could watch live or on demand afterwards and most importantly, take action!

This is the kind of example that really excited clients and agencies.  Not only did the campaign work for Color Line but it also demonstrates how powerful online video can be when the content is premium and publishers, online and offline teams, and clients work together.

Dina Gowar | FMCG Category Development Manager, EMEA

The King is dead, long live the King!  A proclamation which is heard following the ascension of a new monarch.  It’s also deemed a traditional cheer when the rightful heir to the throne is placed.  Fitting then that currently the consumer is seen as king.  No longer the advertiser, or the manufacturer, or even the creativity – all power seems to (rightfully you might ask?) sit with the consumer.  Consumers decide what they want to watch, what they want to buy, when, where and how.  Advertisers are striving to keep up with the constantly changing and fickle world of consumers but as they say, if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em! 

Currently there are a couple of great examples which are running in the consumer packaged goods world handing power over to the consumer.  For consumers who fancy having their dreams of sausage and mash flavoured crisps finally becoming a reality, they can send their picture and details to Walkers for their “Do Us a Flavour” competition and win £50,000 .  Then for the more artistic types, consumers can design the next Skittles package and win a trip to London. Or for the glory of it all and your duty to the world you can “Design the World a Coke”

So is this just a phase? Will the paradigm shift back to the advertiser? Will we once again be told what we should like and what we should buy? I say no. I think the power will remain with the consumer. They have tasted what it is to be in control and will fight to the death to stay in power. Keeping up on blog posts, the consumer vibe, and most importantly what the consumer is asking for is no longer a privilege or an option but rather our duty. So let’s embrace the “King” we have in power and celebrate their triumphs – as long as it’s not the salmon and cucumber flavoured crisps making all the rage!

James Rothwell | Regional Manager MSDR EMEA

There has been a lot of press lately on the latest type of Behavioural Targeting companies on both sides of the pond (specifically NebuAd & Phorm) and what this means for an individual web user’s privacy. Congress and other bodies are firmly placing the spotlight on these types of companies, because they operate closer to the source of a user’s entry into the world wide web i.e. they can see all web navigation and search history through deals with the ISP.

There are certainly legal issues at hand here around US federal wiretap laws but the suggestions that these companies could keep reams of data on every individual and somehow use this for anything but serving targeted ads seems far-fetched. As I understand it, the storage involved in having personally identifiable data that ties into personal web useage is unfathomable. The real issue at hand, as I see it, is whether the ISP’s are providing users the chance to opt in or out of this targeting. And according to a number of sources, this is where the companies are falling down.

Phorm ran a “behind the scenes” test 2 years ago with BT and Cable One in the US have got into hot water recently when it admitted it did not let users know about a test of 14,000 of their users with NebuAd. Yahoo’s recent announcement about allowing their users to opt out of their own tracking technology shows just how topical this subject is, and the way that targeted advertising seems to be going.
My personal opinion, undoubtedly informed by working in the online advertising industry, is that I would rather have targeted ads appearing next to the content I am consuming than be concerned about whether big brother is tracking my movements around the web. I am safe in the knowledge that I am not personally identifiable- I am just another number- but I am a number with data behind it that will hopefully show me something I want to see. I would far rather arrive at a site with behavioural targeting tags, and be offered something relevant than regress to the scatter-gun approach of the SPAM era. We have the technology to do this, so let’s use it. But let’s use it sensibly and give those who are sensitive to maintaining a level of privacy online, the facts and the choice.

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

The latest Jupiter Research report, “Video Advertising in Europe”, will hopefully help put the scaremongering about the “death of the preroll” to an end.  I highly recommend reading the report and the wonderful AdAge coverage of the report’s release.  For now, I’ll draw your attention to the most juicy part (my opinion):

“Netherlands-based video-content network Zoom.in reports that 17% of its 15-second preroll ads are abandoned before completion. U.S.-based video ad network Tremor Media, which plans to launch in Europe next year, says 20% of its 15-second preroll ads are abandoned before completion. By comparison, many sites report that at least 10% of users abandon videos within 15 seconds even when there is no preroll ad. Mr. Elliott said, “Half the people that leave because of the ad would have left because of the content anyway. It’s like flicking through channels on TV.”

This research puts the argument that prerolls make viewers tune out into perspective. 

Of course, this is an opportunity to highlight again the importance of the quality of the preroll. Recommendations include limiting the preroll to a max 15 seconds (and 10 seconds results in even lower drop off rates!), ensuring the creative is interesting to watch, and trying to achieve one ad for every 2.5 short-form clips max.  Jupiter suggests that quality prerolls shown at no more than this duration should only cause drop off of 5% or less of its visitors.

Surely, this is an acceptable sacrifice for sites who are able to monetise effectively thus making the content free for the other 95% of people who visit their sites?!

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

I commented earlier in the week on Gavin Heaton’s “Servant of Chaos” blog on the “Where the Hell is the Sponsor” post. Gavin mentions his P-L-A-Y framework in reference to a powerful viral effort sponsored by Stride Gum.

The Y in the framework is for “yelp of surprise and delight”. Here’s a very recent viral ad from Caterer.com, an online recruitment portal for the hospitality industry, featuring Gordon Ramsay as a child.

The campaign received 8000 views in its first day posted on YouTube and as of this writing has a tally of over 16,000 views.

I certainly let out a yelp when I first viewed it (and then sent it to 10 friends) so imagine the impact it’s having among their target market!

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

My pal Dean Donaldson at Eyeblaster has been keeping me honest lately. I asked Dean for the latest and greatest Eyeblaster benchmarks mentioning click through rates. Rightly so, Dean corrected me that there is much much more to effectiveness than the click. As a former rich media guru myself, I should know better than that.
No one would blame you for being seduced by hot rich media creative like this wallpaper for EA Games “Burnout Paradise” that ran on MSN Entertainment in France.
As we’re staring a tough economy and stricter marketing budgets in the face it’s even more important to see the substance behind all of this style. Eyeblaster has done some really interesting research around rich media’s impact on conversions and most recently have rolled out their “Creative, Meet Analytics” guide for designing ads for measurable success.
Back on the topic of clicks, Eyeblaster reminds us of what a click means and why it shouldn’t, and truthfully can’t, be the end all be all:

A good reminder for us all especially as Jupiter Research predicts that by 2012 over 50% of all online display advertising will be rich media or video…

Dina Gowar | FMCG Category Development Manager, EMEA

The above ‘rule to live by’ comes from Nicholas Bate blog and specifically his “Rules of Life” (you can download the pdf from the ‘free stuff category’ on the blog). I have been fortunate enough to take a course with Nicholas called Personal Excellence and many (sorry Nicholas, not all) of the tools I learned in that 2 day course still very much come into play in my everyday working and personal life. (I highly recommend his blog, or any of the books he has written.)

Now, if only brands could apply this golden rule to how they behave in business. Often it happens that clients want to get involved in every new, emerging, ‘underground’ opportunity without first thinking if it makes sense for their brand. No, Mr. Client your household cleaner will not make a cool viral video which 10’s of thousands of people will watch and share. Don’t get me wrong, getting involved in hot new opportunities is possible and encouraged (!) but it requires the same strategic thinking and planning as your TV or print campaign. And just because it fails, doesn’t mean it was a failure. Test, learn, refine and try again.

As a marketer ourselves, Microsoft commits a certain % of our marketing budget purely to testing. Mich Mathews, our VP of Marketing has spoken openly about the successes and failures we have encountered digitally and how we continue to learn from our failures. It’s important that we behave as we propose our partners behave. After all actions speak louder than words, and sales people can have a lot of words! J

Kathryn Schlieben | MSN Product Specialist EMEA

This past year I was planning a wedding in Canada while living here in the UK. I simply cannot imagine planning the event without the internet. It would have been impossible. Simply being able to email venues, florists, photographers, etc made it so much easier from a different time zone. Nearly every vendor I dealt with had a web presence with photos, videos, 360 degree tours of the hotels and were more than happy to work with me virtually.

Aside from the convenience the web brought to my wedding planning it was really interesting to be in a new demographic during the period of my engagement.

Specifically, I remember ads in Facebook targeted to me as an “Engaged” person. Ads for wedding insurance and honeymoon destinations very helpfully appeared.

Now that I’m married, I’ve changed my profile and most recently saw this ad displayed on my profile page:

I’m not suggesting that Facebook ads are poorly targeted, but rather is someone trying to tell me that getting married is the beginning of the end??

Daniel Dixon

Hi, As Marc introduced me, I’m Dan, the EMEA Windows Live Product Specialist. I look after the evangelism and best practise within our Messenger, Hotmail, Mobile & Spaces products ensuring we make the most out of any new products and optimise what we have currently to offer. I’ve worked for Microsoft for 8 years now & for that time I’ve been responsible for our communication products. It’s amazing how things have shaped end emerged even during this time and for my first blog I thought I’d use an example.

Needless to say, everything was ok in the end and I managed with ease to remember and do everything that was on the list. Without the technology we have and embrace today which even now is taken for granted everything would have been much more of a panic to say the least. Do we ever pause to realise how we’re using multiple devices and screens without even thinking? To be able to be alerted on my pc of urgent matters, even if during a meeting was something back in the days of the early game console I mentioned earlier just would not have been possible. If we think back to what it would be like back then – well it doesn’t even bear consideration. Once you had left the house, that was it! You weren’t contactable whilst on the move & if you needed to reach anyone, well, you’d use the public phone?…..well, imagine that? We’re nearly all contactable at any point during the day or night, whether on the move, at home or in the office. If we’re in an area where you cant speak then it’s possible to be contacted via Messenger or email whilst on the move and via a number of different screens and devices & anything written during that time will provide a reference, record or instruction that’s there in your hand. The devices and technology which we rely upon and use day in day out support us more than we sometimes realise and we don’t even stop to think, what it would be like with our lives today if all those years ago, communication technology had peaked with the fax machine and, well….that was it!? Now we are able to consume media in several different ways and for so many different reasons whether it be streaming video, email, interacting with ads, catching up via Messenger or social networking – it all revolves around staying connected in a near seamless environment.

Thanks for reading, Dan

James Rothwell

So, as Marc says, I am the guy who’s interested in clicks…

I’m also really interested in what happens after the click- as any seasoned online marketer will tell you, this is the true determinant of a successful campaign.

I like to think that we can take a good campaign and makes it better through our optimisation technology. Unfortunately you can never make a bad campaign work, no matter how good the technology is. A favourite but slightly unsavoury phrase about polishing something that is eminently un-polishable springs to mind, but I did not want to start my blogging career with controversy, especially as the blog is in Marc’s name, not mine. So to put it another way “you can’t put lipstick on a pig”. I think that sums it up pretty well.

When it comes to performance marketing, the MSDR offering manages to drive results for hundreds of advertisers across the globe by honing in on the most relevant, and therefore responsive, parts of our audience. But getting those responses is not as easy as it sounds. It has to start with the offer, and whether it’s what the people want.

Appealing or even trick creatives (you’ve seen those fake buttons and fields that dupe users into clicking their cursor onto the ad) can easily encourage clicks, but the offer needs to back up the claims within the banner ad. The “tricked” user incidentally will feel less inclined to do anything beyond that forced click- this is not qualified traffic. An unimpressive landing page, or a convoluted application/buying process for the customer will also lose traffic as quickly as you’ve found it. So end-to-end, the customer experience and exposure to the offer must be carefully considered. It’s amazing how many times this isn’t the case. Having said that, Cost per Action (encompassing all post-click activity: lead, application, download, sale etc.) is a very popular way of doing business for advertisers, representing very low financial risk.

The challenge is that this is at odds with the publisher monetisation model where most audience “owners” consider their traffic to be premium, and of a value higher than the yield that most CPA deals will generate. So there needs to be a compromise and a consultation between the two parties. Expertise on both sides should be applied to ensure success- the advertiser wants results and efficiency, the publisher wants efficiency and yield. So finding these efficiencies together must be paramount to a healthy advertising relationship between media owner, marketer and consumer. Weighing up the offer with the audience, the creative with the target group, and the post click experience with the interested party is all vital to the partnership. Working together on these elements as publisher and advertiser is absolutely key and something we push for as much as possible.

David Pugh-Jones

Thanks for the intro Marc and with ‘perception’ being the operative word let’s start by covering this off from a consumer versus advertising standpoint.

Firstly a brief intro into what I do for Microsoft, as the Creative Strategist my role is to evangelise creativity and innovation online across the portfolio of products we have including the likes of the MSN portal right through to presenting the future of digital advertising. And the cherry on the top is to communicate and understand the current media landscape, the creative agencies ecosystems and our clients advertising demands, ensuring we are truly competitive with our concepts, ideas, solutions and offerings. Now breathe. A bit of a mouthful I know but we like a challenge here!

Now back to this perception thing – If you work in advertising, and it doesn’t really matter what medium you’re in – could be digital, TV, mobile, outdoor you name it, you usually get sucked into your own ‘advertising platform bubble’ (I know you know what I’m talking about) wearing these rose tinted glasses and looking out from within believing every man and his dog gets this advertising thang completely in your medium..Well unfortunately the majority really don’t and here’s the biggest problem. Until we realise that consumers out there still don’t fully understand the ethos and objective of content or surroundings and ads working in harmony together then there will always be a consumer backlash to ads being force fed down ‘Joe Publics’ throats.

Any suggestions welcome? In the meantime I’ll give mine. Changing people’s perception of advertising is simple surely! Make it engaging, exciting, enticing, experimental, educational, humorous, different, personable, relevant and without a doubt original. I would say innovative too but after Fernanda Romano’s (Creative Director @ JWT London) recent quip in Cannes ‘Innovation is an overused word in our industry’ I’ll leave that one out this time! Unless of course you’re willing to create an ad that can actually do this and there have been a mere handful that I can remember in the last decade of my time in digital that have combined all.

Picking up on one of these important factors is making it relevant. For me it has got to be challenging for top spot. I’d love to see brands and products market to me that completely fit in with my lifestyle and would be more than happy to share personal information to ensure these companies could find and market to me even more effectively. I’m not on my own here and surely this is the future of advertising? Many would disagree that sharing personal information is, well too personal and already done in a small way today but think about it for a minute…brands and products you actually want to see send you information and content that you’re really interested in. Hello am I missing something here, is this not just obvious?!

So if we are as perceptive as we think about consumers needs then maybe we should consider asking those close to our hearts once in a while what they think! Recently discussing all things new in online with my Father in law he mentioned there weren’t many brands that successfully targeted his age group? Don’t mention Saga Holidays please! And come to think of it he’s actually right. He loves his SAAB, his BOSE speakers, his Apple Mac and his IPod – all iconic brands and very much targeted to a much younger audience. Do these brands specifically market in any medium to reach this switched on tech savvy target older generation? I read recently ‘Silver Surfers’ as I like to call them, are the fasting growing audience online and yes they already have a plethora of brands that they’ve grown up with and love but in actual fact they are crying out for cool and relevant products that really do innovate and excite them that make them feel warm and fuzzy inside.

I’ll stop ranting for now and in my next post share some v cool stuff we’re up to here including the use of Silverlight. I also hardly mentioned the recent Cannes Advertising Festival so stay tuned for a much shorter but informative entry next time…

David Pugh-Jones

Back to basics

This week I began mentoring a colleague who is quite new to the industry. We talked about display ad serving technology. I assumed that she already knows things that I take for granted, like how an impression is counted. She didn’t and it turned out to be a wonderful opportunity to explain something fundamental but very important. This got me thinking – are we doing enough to educate those joining the digital marketing world on the basics? There is certainly no shortage of information out there for those wishing to embark on self study – but where to begin? I find our industry conferences, panels, publications, and seminars assume a base level of knowledge on the industry. On day one, new hires are thrown terms and countless acronyms (that let’s face it, even those of us in the industry struggle to remember at times).

How do we expect them to be successful in the long term without ensuring that they understand the fundamentals? The IAB UK offers internet marketing courses for a fee. Some agencies, media owners, and technology providers offer training to employees and clients. But what about organizations who don’t have these types of resources? Don’t we all as digital professionals have a responsibility to enable the success of our new hires? It could be as easy as spending a couple hours to answer questions and direct them to information.
I’m interested in hearing what others are doing in this area so look forward to reading comments on this!

Dina Gowar

That’s right, as Marc kindly introduced I’m Dina and I am about to become a first time mother. What the future holds in store for me is unclear but I do know that my and my husband’s life is about to be turned upside down forever. 6 months pregnant and already I have this overwhelming maternal instinct to do everything I can to protect this child. That is why for my first post I thought I would look at something that interests me professionally, and soon will personally as well – how and where we market to children.
Every FMCG (fast moving consumer goods) client should have a level of self regulation which needs to factor into their marketing plans. You will find when you speak to clients in this sector that most marketers already have a whiter than white approach to what they will, and won’t do which goes beyond any Government regulations which may come into effect. Many clients have taken the approach to speak to kids about something other than their product or latest offer. McDonald’s for instance ran a campaign several months ago whereby rather than promoting their latest kid’s value meal chose to inform kids about how they can get up & out, get active and become involved in local sports teams/communities in their area.
Another approach is when clients chose to speak directly to the parents by way of reaching the children. One client who did this very successfully was Robinson’s fruit juice. They ran a campaign with MSN UK around their Raise Them on Robinson’s campaign. The site included a wealth information via videos, articles, community posts and competitions. Parents could get information on diet & nutrition, getting active with kids, sunny day ideas, etc and the response was overwhelming. Parents were spending a significant amount of time on the site absorbing the content, all the while these interactions were subtly brought to you by Robinson’s.
I think both of these are viable and successful approaches to getting engaged with the younger audience in a positive and responsible way. Clients need to find new and different ways to engage not only with their fickle target audience but also the parent’s who can make or break that relationship between a brand and the younger audience. Of course this all leads me back to how I will feel once it’s my child who is getting advice/information from a fast food restaurant or a candy bar manufacturer. I would like to believe I am a progressive kind of gal who will be happy with my child having these type of positive, responsible interactions online. But then again, reading the recent article in Ad Age (US), Survey Reveals Moms Wary of Ads Aimed at Kids (registration needed),only 18% of Mom’s agreed to marketing to children as well as parents, (3% said it was more acceptable to market to kids while 6% said neither were acceptable). It’s all too soon for me to tell what I think will be best for my kids. In the meantime I will think with my professional hat on and say conscientious and beneficial is the way to go. Now if I could just decide which pram is best to buy for our impending arrival….until next time and thanks for reading!