When I jumped over to Digg this morning a new McDonalds campaign was being displayed displayed:
Check out this morning’s early risers:
Stories so fresh they’re not on the homepage yet
It’s nothing flashy, but it’s clever enough that it made me smile, and even made me consider going downstairs to get an Egg McMuffin. And really, that’s all it needed to do.
post-script: I do seem to have an infatuation with advertising on Digg lately- they just seem to be making real progress with campaigns that fit for their audience
Recently Mashable started running a series of “Seizing Opportunities” videos with their sponsor UPS. The ads are done in white-board style, feature the usual UPS music, and focus on a social media topics that Mashable editors can speak to in a useful way in just a few minutes. As an execution I was already impressed, but it turns out the Mashable program is just one piece of UPS’s overall content strategy. The bigger picture can be seen on the UPS “Popurls brown edition: The Dashboard for Business News” page. Here UPS has created a valuable content hub designed to help their customers with everything they need to know about business – curated news on specific topics, “seizing opportunities” videos from a variety of content partners that can speak with expertise on specific topics, and their own commercials.
All together it seems like UPS has come up with a killer strategy. They’re utilizing key strategic partners like Mashable to create custom content that’s tailor suited for Mashable’s audience and also manages to be synergistic with the ideal UPS customer – a business person looking for business solutions. This same custom solution is being built out with TechDirt, VentureBeat, and other niche blogs. Then it’s all being aggregated to provided a very valuable, well rounded solution center for their consumers- all while ingraining the catchy UPS soundtrack & logo into the customer’s head for quick reminder when their packaging & shipping needs arise. Proving once and again that producing valuable content is the best strategy.
While brand teams are working harder to make their advertising valuable content for their potential consumers, social media sites are working to turn their social media content into valuable advertising. Sites like Digg that harvest user generated content have historically found advertising challenging because the unpredictable nature of the user contributions; Digg’s new ad format Digg Content Ads is solving for this, though, by letting brands curate historical articles into a topical banner ad that is a win for everyone involved. (more…)
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.
Online video. Facebook. Twitter. The Internet. It’s no secret that these digital communication tools often puzzle brands. Mostly for good reason, as consumers are sharing, talking and connecting in ways never before seen. The number of tools marketers have access to is growing everyday. Online video is basically old hat compared to some of the new tools; load it up, tag it, and post it on a number of video networks. So, imagine my surprise when a video for one of our properties, a diet & health website, got a rejection notice for a very basic video recap of the latest episode of The Biggest Loser tv show.
Oops. Your video “Coleen Skeabeck Presents Biggest Loser Recap Season 7 episode 14″ was rejected because it contains a written, spoken, or implied message soliciting the viewer to click the ad at the end, which is in violation of this section of our Member Agreement.
After the jump is a screen shot of the video where Coleen says “Don’t forget to check us out on Twitter” with a Twitter url in the lower third. (more…)
Earlier this month, the Online Publishers Association announced that a broad set of its members would be adopting new larger ad units. The initial list of participants is fairly impressive, including more than 2 dozen top tier publishers such as CNN, The NY Times, WSJ Network and ESPN. The full list of publishers reaches over 66% of the total Internet audience, or roughly 108 million visitors. These heavy hitters are adding some truly massive units to their arsenal of ad units.
The “Fixed Panel” – a 336×860 pixel banner. It’s wider than standard skyscraper and follows users as they scroll down the page.
The “XXL” – a 468×648 pixel box with expandable video capability.
The “Pushdown” – a 970×418 pixel unit that takes up over half of a page before rolling up.
There’s little doubt that these ads performed in tests leading to rollout. On a limited basis I’m sure they resulted in a lift in CTR, engagement, and possibly even conversions or transactions. It’s hard to disagree with the OPA’s intent to foster innovation and efficacy in the online space, but this particular move is a dangerous one that could easily backfire in the long term.
I am a Senior Strategist at SS+K. I handle digital & social media strategy for a number of clients. I also keep a personal blog here. View Kevin Skobac's profile
View Kevin Skobac's profile