Advertising

Marketing is an inherently analytical field:

"We undertook the following X activity, with the hopes of achieving Y result. We will have some measure to check whether or not we have achieved Y. If we don't achieve Y, we'll take a closer look at X to see where we went wrong."

That last part is the what some marketers like to skip. "If we don't achieve Y, we'll take a closer look at X to see where we went wrong." No one wants to fail, especially if their employer doesn't encourage failure. So how do you ensure you don't fail? Don't measure! As without measurement, neither success or failure is possible.

Not collecting and analyzing results has nothing to do with marketing medium, style, or just plain being bad at math. Not collecting results is a reflection of the marketer's desire not to be seen as a failure.

That's why so many ad agencies do a poor job of measuring their own campaign's success.

My advice? In general, you probably shouldn't hire someone if their main goal is not to be seen as a failure. They tend to work hard at maintain the status quo, which itself has a tendency to remain unchanged. Hence, why pay extra?

Recognizing a mistake isn't a bad thing. Having a calculator on your desk doesn't make you uncreative.

Take a look at the following ads:

Now take a look at the heatmap of the ads

This is a case of design distracting people from the product. A quick change in the eyes of the model corrects the issue. original source via grok

Sorry for the long delay in blog posts - I recently switched jobs (don't worry, it was at my initiation), and have had to focus elsewhere for a short while -

I'm also still having problems with my blog template for a continued unknown reason - hopefully I'll find some free time to get to the bottom of that problem soon.

Anyways, back on topic. For all those viewers who tune in regularly, I was in Scotland last month at the Edinburgh festival. It was a grand time, and I highly recommend you all visit it. It was also a great "case study" in how difficult marketing can be in a highly competitive marketplace.

Hundreds of thousands of people pass through Edinburgh during the festival season, as do thousands upon thousands of acts. In fact, there are so many acts that the light poles get deformed from having such a large quantity of posters stapled on them at eye level:

This causes a big problem: with everyone trying to stand out by having the most posters / flyers handed out, no one really stands out at all, as the consumer (in this case, me) just gets overstimulated by all the commotion. Interestingly enough, some of the performers realized this, and therefore changed their strategy - they adopted more of a Immersive Advertising - making people more aware of their advertisement by better integrating it into their natural surroundings.

Here's one example of immersive advertising for a play about vampires:

Pretty cool, got my attention.

Here is another neat example. One of the shows I saw at the festival was "Macbeth: Who Is That Bloodied Man?", a re imagining of Macbeth using Motorcycle, Stilts, and guns. Very cool show, albeit a little abstract at times. The producer's of Macbeth generated publicity for their show in the classic circus style - by prancing one of the "wacky characters" which are central to their show through the city center at a busy hour.

Those characters were the witches by the way. They were carrying noise makers as well - you know, just in case the fact that they towered 5 feet over you didn't catch your attention.

I found the Macbeth interactive/immersive advertising stunt more effective than the Dracula one.

I didn't really interact with the guy in the coffin. I didn't see anyone actually take a flyer - almost as if everyone thought he was a theatre/art piece. If you look in the photo you'll notice how people just surrounded him, giggled, then walked on. Somewhat of a passive experience.

The Macbeth stilt walkers though, they were mysterious! They were interactive! They passed right by me, not even giving me the option of taking a flyer. I wanted to know more! Who were they, and what were they advertising?

Luckily the Macbeth: Who is that bloodied man? show was well reviewed, and therefore had enough additional publicity that I was able to put the stilt walker together with the show name. Publicity stunts only really work if there is enough information about the stunt maker floating around that the masses can make the connection.

That being said, I can't say I ended up seeing the show only because of the stilt walker - it happened to be very well reviewed as well. But there is no question it did play a part in my decision.

I mean heck - at least I knew the show would have a guy walking in stilts!

Interesting Article over at Slate about The History of Racism in Marketing.