So, I've had a few discussions with people lately about the effectiveness of advertising. My standpoint is usually to the effect of... Why does McDonald's need to advertise? Everyone, basically, in the world knows who they are, what a Big Mac is and where the nearest McD's is to them. I either want it or I don't, a commercial with some kid eating Chicken Nuggets, or some crazy clown (or king as the case may be) does NOT make me hungry. In fact, the trend is growing that people don't watch commercials, more and more.
This link talks about "audience engagement" guarantees from the broadcast networks and the plan to provide data. The assupmtion is
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Originally Posted by From the Article
"For NBC, engagement will be measured by IAG Research, which will poll audience members to find out how well they can recall certain plot points and other information. The idea is that viewers who are engaged in the show will also be paying more attention to the commercials. Advertisers seem to like the new set up, and in fact have been the ones pushing for it."
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I don't agree at all. In fact, I can discuss plotlines for shows I watched a few weeks ago (I only usually watch shows I want to to beign with) but I cna't usually tell you about the commercials by the time the next set of commercials start. Often, if I do remember a clever commercial, I don't recall who it's for becuase the commercial was entertaining, but the service was useless to me. Is that really worth advertising dollars? Think of what a company, again McDonald's, could do if they spent a single year NOT adveritising, but making their food tastier, healthier and better, and then advertising THAT the next year.
That said, I can understand advertising a new product, or a sale... but just general advertising, especially if the same commercial gets played every ten minutes, is just annoying most of the time. I'd rather have a 30-minutes slot filled with a 28-minute long program that had advertising built in. Don't make a fake label for the Coke can... sell the fact the people are watching that show and will see their favorite character drinking Coke. It's recurring, it valuable and it's more gauranteed that any other method... which is one of the reasons why
video game advertising is on the rise. If I'm playing Grand Theft Auto 8: Kill Them All, I'd rather see a Coca-Cola billboard or a McDonald's billboard in the game than one for "Jimmy Joe Bob's Fake Stuff Emporium". If nothing else, it adds to the emersion. The same could be applied for TV spots. First, I'm more engaged by the program, and wait until commercials to go to the bathroom, get food, get a drink, check my email, et cetera. With the ever-shrinking attention span of most Americans, commercials CANNOT really compete for our time. If the product placement was IN the show I was watching, I'd probably barely even notice, but the message would still BE there. How is that NOT the best way to go... viewers get MORE of their favorite shows per hour, which brings a larger viewing audience... and still get the ad revenue, maybe even MORE ad revenue because now the companies don't need to spend as much filming TV commercials, they can pass some of that $$$ to the networks. Win win, much?
So... what are your thoughts? Anyone in the broadcast industry? Anyone working for NBC? I'm happy to take a nice juicy paycheck for the best advertising scheme ever!
edit: As a sidenote, anyone who looks at the last link will see a brief mention of it as TV spots as well as movie/video game spots. However, it's still MUCH much more rare. How many reality shows have the pop can fuzzed out or the logo on someone's shirt or anything else of the sort. Turn that blur into dollars, yo!