Experience the Message

MY FAVORITE EXPERIENTIAL SPOT

Jim Stengel, former CMO of Procter & Gamble admitted in this interview that this is his favorite commercial.  I write about this because ever since it came out a few years ago, this has been my favorite commercial as well, a spot that is as experiential as it gets. It may have something to do with the fact that I just had my first child at the time, but this work from Saatchi & Saatchi sort of changed my life through a deeply personal experience. I thought I'd share it with you here:

ONE OF THE BEST STUNT CAMPAIGNS I HAVE EVER SEEN!!!

PRODUCT PLACEMENT GETS EXPERIENTIAL

Readers of this blog will know my interest in product placement. It stems from my experiential bent for engagement and context. There's nothing worse than bad product placement -- overt and reeking of commercialism. It's eyeball hunting at its worst.

However, contextual product placement is a different matter altogether. It espouses engagement, and in doing so, is adopted by the viewer as a benefit rather than a detraction to the viewing experience. Marketing messages therefore are welcome, because they are embedded when and where the viewer is most responsive and receptive to them.

This story from MediaPost describes an evolution of product placement, one that is quite experiential in nature:

"Storyline placements are growing as the industry becomes more sophisticated about product integration deals," says Annie Touliatos, director of product development, Nielsen Product Placement. "Meanwhile, we're seeing a steady decline in background placements."

Nielsen's first-half product placement data demonstrate these trends, at least on cable networks, which accounted for 82% of the nearly 249,000 total TV placement occurrences logged by Nielsen.

Products being incorporated in the storyline accounted for 3,500, or just 2%, of the 204,000 total placements on the five cable networks tracked (A&E, Bravo, HGTV, MTV and TLC). But that represented a leap of 143% for the period, compared to first-half 06.

Foreground placements, representing 24% of the total, jumped 29%, to 49,181. Getting a brand shown on a T-shirt or other piece of wardrobe was the most prevalent tactic, accounting for 54,973, or 27%, of occurrences (up 4%).

Okay, other than the fact that the most popular tactic is probably the most lazy one, the rise in storyline product placement only strengthens the argument that marketing must add to the experience, not detract from it. Also, marketers have to work harder. Storyline placement is leaps and bounds beyond t-shirt placement in terms of sophistication, engagement and context.

And another quick note:

Overall, however, incidences of placements were down 7% on cable but up 40% on broadcast.

Is it no surprise that viewers are flocking to cable?

Blowing In the Wind

Well, the Internet has finally surpassed radio. According to this article:

eMarketer, a firm that tracks and analyzes spending trends across various media, is pegging Internet ad spending at $21.7 billion, compared to $20.4 billion for radio. eMarketer's report comes as the Internet already has surpassed outdoor ad spending, and as a recent report from equity firm Veronis Suhler Stevenson predicts that the Internet will displace television as the No. 1 ad medium by 2011.

In other non-related but equally telling news:

New consumer research from Leichtman Research Group, Inc. based on a survey of 1,300 households throughout the United States, found that over one in every five households in the United States now have a Digital Video Recorder, up from about one in every thirteen households just two years ago.

Other key findings include:

The mean household income of DVR owners is 33% above average
53% of DVR owners say that they have an HDTV set
45% of DVR owners record five or fewer programs per week
84% of DVR owners rate the ability to skip commercials as very important
Only 8% of DVR owners say it is the greatest benefit of having a DVR

Does anyone still believe that traditional forms of advertising are going to be relevant in 10 years?

SMART OR DESPERATE?

What do you think?

Last night, KFC aired a national TV ad for its new Boneless Variety Bucket in which it placed a sound you might have missed, especially if you are over 30.

Only people under the Big 3-0 are expected to be able to hear the Mosquito Ringtone, a frequency of 17.6kHz, since hearing deterioration begins at 20.

The Mosquito Device was invented by Howard Stapleton of Compound Security Systems and is now a popular ringtone among teenagers who don't want nearby adults to hear incoming cell phone messages.

KFC is offering $10 Boneless Variety Bucket gift checks to the first 1,000 people who tell the Louisville, Ky.-based company, via its Web site, where the tone was embedded. It's just another way the company is working to keep viewers watching its ads.

Keep reading here.

REAL WORLD IS VIRTUAL

I have always maintained that experiential marketing may be even more important in the virtual/online world than it is in the real world (I would love to see a Jack Morton study on that!). So it is no surprise that this blog is becoming inundated with posts about virtual experiences.

This post is no different, other than it involves a network that is at a crossroads between television and their audience: MTV. It has dawned on the cool cats at Viacom that they might be losing their cool creds, and that maybe...just maybe...television isn't where the action is.

Well, heck. We knew that for a few years now. But MTV -- as vibrant and avant garde as they thing they are -- hasn't woken up to the cold, hard fact that teens don't respons to TV like they used to. So, if MTV can't deliver them The Real World, they will now begin delivering the the virtual one instead.

This New York Times article says that:

...the cable channel aims to push the boundaries of false reality one step further. This week, MTV will introduce Virtual Laguna Beach, an online service in which fans of the program can immerse themselves — or at least can immerse digitized, three-dimensional characters, called avatars, that they control — in virtual versions of the show’s familiar seaside hangouts.

“You can not only watch TV, but now you can actually live it,” Van Toffler, the president of the MTV Networks Music, Film and Logo Group, said in an interview.

Wednesday’s introduction of Virtual Laguna Beach is the first of three virtual worlds that MTV plans over the next year as part of an effort to steal a march on popular Web sites like MySpace and YouTube that have diverted the attention of the MTV audience....

...Of the two other virtual worlds planned, VMTV is a music destination where visitors can club-hop among hip neighborhoods, buy music, watch videos, sing karaoke or even start their own bands. The third virtual destination, LogoWorld, an offshoot of Logo, the gay and lesbian cable channel, will be designed entirely by its participants.

One of the appeals of virtual worlds for MTV is the possibility that advertising can spill over into the real one. Visitors might buy a digital outfit for parties using currency they earned watching an infomercial or checking out a new product for an MTV advertiser. Then, they might decide that they would like to buy the same outfit for their offline selves, and, with a few clicks of the mouse and some real dollars, have one shipped to their home. In trial form, Virtual Laguna Beach has advertising relationships with brands including Cingular, Pepsi-Cola, Secret and another Viacom company, Paramount.

Oh yeah, it wouldn't be MTV if they couldn't make a buck off of the kids. The article states that "residents of Virtual Laguna Beach will have the opportunity later this fall to get a virtual car and a virtual house for a gold membership fee of $4.99 a month. For $5.99, a platinum membership will get them status: V.I.P. access to nightclubs and other events to be staged 'in world.'"

Let's hope the experience is worth it.

FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS

Mark Burnett is kind of like that blind ferryman on the River Styx, ferrying the vestiges of television advertising and product placement across the river of death to their fated time in the afterlife. Stupid analogy, I know.

But I can’t help but think that all of Burnett’s highly successful TV machinations and “breakthrough” programs are like the death throes of a once-powerful mythological hero. And if Greek tragedy is to teach us anything, it’s that heroes go down. They go down hard. The bigger they are, the harder they fall.

So here he is, Charon himself. According to Ad Age, Burnett’s latest salvo into “breakthrough programming” is something called Gold Rush, a piece of reality television that is, basically, a giant commercial that surrounds itself with more commercials for the commercials imbedded in other commercials.

Say what, honky?

More than $2 million in gold was recently hidden across the country, and to track down the treasure, viewers will be asked to spot clues on AOL.com and in CBS programming -- as well as in actual commercials airing on the Eye network. CBS entertainment chief Nina Tassler gave advertisers the opportunity to embed clues in their ads this week during the network's upfront presentation.

What is going on in TV land? Why is being "TiVo-proof" translated into obnoxiousness? What happened during the upfronts? Did a bunch of TV execs wake up with a severed horse head in their beds?

Please, for the sake of everything that’s good in advertising, show me a study that shows people are watching more commercials. Please, someone, convince me that any empowered consumer – the one that is so damn disdainful of marketing ploys and cheap ratings whorefests -- is going to participate in this type of marketing. This isn’t “jumping the shark.” This is jumping the entire freakin’ fish world.

So is it any wonder that there’s a column on ClickZ called “TV Spots Are Dead,” which is addressed to ad execs, postulating that they “must stop producing TV spots, plain and simple.

You must stop producing TV spots and start creating multiplatform video commercials, for lack of a better term. Now, more than ever, you must ask yourself: why is the viewer going to watch this? You're not blasting a message to a captive audience anymore; you're serving an empowered consumer. They will ignore your ad if you don't provide some relevant value.

You must stop Mark Burnett, too. Stop him now.