Do online ads pose a big creative threat?
The media world has long propagated the view that placing ads in the right place is the key to success.
Ever more so with the advent of digital, and especially social media, with its vaunted precision targeting capability.
The content of the communication often seems to be of secondary importance and would appear to have little bearing on proceedings.
When considering placing a TVC online, a client recently asked a difficult question. ‘Will this be effective in the first five seconds because I am told that after that short time most people will click it off?’
A recent Skype conversation with a friend conducted under tight time constraints made it impossible for me to refute his theory.
When going to YouTube to send a link, my friend suddenly exploded, ‘When Google bought YouTube they (expletive) it up for everyone! Now it’s impossible to see anything without first being assailed with a (expletive) barrage of ads!’ Why was my usually so even-tempered friend suddenly so furious? It is hard to get a positive response to any message when someone is in that frame of mind.
Obviously the fury was as a result of being interrupted and delayed while performing an act he considered both important and urgent. It made me reflect on the fact that the different dynamics between online and traditional media might be greater than I first thought.
Our minds have long accepted that there will be commercial breaks when we are watching television, and that there will be a good portion of ads in our newspaper and magazine pages. Our minds are programmed and pre-set to accommodate that – we might mentally switch off when a TV commercial runs. And we might quickly turn the ad-filled page, but we do so with equanimity because we are relaxing and, crucially, we are not being interrupted while per- forming a task.
The former is like an expected stranger entering the room; the latter is like an unexpected stranger pushing us aside to enter our personal space.
David Ogilvy’s How to create advertising that sells may have long been considered outdated dogma in many parts of the advertising world, yet ironically, his advice to make the first three or four seconds of a television commercial attention-grabbing and also intriguing, in order to retain interest, might now be even more important than ever before. And, especially in light of the above, more enjoyable and likable than ever.
So while having a media schedule that hits the right target is always essential, the key to overcoming resistance and rejection – in other words the key to success – can only be the engaging charm of the content itself.