To my handful of readers: Rumours of my death have been exaggerated. Not quite as much as those of Gordon Lightfoot, but nonetheless. While there have been a lot of things happening in the world recently, there’s been little time for me to comment on them. I’ll attempt to remedy that in the future.

This article caught my eye today: Online Advertising Revenues Climb Out Of The Trough, Boosted By Search, Display, And Video

I found it interesting because I work in an industry closely tied to online advertising. But how close? Without going too far into the details, my employer is in the Digital Signage space. Thus every piece of media we produce either links to, or connects with advertising in some way shape or form. But is it online? What does that even mean anymore?

In my previous post, I suggested we do away with the term “Digital” as its meaning has become too convoluted and disconnected from reality to have any… well… meaning. I propose the same with “Online.” On the surface, it seems like a term with a fairly clean and simple meaning; you’re either online, or offline. Or are you?

Smartphones, wifi, GPS, Satellite Radio, RFID, Web-enabled TV, …Web-enabled FRIDGES. All of these have rendered the idea of being “offline” almost meaningless. If you lose your network connection to your desk/laptops, its entirely possible that you have a completely separate connection available on your mobile devices. Even newspapers are becoming ever more available on eReaders and mobiles.

As far as advertising goes, what this means is that the distinction between “online” and “offline” also needs to change. “Offline” advertising then, is essentially anything on paper or slapped up on a wall. Everything else… EVERYTHING is online. So what this makes me think, is that if “online” ad revenue is starting to “climb out of a trough” (especially during the current climate), what on Earth is happening to ad dollars from other “traditional” or “offline” forms of media? Further, now that you can have circuitry embedded in the surface layer of a contact lens, how long will it be before display advertising can be targetted to specific eyeballs?

Why would you even bother with paper or brick-and-mortar advertising at that point?

…is that (unfortunately) they don’t resonate with the majority of the North American audience.

Now, a few points I need to clarify here:

1) I’m in North America.
2) I’m not calling the general public a bunch of morons. … …
3) I’m not under the impression that this is a ‘new’ idea.

I’ve been going through the archives at http://www.ibelieveinadv.com/ and I just started to notice that whenever I’d smile and nod, savouring that “a-ha” moment that really good ads are known for inducing, it would be due to one of the non-North American teams at BBDO, Publicis, Oglivy etc etc etc… Seldom were those moments the result of an ad that was grown and cultivated here on this side of the pond.

This post however, is not about the differences between the North American market and… pretty much the rest of the world. I just wanted to make a few observations about ads that make me wonder about them for a little while after I’ve seen them, and the effect that has on the brand the ad is trying to represent. It tends to be the rule rather than the exception, that advertisers want their customers to “get it” immediately after they consume one of their ads. Sometimes, that actually works:

There’s an instant connection/spark/kick to the groin upon delivering their message. However if this fails, well then you can always resort to plan B; play the ad 10-15 times an hour, plaster it within view of any moving organism with a pair of eyes and shove it in every paper publication available on the news stand in order to beat your message over the heads of the public.

Or… you can do something like this (click the image to go directly to the IBIA site):

Now I’m completely open to the fact that I may just be obtuse and I didn’t “get it” instantly. But those of you that (like me) looked at it for a bit and went “…what?” will know what I mean. The internal monologue in my head switched on, and I started to wonder about what exactly was going on here.

There’s a shirt, a tie… a rather extreme closeup of said things. Hmm… It’s for Clearasil. They’re an acne cream. There’s not much of the guys face in the ad. “Say hello to the mirror…” What does that mean? … That guy’s collar’s kinda weird. You’d think he would ha-…

Now here’s an ad that just got me to stare at it for about the same length of time as an average television spot, and all it had in it was a picture of a shirt and a tie (and some stubbly dude). Is this going to have the same effect on me as an ad that repeats… *ahem* ad nauseum (sorry), or one that appeals to my sense of kitsch like a cute ol’ grandma wondering about the location of misplaced beef? Perhaps, perhaps not. I suppose the real question is, what kind of brainpower does one need to apply towards perceiving an ad (active or passive) before that ad becomes ‘effective’? Further, if both types of perception result in increased sales, does it really matter?

As usual, leaving you with more questions than answers,… cheers.

They have the ability to lie dormant for years, re-activated for any one of a thousand strange reasons. Maybe you’re at a party and someone whistles 3 or four notes that force you to stop and try and remember their origin for days. Or perhaps you’ve heard someone utter a cryptic pop-culture phrases like “Where’s the Beef?” or “Mikey Likes It!”. Whatever the reason, there’s a good chance that if you grew up in front of the boob tube, part of your subconscious is now permanently etched with countless slogans and catchphrases used to market just about everything, from Ketchup to Cars.

Think you’re different? Think your psyche’s been cleansed for the better? …

(I’m sure just those 3 videos, or any of the ones linked above, will no doubt cause a 3 hour YouTube session. You can thank me later.)

This was just a fun little post. There’s no deep analysis here. No probing question for you all to chew on. Except for maybe one. Despite their overall quality, what makes these old ads so … “appealing” 10, 20, or 30 years down the road? What is it about nostalgia that makes us praise and treasure something that was seemingly worthless and annoying (regardless of how catchy it was) when it was created?. Further, which ones are destined to become the next batch of guilty pleasures that will make future generations question their own sanity?

In the last post, I attempted to guess at the future of advertising with respect to the gaming experience. I suggested a scenario whereby you’d be able to order a pizza while playing a game, without ever having to leave the gamespace. Well, it turns out that this was in fact attempted (sort of) by Sony and Pizza Hut back in 2005. While playing EverQuest II, as a player you could enter a command into the system which would then bring up the Pizza Hut website.

This is not exactly what I had mind, as all this really does is launch a web browser which is outside the game world. But it was certainly a step in the right direction. Merging elements of real life into the game environment is something that’s evolved over the last few years, and it’s been met with equal amounts of positive and negative feedback from both consumers and game developers. The major concern amongst the gaming community is that the inclusion of marketing material into a game detracts from its creative value; if you put an ad for Coke or Pepsi into a game, the entire game essentially becomes one giant advertisement. On the other hand, the industry has to be open to different revenue models that will allow it to remain competitive. At the end of the day, someone has to get compensated. So where’s the middle ground?

Well, there are some companies that have been trying to strike a balance. IBM, SonyBMG (there’s that name again), and Nike among others have all set up permanent residence within SecondLife, an online world which has been eluding a specific definition since its inception in 2003.

Once a brand makes a transition like this into a virtual world, it changes in a way that marketers and gamers don’t fully understand yet. If you walk into a store “in the real world”, you interact with a brand. It’s the goal of advertising to make this happen (in order to facilitate a transaction). If you “walk” into a store in SecondLife, the distinction between marketing and brand-interaction becomes blurred. If you end up making a transaction, the experience is really no different than if you walked into a physical store.

The difference between SecondLife and other online worlds however, is that SecondLife has no inherent storyline. There’s no plot distract from, which makes advertising seem less intrusive. It’s almost part of the experience itself. The open ended nature of many modern online games allows for the same kind of “freedom” when it comes to in-game ads. As players find themselves in between a particular set of tasks within the game, they usually congregate in common areas, which provide prime opportunities for advertisers to engage them. At this point, it’s merely up to the advertisers to do what they’ve always been tasked with doing: Provide consumers with an engaging message that persuades them to [trans]act. This doesn’t mean billboards and banners, which seem to be the predominant form of IGA (in game ads) right now. This means being as immersed within the game world as the gamers are. This means understanding their behaviour, and responding to it in a way that is as engaging as the game itself.

An example of such behaviour involves something as simple as traveling within the game world. One of the more tedious aspects of online gaming involves plodding/flying/otherwise moving from place to place. Such a thing can take several minutes, hours, or in some cases, days. So what if a company like RedBull offered an in-game service that would take the player to their desired destination (giving them wings as it were… sorry) for a nominal price (real or virtual)?

Makes sense, no?

“The State of PC Gaming.”

It’s one of the more recent debates that’s polarized both consumers and game developers. There’s been a sharp decline in the variety of titles on store shelves, which themselves have yielded floor space to console games. At the same time, subscriptions to popular titles like World of Warcraft and Lord of the Rings Online are quite high. Whether it’s dying, growing, stagnating, or recovering, there’s only one thing that most people can seem to agree upon; it’s changing. Scratch that… it’s changed. In fact, I can’t think of anything significant about PC gaming that’s remained the same in the last 3-5 years. But that’s actually a good thing, for those differences have allowed PC games to survive for as long as they have.

The past:

Walk into a retail outlet, buy a game off the shelf. Return home, begin the install process. Check the manufacturer website for the latest game patches. Check your PC component specs to ensure that they’re also up to date. Once you’re in the game, the usual single player vs multiplayer options present themselves, and then off you go. After an average 30-40 hours of play (single player), the title is essentially expired, and it’s off to the retail outlet once again. The only exception to this would have happened if you were involved with the still rather niche FPS genre (Counterstrike, Battlefield 1942, Unreal Tournament), or with MMORPGs which were in their adolescence at the time.

The present:

Download a full game from the manufacturer’s website, or though distribution channels like Steam and Stardock. Launch the game and wait for it to automatically update itself, verify compatibility with your system, and connect to a group of servers. Then decide if you want to pay for it. … That’s right. Lots of games are offered virtually free of charge, supported by in-game advertising, graduated subscriptions or other forms of user segmentation. Further, these same channels also allow you to centralize game/community settings, character configurations, and even hook into already established social networks in order to enrich the entire gaming experience.

The future… is anyone’s guess, and here’s mine:

As game platforms evolve, so will their content and their methods of distribution (regardless of genre), and the popularity of the MMO format will continue to inform this transformation. While this is happening, there will be a convergence between the offline and online identities of gamers themselves. The notion of a gamers “Profile” will carry more and more weight. You’ll no longer purchase “a game”. You’ll adopt a another brand which you can then apply to your profile. “John Doe the FPS player” becomes “John Doe the adventurer” with consistency in the way their online identity looks and [perhaps] performs in the new game environment. That environment will continue to integrate different (and hopefully engaging) forms of in-game advertising, in order to sustain the financial growth for the different franchises that choose to be a part of it. Imagine a scenario where you actually order a pizza from within a game environment like Grand Theft Auto, or the Sims, and it shows up to your front door. The advantages to this multiplicity favour both the gamer and the manufacturer (not to mention the marketer). If this model does indeed develop, the information associated with a player’s profile becomes that much more valuable. Granted, the requisite privacy issues will have to be ironed out, but those issues are omnipresent in any case.

To say that “PC gaming is dying/ has died” is to fail to recognize that a PC is merely a manifestation of technology, which continues to change. Arcades have all but disappeared from the planet, but you can still find just about every single game they provided a home for with a quick search online.

A very familiar face has been in the news recently, though I’d be willing to bet few people actually know his name. In fact, I’d bet that even after mentioning Vince Schlomi, most people would still be at a loss to figure out exactly where he was from. That is, until you see a picture of him.

Vince Shlomi. aka: The ShamWow Guy

Vince Shlomi, aka: The ShamWow Guy was arrested recently and is alleged to have assaulted a prostitute. You can read all about the sordid details here: at the Smoking Gun website. As this made the rounds on the internet, it got me thinking about infomercials themselves. You wouldn’t have much trouble getting consensus over the fact that the vast majority of them are absolute train-wrecks. Formulaic, half-baked scenarios encrusted with bad acting, with a nice thick syrupy coating of dubious promises and happy days ahead.

And this is also probably why they work. Little known, but omnipresent companies like Thane Direct and Interwood Direct Marketing are the companies responsible for the vast majority of infomercials that flood the airwaves when any sane individual should just be drifting off to sleep. They’re also responsible for raking in a LOT of money (it’s hard to track down actual numbers for these giants, but it doesn’t take an accountant to take a guess at profits for either behemoth.)

I guess the question is, why is it that we give infomercials so much leeway for being so utterly horrible? Why do we glue our eyes to the screen to watch these pitchmen try to sell us miracles of modern technology that amount to no more than your average chamois, blender, or reasonably sharp knife? There’s got to be a reason why we expect a different calibre of advertisement from a car company or a even a shampoo manufacturer, than we do from Vince or his colleagues.

HI! I'M BILLY MAYS!

I actually don’t think we have to look very far to find a workable theory. The problem is that it suggests a schizoid break between the way we’d like to perceive ourselves, and the way that we actually behave. It’s something that marketers have known for years.

We all want to be sold to.

But, we also hate salesmen, no? The very mention of the term instantly triggers visions of a fedora topped gentleman in a bad suit knocking on your door, trying to sell you a vacuum in the middle of Vietnam (true story, a friend of mine actually does this for a living). But at the same time, perhaps there’s some sliver of psychological need hidden in Maslow’s pyramid that we haven’t yet discovered. You know, if you uhm… subscribe to that particular theory anyways. There’s got to be a reason why someone with a particular cadence in their voice and a flair for the dramatic can capture your attention and dazzle you as they make a waffle in 15 seconds. Maybe it’s the sense of a challenge. We’re all reasonably intelligent individuals. “Alright sure, if you think you can woo me with some fancy talk and an hassle-free payment plan, then be my guest.” Or, perhaps the same part of the brain that’s responsible for the food dehydrator you have hidden away in the back of your cupboard with your sense of shame and defeat, is also the one that feeds your pleasure center. Your guilty pleasure center that is.

Looks a little ... underwhelming when you get it home, doesn't it?

Whatever the reason might be, the future seems bleak for those of us convinced that humanity has, or ever will evolve beyond the need for some degree of state-fair pageantry in advertising. It seems there will always be a provider for that coveted 3am – 5am time slot, now home to Mr. T, Jack Lalaine, and … that girl that was Chrissy’s cousin on Three’s Company.is

I figure the first post on this blog should explain the name, which in turn should give readers a sense of what it’s all about. In the 1998 film Pi written and directed by Darren Aronofsky, protagonist Max Cohen is seen sitting in a cafe explaining to onlooker Lenny Myer that when you divide each successive number in the Fibonacci sequence into one another, the result “approaches Theta.” He then explains that Theta is a Greek symbol representing one of the key numbers in mathematics linked to The Golden Ratio, a mysterious and profound concept that manifests itself across several aspects of our Universe.

What’s interesting is that (like many ideas derived from the movies) this is only partially true. In actuality, the symbol Phi is more closely linked to this concept than Theta. But unless you’re either versed in mathematics or take the interest to research it further (the latter applies to me), you’d be among those confidently distributing “the Theta hypothesis” at your next dinner party.

What I’ve realized is that there are a lot of similarities to this albeit unintended deception in the world of Digital Marketing, a world that I’ve been a part of for the last several years. At some point, we’ve all met a Max Cohen who attempts to explain a concept like Online Segmentation or CPM ad campaigns, but fails to do so because of errors in communication or what have you. We’ve all been in Lenny’s shoes, blindly adopting the explanation and treating it as gospel. In fact as far as the world of Digital Marketing is concerned, I’d wager that there are thousands of Theta hypotheses out there, influencing corporate decisions and consumer behavior.

The important question doesn’t really have to do with the perceived “wrongness” of such hypotheses though. I think there’s a lot more value in examining the responses that are generated as a result. Let’s look at the recent atmosphere surrounding two social networking darlings. Facebook has been receiving seriously negative feedback in light of its new layout, whereas Twitter is positioning itself to be the next emerging giant in the marketplace. Should Facebook focus on figuring out “what went wrong”, in order to self-correct? Should they primarily try to understand what Twitter is doing correctly that’s driving their success? Or is there more value in evaluating the landscape for what it is; constantly in flux. It could be that by the time they’ve re-evaluated their Theta hypothesis and executed a new strategy, consumers will have moved on, even beyond Twitter, to the next greatest thing.

The over-arching theme for this blog involves looking at Digital Marketing from that perspective. Rather than wrestling with the semantic innards of concepts like Social Networks, Microsite Campaigns, Mobile Subscriber Turnover and the like, I’ll be discussing how those concepts drive responses and stimulate change (if any) in an industry that refuses to remain static and easily understood.

There’s also the fact that “Approaching Phi” was a rather unwieldy blog name. But I digress.

Enjoy.