Hey Everybody,
Just read this article in Ad Age. And I totally agree. It is not the programming that makes people skim the program. It is the ads. Intrusiveness (once our goal) is now associated with the idea of Spam. We have got to do better. Hopefully this article will be the straw that broke the traditional camel’s back for some more advertising people and we can see some more engaging initiatives instead of interrupting.

It’s the Ads, Stupid

MediaWorks Viewpoint: Viewers Are Avoiding Ads, not Programs. The Networks Get It. The Ad Agencies Don’t.

By Gene DeWitt

Published: May 16, 2008

As I think back over the last four decades of TV advertising that I’ve experienced as an advertising professional, one thought predominates: A key aspect of the phenomenal power of the medium is that in the past even mediocre ads could effectively sell products and build brands.

We called this intrusiveness. Before the remote control, it took quite an effort for a viewer to get up and to flip the dial, standing around hoping for a better program alternative. Today of course the audience has a great deal more control over the ad exposure and is increasingly exercising it to zip by commercials or avoid them entirely.

Read the Rest on Ad Age.

Talk to you later,

William Flavell

Hey Everybody,

I just read Advertising Age’s Seach Marketing Fact Pack of 2007. It is a really cool resource of facts, stats and more on search and search engine marketing. It also has some cool stuff on SEO. I just think that it can be a great tool for anyone in advertising to sell this practice to the C-Suite or to a client. This fact pack also has a great business breakdown of the top 5 search engines: Google, Yahoo, MSN, AOL, and ASK.

Favorite Stat:

From the “Budget Being Shifted to Search Marketing” section. 20% percent responded that their budgets came from Print Magazine advertising.

Most Humorous Factoid:

In the “Top Sites by Share of Visits by Category” under “Health” Viagra.com was number three. WOW! That is a lot of ED searching.

Anyway get the Search Marketing Pack here: searchfactpack2007.

Enjoy,

William Flavell