
Why is digital advertising so lousy? Industry is too smug to innovate. - mjfern
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/29/AR2010052900287.html
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modeless
The biggest problem with online advertising is what happens _after_ you click.
Every time an extremely specific ad dumps you into a generic landing page or
(worse) search results, that tells you "clicking on ads is a waste of my
time". Every time an ad makes false promises of any kind ("PS3 for $21.97",
"You won a prize", etc), it reduces the effectiveness of _all_ online
advertising because it conditions people to mistrust ads.

I think the only way to combat this is to have "branded" ads with guaranteed
quality. Google AdSense was the first example of branded ads online (that I
know of); they had a unique style that indicated "these ads are different".
Unfortunately the style was quickly copied. The only solution to the copying
problem is to brand ads with a trademark, e.g. "ads by Google".

The quality of AdSense ads has deteriorated over time, so "ads by Google"
isn't a real indicator of quality any more, but I think the concept is good
and there's room for a new "ad brand" that only accepts real quality ads. Ads
that are honest, funny, pretty, respectful, and most of all take you somewhere
good when you click. Perhaps iAd could be it.

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sekou
I think it's odd when online television shows have the same advertisement at
every commercial break.

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DilipJ
Repetition is the best way to get the message into the heads of viewers. For
example, if I asked you about a specific ad that ran on "60 Minutes" on CBS
tonight (assuming you watched it), you might have trouble recollecting it
since it was but one of many. But if it was on Hulu, which repeats the same ad
over and over at each break, it would probably stick in your head longer.

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SilianRail
Do you have evidence to support this?

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bdickason
He's correct that repetition does drive things into our memory. This is the
whole idea behind 'behavioral advertising' (google it for full explanation).

The theory: If a user has visited Amazon.com and browsed Digital Cameras
lately, I'm going to drop a cookie and pass that to my ad server so that
whenever he goes to Dictionary.com, I can show him an Amazon.com Digital
Camera ad.

It's quite effective (has worked on me before).

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rigard
I posted this on the article's comments:

Well I can gather two things from this article. 1, the Washington Post is very
definitely not involved in the digital advertising industry; 2, the Washington
Post does not deal with a decent digital marketing agency.

"Lazy" is a remarkably strong term for many agencies whom, in my experience,
often work around the clock to deliver on tight deadlines and low budgets, as
clients still do not consider digital as important as above-the-line media.
With extreme constraints, some of the most interesting conceptual work tends
to come from digital agencies, who are forced to push limits in a constantly
changing environment, with high demands from an intelligent user base who are
not interested in simplistic and overdone banner advertising (which seems to
be the focus of this article!).

Innovation is exactly the name of the game when it comes to digital marketing.
Take Farfar's tremendously successful campaign for Diesel
(<http://www.farfar.se/awards/cannes2007/heidies/>), or R/GA's Nike+ campaign,
which received numerous awards and incredible ROI (Google it), or Crispin
Porter and Refresh Partners' Whopper Sacrifice Facebook campaign for Burger
King, that was so successful in its execution that Facebook had to kill the
application, or even AKQA's campaign for VW, which relied on nothing but an
iPhone app
([http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=324848336756&r...](http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=324848336756&ref=mf))

These are but a few of the very successful, innovative, forward-thinking
digital marketing campaigns and strategies out there, that are so far beyond a
simple banner ad and truly identify the kind of industry that digital is all
about. The question "Why is digital advertising so lousy?" is a useless
question, and is simply responded to by the fact that only lousy digital
advertising is lousy, very similar to lousy advertising in other types of
media. Just think of the pamphlets that are handed out on streets, or left
under your car's windscreen wiper, or the terrible infomercials on TV or
adverts with bad acting, or big billboards with no thought behind them.

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erik
The article raises some interesting points, but I don't think it explains why
traditional advertising generates so much more revenue than digital
advertising. Is print advertising overpriced? Are digital ads an inferior
format? Is it perceived value? What explains the huge difference?

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glhaynes
Certainly seems a smug industry, based on this article in Advertising Week:
"Memo to Steve Jobs: the IAd Is No Miracle Worker"
<http://adage.com/digitalnext/article?article_id=144050>

paraphrased: "Jobs says online ads suck? We've got our best people working on
that suck, I'll have him know."

We'll see...

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sh1mmer
I think the first point is utter hooey. Online advertising is worth less than
online for two reasons

1\. It's measurable. Unlike print it's not about the number of people who
_may_ have seen your ad. Its about the number of people who did, or even who
clicked. That's a big difference. Companies aren't wicking to apply the
traditional brand marketing fullsnto online.

2\. Kids are much more banner blind then previous generations. They have grown
up saturated by ads and ha e developed banner blindness. However because of
point 1 this now has a direct impact on the bottom line of the publisher.

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abalashov
You mean: worth less than print? :)

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sh1mmer
Yeah. I shouldn't comment while jetlagged and on my iPad. I still think it's a
valid point though.

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commieneko
Not too smug; the word is lazy. Smugness is a cover for lack of imagination
and drive.

And it's human nature. Most want to turn the crank, the same as they did
yesterday, collect their pellet, and strut around the barnyard. Nothing wrong
with that as a life plan, but it's not the way to innovate or change your
business.

~~~
bdickason
I would argue that people in advertising are not smug or (abnormally) lazy.
They are scared.

For every great advertising campaign that ends up all over
twitter/facebook/etc, there are 10 that bring consumer complaints, shame, and
a negative image. People are scared to try new things because their client
might get mad and fire them.

To understand why this mentality exists, you need to get the 'media
landscape.'

The Client - Whoever is paying for the advertising. This could be Pepsi, Coke,
or Trojan. Generally the actual person is a high-powered marketing exec with a
VP+ title.

The Media Agency - A middle-man group that manages the 'campaign' on behalf of
the client. They recruit the different groups involved, pay them a bit, and
run all the numbers for the client. In the end, they are judged on 1-2
'metrics' that the client cares about. This could be 'Performance' (# of ads
clicked vs. ads viewed), 'Engagement' (# of times people click the play button
in a video player, for example), or 'Share of Voice' (percentage of a
website's views in a given time period that the brand owns).

The Media Agency boss is generally a 40-something advertising hotshot. He is
hands off on nearly everything once his company signs an exclusive deal with
the brand.

The Media Agency worker is generally a 20-23 year old who couldn't decide on a
major in college so they went with 'international business.' They don't really
use the internet much and are judged solely on the metrics mentioned above.

In the end, advertising deals are closed based on: -Buying the agency a
stripper or tickets to a hockey game -Being friends with someone at the agency
-Being a website that someone at the agency visits every day

I can go into a ton more detail on things like the ridiculous 'RFP Process,'
Creative Agencies, and other stupid advertising things if the interest is
there.

p.s. I've worked in online advertising for the past 3 years and have no idea
wtf the word 'media' means.

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smokinn
I think their fear stems from something else entirely. While what you mention
is indeed a factor, I think the greatest factor is the fact that on the
internet, ROI can be calculated. The metrics are much more precise and I have
a feeling that there's been a _LOT_ more money spent on advertising than was
ever justified.

I think this is just the effects of greater transparency on the client side.
When the client can measure effectiveness, advertising prices plummet. I think
the current dismal advertising revenue on the internet is actually what
advertising revenue should've been all along.

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patio11
To elaborate: If text ads are cheaper and demonstrably more effective than
multimedia ads, and text ads can be created by literally typing for five
seconds and letting the computer pick which line works best, then what does
this imply for the careers of the Big Thinkers at the ad agencies?

Here's a scary prospect: most insurance companies could fire everybody they
have working in advertising, replace them with one 22 year old English major
tasked with writing PPC copy, and _make hundreds of millions of dollars_.

I don't think we're necessarily overspending on advertising... we're just
overspending on _ineffective_ advertising.

~~~
bdickason
I agree that on a straight CTR calculation, ad agencies could make a killing
on text ads.

However, I also firmly believe that you have to pay more to effectively reach
certain people.

Example: Men tune out banner ads. Especially internet-savvy ones. If you want
to reach them, you have to either do something incredibly cool (like
sponsoring FilePlanet to have no download queues for a day or Virgin America
to have free in-flight wireless) or incredibly annoying (like those big
'stunts' you see on nytimes.com occasionally).

