entertainment, media and communications technology is shifting the balance of power from those that own entertainment and media to those that consume it, according to PricewaterhouseCoopers director, Matthew Liebmann. The statement also rings very true for ad agencies.
Yes, we need to create customised online content, not just run a TV or print ad on the internet. Our 2006 Cannes Cyber Lion finalist for Westmead Children’s Hospital utilised online iconography to graphically demonstrate a heart operation, and we’re currently working to develop a highly-interactive site to take this further.
Great online needs to be immersive, offering you the chance to creatively ‘lift the lid’ and explore a brand’s inner workings.
Yet, in my view, the web has forced agencies to confront a much bigger issue than integrating online with the rest of our campaigns. The web has actually caused a seismic shift in communicating a commercial message.
We’re moving from broadcasting to broadcatching, and the change is irreversible.
We can no longer rely on an audience sitting receptively on their couches, happy to absorb content at 8.30pm in nicely-packaged chunks. Broadband means people are increasingly compiling their own content from a variety of possible sources, then storing it to experience at a time that suits them, not the broadcaster.
If we want people to give us time, we’d better be relevant and immersive enough to warrant their attention.
The Land Rover Go Beyond site, created by our Harris Troughton Wunderman office, introduces six channels of content and ties into the brand's adventure race, the Land Rover G4 Challenge. The site offers streaming videos ranging from travelogues of the “Great Palaces of the World”, sports clips like “Free Skiing in the Alps”, lifestyle vignettes about mixing a perfect cocktail in Iceland, and brand ambassadors like tennis player Maria Sharapova and sailor Sir Robin Knox-Johnston.
Our client Ford has also created a fascinating site that’s pertinent to the consumer and impertinent to the category. The warts-and-all www.fordboldmoves.com site ‘tells it like it is’ in a time of rising fuel prices and challenging market conditions. You can see what really makes a brand tick and it’s not all slick marketing veneer.
There’s also a huge opportunity to incorporate gaming into our online communications. Many academics are researching the way information is retained when the brain plays with certain elements, rather than being simply exposed to them in a passive way. Kenneth C. Green from The Claremont Graduate University asks, “How can we do better in our efforts to create engaging and effective electronic instructional content for a generation of students who enjoy learning through gaming?” It’s no coincidence that some of the best online to date is very interactive.
Two of Lester Wunderman’s 19 principles are “encourage interactive dialogues” and “create an advertising curriculum that teaches as it sells”.
For broadcatching in 2006, truer words were never spoken.
