When the going gets toxic

According to Marketing Magazine it was

"pressure from advertisers [which] forced the shock closure of the UK's most-read Sunday newspaper, the News of the World"

That's to rather overclaim advertisers' influence. As the ensuing events have demonstrated, there are forces at work even more powerful than where we spend our media budgets. But the story does open up quite thorny questions about where ads are placed. I wonder to what extent marketers feel responsible for the media content they pay for? The printed press, just like its online equivalent, as well as broadcast TV, relies on advertising revenue. Every ad placement is a cash-vote in favour of that channel.

In general brands work hard to build wholesome reputations. Yet the attention to detail doesn't make it onto the media plan. Many media brands are, at best, salacious and scurrilous. The ethical brand manager would struggle to reconcile the two. One might argue that marketing decisions are purely commercial, without an ethical dimension. But even then, it's clearly far from ideal that the major channels to reach great swathes of the audience are so incongruous with the brand's own message. And in a wiki-world, where reputation is everything, such "its only business" arguments are valid only if you believe you could stand on them, even in the heat of an as-yet-unimagined crisis. Could you? I couldn't.

The truth is that, for most of us, media channels are but a means to an end, a necessary evil to be endured (as they have been for politicians). The question, of course, is just how necessary. Renault has said it will not be advertising in any News International titles for the timebeing. Is this as noble as it sounds? Does Renault believe the competition are, ultimately, a better fit for its brand, or is this just a crisis management response? Would your brand choose to be identified with the sentiments expressed on any of these covers:



Of course, the last one is a viral spoof. But what brand would freely choose to be associated with a publication that attracts such parody (even if it were undeserved)? As Marshall McLuhan observed almost 50 years ago, "the media is the message". Too often, I fear, our message is expediency. Not good enough. Unless one of your brand values is "prejudiced", of course. But it probably isn't.

Some people can't relate and others have a lot to learn

When I worked for Britvic, the Tango brand director (who I have to thank for hiring me in to my first real job), bought all the tabloid papers each day, in an effort to know what the brand's consumers were seeing, reading and talking about. For a while in the 90s I attempted similar discipline to the internet - visiting the "big" sites that would otherwise be out of my repertoire, as an act of professional diligence. Futile, obviously. (When vinyl records were invented my grandfather decided to amass a complete set of all the 78s published - he had to abandon that plan quite quickly too).

It is no longer possible to attempt to see through others' eyes. The biggest websites each deliver a combination of search and social, so we all see them differently. (The top 10 by hits are Google, Facebook, Youtube, Yahoo, Live, Blogspot, Baidu, Wikipedia, Twitter and QQ. You are forgiven for not knowing Baidu or QQ if you don't speak Chinese). Content led sites don't feature very highly - and I suspect our choices, at that level, are as fragmented as ever (the BBC is #41, livejasmin is #44 - take your pick).

This is part of a general trend of cultural and social fragmentation. I sat today on the tube next to a guy little more than half my age, as we both listened to our mp3s. I take a little pride in my music taste, but I suspect my age is beginning to show. Mine may be the most ear-bleeding trendy guitar based music in town but, as Decca observed with much foresight when they turned down the Beatles in 1962, "guitar groups are on the way out". My neighbour was listening to Tinie Tempah, for all I know.

Aside from being an obvious problem for media planning, this is a seismic issue for brands that have made themselves "relevant" to consumers by simply mimicking the consumer's perceived interests: "You like XXXXX, so do we!" If consumers aren't into the same things, just what should a mass market brand align to? The few big unifying consumer interests (such as major sports) are not very differentiating. And in many spheres there's little to unify consumers at all. (As far as I understand, the unifying theme of fashion these last few months has been nothing more complex than "socks".)

Affinity marketing was always lazy - the "in thing" is surely an overpriced way to reach the audience. Winning brands have the confidence to carve their own groove. The trick is doing so in ways that consumers are drawn towards.

Media before message?

The IAB reports today that internet advertising spend has overtaken TV.

What a long journey it has been to get to this point. Personally, I think the final destination is much further (which tells us a lot about the future of TV - it will become a primarily on-demand medium, with broadcast merely a loss leading way to market its own content).

Of course, we don't spend as much time online as we do watching TV. But that's not the point. As a connection moment - in particular the ability to target and to engage - the internet is a superior medium.

Interestingly Nielsen data in the US shows that we increasingly consume several media at once - such as watching TV while online. That's certainly how most of the grocery shopping happens in my household. On those moments a relevant click is going to be far more effective than a haphazard TVC, no matter how great its production values.

But if we're making the right decisions with our investment of media time, are we getting the creative we deserve? How many ideas are still born as scripts? I bet it is more than 50%.

Newsflash 20:35, October 7
Three little updates hot on the heels of publishing this.
1) On 2nd October the Evening Standard announced it is to become a freesheet
2) Over the weekend it was confirmed that no-one is wants the TV rights to the England-Ukraine game, so it will be offered on internet pay per view only.
3) Yesterday the Economist told readers that it is to raise its 'paywall' - i.e. to restrict online access further in favour of paying subscribers.

The game is inconsequential and its a fire sale after the collapse of Setanta, so we should read little in to that: but its a precedent regardless. The Evening Standard's move (there's a whole backstory around London freesheets) is more interesting. They believe increased circulation is worth more in ad revenue than the loss in cover sales. I wonder, from an advertiser's perspective, whether this is true. More eyeballs may not be better eyeballs, so I'm not sure how much more I'd be willing to pay for them. Or maybe its just about increasing the number of advertisers, which merely dilutes the impact for each one. What's really fascinating is that this happens in the same week the Economist moves the opposite direction. All 3 moves are not entirely voluntary, but driven by financial pressures from the economic crisis. Strange, unpredictable, contrary forces.

Street media: Beauty over ugliness

As part of the media mix for The Heineken Cup about 10 years ago, we painted advertisements on garage doors along the route from railway stations to rugby grounds. It was a tactical element of the mix: fun and low cost. Garage doors are not inherently beautiful. I like to think there was social, as well as commercial, value!

Many high streets are currently blighted by shuttered shop fronts. Streetskins are doing us all a favour by providing the opportunity to turn them into advertising space.

Of course, what will turn this from a cost opportunity (pulling down the price of outdoor) in to something more will be the ability of ad agencies to develop some knock-out creative to bestow on them.

Over to you...

Any good news? The lowering PR barrier.

Sitting recently in the lounge at Chicago airport, watching 'The Situation Room' on TV was not a joyeous experience. Statistics crashed down relentlessly on screen. This is, for example, we were told, the first time on record when all 50 states have seen simultaneous rises in unemployment. And, to get the point home it was backed up with voxpops of the recently redundant from across the country. The unavoidable conclusions was simple: there's nowhere to run to.

But, equally, there's plenty to run from. The front page in St Louis announced that a million people in Missouri alone received food stamps in January - the highest number ever, and Missourians make up only 6m of the 300m in the US.

The same story is true in every 'developed' market I visit - horrific headlines, often with the added implication that the situation is at its most acute just where you, the reader/viewer, are sitting.

The problem with PR plans has always been that no-one wants to publish what brands want to broadcast - or at least, not on the news pages. This is, clearly, the moment to challenge that wisdom. A deftly delivered brand-good-news story (maybe linked with the CSR agenda to give something back in hard times), could capture disproportionate column inches and airtime.

Is PR planning the driving cog of 2009 marketing?