Filed under: Branding | Tags: advertising, agency, Branding, business, campaign, change, client, communications, integration, marketing, media, Oxygen, Red Bull, Sony Ericsson, stealth marketing, trends
Once upon a time, ask anybody what media was and most of us would probably rattle off the usual few – TV, radio, the worldwide web, and the list was finite at least.
Not that these media channels are not powerful anymore. They definitely are. But perhaps, they’re just not enough anymore, if not now – at least some day in the future.
1) For one, it’s how we’re using them.
Recently, I attended an interesting session by a media owner and one recurring issue kept arising. Many clients and agencies tend to take a ‘one size fits all’ approach for integrated campaigns. One common approach, for instance, is to adapt a TVC (TV commercial) for OOH (out-of-home or outdoor) use and digital.
Of course there are almost always very valid reasons for taking this ‘one size fits all’ approach such as budget constraints or short lead times. Unfortunately, as with most things in life, there’s always a price to pay to every decision.
In doing that, are we wasting the media spend altogether? Because we are not using that media channel optimally? For instance, a 30 second commercial may be well and good for TV, but if the same 30 second commercial were to play in OOH, where you have people’s attention for only 5 – 10 seconds, would the message really get through? In that case, would the OOH spend be wasted? Is this ‘one size fits all’ approach really all that cost efficient, after all?
2) Oh, those defensive consumers!
Traditional media channels have the reach and circulation, which are highly important, for sure, and which continue to drive results. But increasingly, perhaps we have to begin questioning reach figures, because even if the TV set is turned on and the consumer is staring at the screen, does it necessarily mean that the message is getting through to him/ her?
Maybe I’m a difficult consumer (I don’t think I’m alone though) – when commercial time begins, I either run off to grab a drink or I mentally switch off, allowing this barrier in my mind to screen out everything that I see on the screen. My eyes are on the screen but my mind has floated somewhere else… to a conversation I had earlier with someone or to somebody I miss – anything but the commercial before my eyes. 
That’s why I believe that eventually, searching for new media channels in the form of stealth marketing will become increasingly important.
When that happens, your media channel can be that beautiful blonde by the bartop asking you to buy her a particular brand of alcohol or it can be the pile of empty cans in trash cans around the city (yes, Red Bull really did that) or it can be that troupe of actors posing as tourists, asking passers-by to take photos of them using the Sony Ericsson T68i phone or even ice-cream trucks giving out labeled popsicles with information on upcoming broadcasts (Oxygen – the women’s cable network did that).
For more on stealth marketing and alternate ‘media channels’, you can check out the article in Time magazine (‘It’s an Ad, Ad, Ad World’) by Daniel Eisenberg here.
3) But but but… how do we justify the budget?
If you notice the date of Daniel Eisenberg’s article, it goes all the way back to 2002! Yet, even today – it’s not all that often that we witness campaigns using such radically different channels of communications, do we?
Therein lies the problem with using alternate media channels – how are we going to justify the expenditure with results and measures of success? Especially when they are usually incorporated as part of larger media campaigns alongside TV and digital outreach, for instance. How do you know it’s that Red Bull can in the trash can that made the consumer want to buy Red Bull, and not the Red Bull website?
Still, I believe that eventually, as traditional media channels become increasingly cluttered, ‘desperate’ clients and agencies may need to start looking for alternate forms of media – including rubbish in trash cans! The trick behind these alternate media channels is that consumers were not expecting to find messages there and your messages get through more easily because their defenses are down. This calls to question ethical considerations I know (which warrants a separate post altogether.) Gradually, creative measures of success will be developed in line with this trend out of necessity.
When that happens, will we be ready? I hope so!
Till that happens and coming back to the present, Happy National Day! (For my overseas readers, it’s Singapore’s birthday today.) God bless Singapore and all of you! 
[Images courtesy of: ignite social media, istock, and izismile.com]
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