was a blast. It was my first time to speak and act as a panelist, and my three co-panelists -- Tom Ajello of Agency.com, Lars Bastholm from AKQA, and Jeff Benjamin of CP+B -- and moderator Mike Donahue of the AAAA were cool and fun to speak with. And smart as hell, each of 'em.
I hope I get another chance.
Sunday, November 13, 2005
Wednesday, October 26, 2005
Where would you place
the line of accountability among the advertiser, the publisher, and, say, your third-party rich-media vendors?
The first line of accountability rests upon the data and influence gained during the consumer dialogue. Some just post a privacy policy, some call it ‘data transparency,’ others call it responsible business. A few years ago most everyone began asking users to opt in. Later, with the failed credibility of corporate America and the ongoing media hunt for suspect data usage, it’s more than courteous. It’s obligatory.
Now we see that any time the user steps in or around something we create, it’s more probable that they’ll be irritated than turned on. Thus, everyone on the team must understand the end-objective and build an atmosphere that (with luck and talent) reliably spits out brilliance.
The second line of accountability is toward each link of the client-agency-publisher chain, with an eye on strong relationships along the continuum. This is critical, because when something breaks, no one will pass the buck and most will cooperate in the all-hands-on-deck scenario. Without real shared responsibility, there’s only one true loser: the brand.
Popular logic states that company personnel, at the end of the day, need only feel accountable to their employer. Winning logic states that company personnel should act in the interest of their employer, which makes vital the cooperation among the publisher and the agency and the ad hosts and the IT groups and, of course, the client.
When this happens, you’ll notice the first line of responsibility is somehow automatically fulfilled.
The first line of accountability rests upon the data and influence gained during the consumer dialogue. Some just post a privacy policy, some call it ‘data transparency,’ others call it responsible business. A few years ago most everyone began asking users to opt in. Later, with the failed credibility of corporate America and the ongoing media hunt for suspect data usage, it’s more than courteous. It’s obligatory.
Now we see that any time the user steps in or around something we create, it’s more probable that they’ll be irritated than turned on. Thus, everyone on the team must understand the end-objective and build an atmosphere that (with luck and talent) reliably spits out brilliance.
The second line of accountability is toward each link of the client-agency-publisher chain, with an eye on strong relationships along the continuum. This is critical, because when something breaks, no one will pass the buck and most will cooperate in the all-hands-on-deck scenario. Without real shared responsibility, there’s only one true loser: the brand.
Popular logic states that company personnel, at the end of the day, need only feel accountable to their employer. Winning logic states that company personnel should act in the interest of their employer, which makes vital the cooperation among the publisher and the agency and the ad hosts and the IT groups and, of course, the client.
When this happens, you’ll notice the first line of responsibility is somehow automatically fulfilled.
What can be done
to address the challenges that online marketers face yesterday?
Clients must learn to rely more heavily on both their internal teams and interactive agencies to remain vigilant while they tend to whatever it is they do best.
When an audience or medium shifts, they must be ready to hear their consultants out, move with conviction, and act swiftly.
Without genuine top-down buy-in from clients, improved creative will not have the oxygen to breathe and succeed.
+METAPHOR ALERT+ The work’ll suffocate.
Clients must learn to rely more heavily on both their internal teams and interactive agencies to remain vigilant while they tend to whatever it is they do best.
When an audience or medium shifts, they must be ready to hear their consultants out, move with conviction, and act swiftly.
Without genuine top-down buy-in from clients, improved creative will not have the oxygen to breathe and succeed.
+METAPHOR ALERT+ The work’ll suffocate.
What challenges does the
industry face for improved creative?
Once again, the answer comes down to user experience.
With the growth of those technologies which enable agencies to engage consumers more effectively, so is some other application learning to keep commercial messaging out. Remember, with every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction -- pop-up blocking being the most basic example.
Smart creative shops with foresight will think well outside the machine to earn a coveted “brain bookmark” with their audience members. The others -- what with having to involve (heaven forbid) traditional, direct response, and other kinds of agencies -- will be pulled kicking and screaming into the real-world user’s sphere, probably recognizing too late that this was where they should have been all along.
Once again, the answer comes down to user experience.
With the growth of those technologies which enable agencies to engage consumers more effectively, so is some other application learning to keep commercial messaging out. Remember, with every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction -- pop-up blocking being the most basic example.
Smart creative shops with foresight will think well outside the machine to earn a coveted “brain bookmark” with their audience members. The others -- what with having to involve (heaven forbid) traditional, direct response, and other kinds of agencies -- will be pulled kicking and screaming into the real-world user’s sphere, probably recognizing too late that this was where they should have been all along.
How will web creative
-- and I'm talking EVERYTHING -- change over the next 12 months?
Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity.
Or, for the simple folk, only one "simplicity," please.
After a decade of adding functionality ad nauseum, Google and its stark sterility are the multi-billion-dollar gorilla. Oh sure, there’s plenty of technology under its Egyptian cotton homepage, but the site’s enormous success -- in contrast to its minimalist design -- proves less is more. Heavy on the “more.”
Certainly, Google is no more an ad unit than is The New York Times, but it’s time we stopped viewing online ad initiatives so separately from site environments; the user’s eyesight has had every reason to blur these two together. Ads and the sites they occupy have been sharing DNA for years now.
Even offline we see the iPod-itization of our surroundings. (No, not the 20 million iPods sold, which are ubiquitous.) It’s what art gallery curators worldwide have always known -- busily overwhelm your visitors and they’ll quickly exit.
The causes for clumsy interactive products are many, but to my mind, the culprit is two-pronged: first, user feedback just doesn’t make it back to the engineers and designers, so they work in a vacuum and lose touch with customer needs; and second, the immense competition for consumers leads companies to pile more and more toppings onto an already ten-pound pizza.
Online creative, as adroitly as it moves, will follow closer than any other medium. Over the next year, we’ll see the “keep it simple stupid” approach flourish big-time.
P.S. With such an evident surge toward cleanliness and simplicity, mobile devices and their users should benefit greatly (at least in the States, where we’re behind in infrastructure). After this movement is manifest, watch speech recognition software become the hot new sector. When users only have to press the “Send” button to get whatever they want, it can’t get much simpler.
Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity.
Or, for the simple folk, only one "simplicity," please.
After a decade of adding functionality ad nauseum, Google and its stark sterility are the multi-billion-dollar gorilla. Oh sure, there’s plenty of technology under its Egyptian cotton homepage, but the site’s enormous success -- in contrast to its minimalist design -- proves less is more. Heavy on the “more.”
Certainly, Google is no more an ad unit than is The New York Times, but it’s time we stopped viewing online ad initiatives so separately from site environments; the user’s eyesight has had every reason to blur these two together. Ads and the sites they occupy have been sharing DNA for years now.
Even offline we see the iPod-itization of our surroundings. (No, not the 20 million iPods sold, which are ubiquitous.) It’s what art gallery curators worldwide have always known -- busily overwhelm your visitors and they’ll quickly exit.
The causes for clumsy interactive products are many, but to my mind, the culprit is two-pronged: first, user feedback just doesn’t make it back to the engineers and designers, so they work in a vacuum and lose touch with customer needs; and second, the immense competition for consumers leads companies to pile more and more toppings onto an already ten-pound pizza.
Online creative, as adroitly as it moves, will follow closer than any other medium. Over the next year, we’ll see the “keep it simple stupid” approach flourish big-time.
P.S. With such an evident surge toward cleanliness and simplicity, mobile devices and their users should benefit greatly (at least in the States, where we’re behind in infrastructure). After this movement is manifest, watch speech recognition software become the hot new sector. When users only have to press the “Send” button to get whatever they want, it can’t get much simpler.
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