Usable Clicks

Good Advertising is Content

As part of the massive marketing campaign to promote Microsoft’s new(ish) search engine Bing, Federated Media launched a website called BingTweets. The site takes the trending terms on Twitter and does Bing searches for them, giving context to the buzz. Chris Brogan puts it well:

“What’s cool about that is there are MANY times when we see trends on Twitter and we wonder what the backstory is. In my example, I clicked half-blood prince and got local showtimes for the new Harry Potter movie. I think this can be pretty darned useful”

His point is an increasingly powerful rallying cry for the advertising community – if you want your advertising to hit home with your audience, make it good content.  Look at what DeepFocus did for the new Mad Men series, it gave the audience something we wanted (I’m one of the many fans), and we responded by spreading the word in hordes.

This is why I’m pretty psyched about the recent Elmo’s Tickle Hands program that we at DraftFCB launched. It’s tied to a product, but it’s something great for the audience. Free, cute, “Ticklegrams” for Facebook users to send their friends, without having to install even an application (which to me feels almost unheard of on Facebook). It’s something valuable, and it conveys the message. It’s advertising as content.

Disclaimer: The postings on this site are my own thoughts and opinions and do not necessarily represent the positions, strategies or opinions of The Interpublic Group of Companies, Inc, Draftfcb, Inc. or their clients.