Know-How Exchange : Branding

I am frustrated that so many advertisers are stuck in the mud when it comes to content. It seems there's a world of advertisers out there that are afraid to advertise on Blogs, Message Boards, or the like because they're afraid that their marketing message will be publicly blasted on the same webpage they're marketing on. They're also afraid of topics like sex, drugs and in some cases, swearing.

I find this to be downright old fashioned. You're a large advertiser trying to reach active teens on the web, you're running a rich media campaign, (which is a hot trend for branding campaigns) yet you're afraid of running your campaign on a site with loose content? Please, that's like ordering an Old Fashioned Cosmopolitan.

Teens are teens, they are going to curse, they are going to talk about sex, drugs and every other topic in the world. If a teen says something negative about the product or service you represent, wouldn't you look at that message as a learning curve? I would think that a message written by a consumer, whatever that message was, would be viewed as a testimonial. If someone talked trash about your product, isn't that the same as spending thousands of dollars for a product discovery test? I'd be more concerned why someone doesn't like my product.

So my questions is this, why are people treating interactive advertising like traditional advertising. They aren't the same medium. I mean sure, the print, radio, cable and network folks would like everyone to believe all mediums have the same ideals, but that's not the case. If you have a website that's cutting edge and attracting millions of trendsetter teens, you're not going to put a banner in front of them for fear your product will get torn down? It just doesn't make sense.

Look at Proctor & Gamble. They advertise Tremor on websites with blue content. They try to reach treendsetter teens and invite them to join a panel where they in turn report on how cool various poducts are. Proctor & Gamble has been using this strategy since 2002. The most ironic thing about the strategy is that after they're done with their market research, they turn around and sell it to companies that are afraid to advertise on the sites where P&G originally recruited the panelist that provided the information that the old fashioned company is buying. So you have companies that are scared to advertise on websites that don't have proper content control measure buying research gathered from the same sites they're scared of advertising on? Does that make any sense. Isn't that almost like being scared of Peter, so you pay Paul to talk to Mary for information about Peter?

Once this old fashioned way of thinking goes out the window the world of advertising will be a better place. Look at Hewlett Packard. Steve Stoute is throwing Tequila parties with DJ's to promote digital cameras and mini-printers to the Hip Hop generation and guess what, it's working. Hewlett Packard buying 500 tequila shots for a Hip Hop audience at an on-site promotion? They must have some forward thinkers in their media department. No wonder they are starting to dominate the market? They aren't afraid.

Our generation was throwing around the slang used in most TV commercials that are, "cutting edge" ten years ago. Some of the funniest commercials I see on TV have phrases that my group of friends were throwing around in the early 90's.

When our advertisers going to stop thinking like Marcone and start thinking like Bill Gates?