The ad industry is causing their own cancer. Can they now create the antidote?
In the old days if you didn’t like an ad you just turned the page or changed the channel. Circa 2015 your phone / tablet doesn’t have the juice for bandwidth sucking, malware installing, bad ads. Neither does your browser [In case you’ve never checked under the Chrome hood. Lots going on. Geeze!!]
In addition, your phone’s personal. You paid for it. You hold it close to your face. It’s expensive. And you can sorta customize it.
Enter “ad blocking”. Apple, which has the largest market cap in history [$700B], recently gave the nod to ad blocking. This will now expand beyond the kids and techie set of current users to the yoga mom everyone that everyone wants to sell digital Black Friday – or is it Cyber Monday? Whatever. No matter.
There is a long, likely slow, light at the end of this tunnel.
- Better ads: Make better ads. Someone either destroy the ability to create and post the Belly Flab “…with this one weird trick” ad, or remove internet access to anyone who’s ever clicked on it. L2 inc. knows what we’re talking about.
- Pre-roll: Stop making me watch 1 min pre-roll. If I have the option of “Skip this ad in 3, 2, 1”, I’m going to do it. So, tell me what you’re selling first thing. Geico said YES to this tactic. From there, if the ad is fun, I’ll have a go.
- “Content”: now just a word for “ads”, can work, too. RedBull owns this in their category.
- Product placements: Sure. Though, anyone really believe James Bond driving a Ford Fusion in Casino Royale? Exactly. Swing / miss.
- Bots: Fake traffic? This trend is real. There’s even companies now that can fight that fight for you. That said, even if 50% of your traffic is fake, the conversation is really about assessing the value of the good 50%. Your CPM might actually be priced appropriately.
- SEO: You might have just spent $2m with an SEO company to ensure top results. Maybe you’re still not #1. But did you sell more widgets this season? If the answer is yes, stop worrying and learn to love the bomb, so to speak. [Though, if you want to hide a dead body, page 2 of Google is a perfect place.]
This Redef piece has a few gems, as long as you can suspend disbelief for prognostication. [Now go immediately to your Twitter account and furiously rebuke any point that helps sell more of what you sell. Social loves outrage. Your brand metrics will go wild.]
The internet punishes intrusiveness. You clog my sink, I get upset. Players beware.
