What’s an agency to do?
Digital video recorders have dealt a blow to the advertising world’s longtime standby, the 30-second TV spot. Podcasts and satellite radio offer custom programming without ads. And software can block pop-ups and skip Flash ads online.
“I don’t really know that there’s a whole lot that you can do to get around it,” said Mark Choate, president of Open Minds in Irvine, a unit of Rubin Postaer and Associates in Santa Monica that does work for Kendall Jackson wines, Kirin beer and Seagram’s vodka.
The shift is playing out in how companies spend money on advertising.
“We are impacted by it every day,” said Rick Eiserman, president of Young & Rubicam Brands in Irvine, part of Britain’s WPP Group PLC. “One of the direct results is that we are seeing significant dollars shifted out of other media and into interactive, digital advertising.”
It’s easier to see results,and a return on investment,from online ads.
“Interactive marketing is becoming a safer play,” Eiserman said. “From the clients’ standpoint, it’s forcing everyone to look at how every dollar is spent.”
The Web brings its own challenge: capturing the attention of people used to speedy Internet surfing and for whom ads largely are seen as a nuisance.
“The challenge is to have a message that’s strong enough and engaging enough so that people will actually want to see it,” Choate said.
Some agencies are turning to guerilla or viral marketing to get attention.
Tactics rely on word of mouth and fostering “buzz” through elements of surprise.
Last year, Young & Rubicam helped the Los Angeles Dodgers launch a guerilla campaign to promote the $25 million makeover of Dodger Stadium. The overhaul included replacing every seat with retro, 1950s-style seats.
Y & R; took a few of the seats and placed them in busy spots around Los Angeles County, such as the Santa Monica pier and at Universal CityWalk.
The seats were stocked with promotional materials that urged fans “to get the best seat in the house” and to buy season tickets.
Each seat had a unique toll-free number so Y & R; could track responses, Eiserman said.
At CityWalk, Y & R; set up a cross-promotion with mobile phone service provider Cingular Wireless, which now goes by AT & T.;
Passersby could sit in the chair for a minute with a Cingular phone nearby. If the phone rang during the minute, the sitter could answer and win prizes, from a signed Dodgers T-shirt to season tickets.
“We had a line of 150 people waiting to sit,” Eiserman said.
About a year ago, Y & R; did a viral campaign for Land Rover’s LR3 sport utility vehicle that tapped video sharing sites such as YouTube and Google Video.
The company aimed to promote the SUV by having its advanced navigation system direct a plane.
“We strapped the car into a C-130 cargo plane and had it fly from Nice, France, to the island of Corsica,” Eiserman said.
The flight was shot in grainy, black and white test footage. Then Y & R; leaked it to Land Rover fan Web sites, automotive blogs and video sharing sites.
“You could watch all the buzz and all the traffic as people were trying to figure out what it was,” Eiserman said. “We had a whole push leading up to before we got to the mainstream advertising.”
The ad-avoidance phenomenon isn’t all bad, according to those in the industry.
For one, it forces agencies to come up with original marketing backed by a compelling message.
“The ideas have to be that much stronger,” Eiserman said. “There’s not that reliance on a single TV spot,crossing your fingers and hoping it moves the business. I think the ideas are better as a result.”
It also prompts agencies to come up with eye-popping visuals that will make the consumer watch.
“Hopefully you can come up with something that’s visually strong enough to pique people’s interest as they are scanning through (commercials),” Choate said. “It really puts a lot of pressure on the visual element.”
Some agencies skirt the issue by working within a niche.
Costa Mesa’s Pacific Communications, partly owned by Irvine-based drug maker Allergan Inc., does only healthcare advertising. Allergan is its top customer.
“Our ultimate target is typically physicians,” President Ryan Abbate said. “They are not worried about new technologies” and their effect on advertising.
Some brush off the technology threat.
“My personal feeling is that it’s been blown way out of proportion,” Open Minds’ Choate said. “The jury is still out.”
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Hispanic Challenge
Hispanic advertising agencies don’t have to sell companies on the need for their services anymore. The challenge now: reaching bilingual, second-generation Hispanics whose money companies are clamoring for.
“It’s about understanding the identity and the culture,” said Dan Nance, president of Casanova Pendrill Inc. in Costa Mesa, part of Interpublic Group of Cos. “We are doing more and more efforts in English targeted to Hispanics.”
Casanova clients include the Army and beer importer Crown Imports LLC.
The trend has a reverse effect. Hispanic culture now has a big influence on pop culture.
TV’s “Ugly Betty,” reggaeton beats on the radio and Taco Bell’s Spanish-speaking lions (carrrrne asada, anyone?) are signs of Hispanic culture going mainstream.
“It’s finally become cool to be Hispanic in the U.S.,” Nance said.
But targeting the segment isn’t easy.
“Language is not an issue, but they share the same values and life experiences as every other Hispanic,” said Eduardo Bottger, president of al Punto Advertising Inc. in Tustin. “There are big differences even to the kind of programming this group relates to in English.”
Al Punto’s client list includes Kia Motors America Inc., Holiday Inn and H.J. Heinz Co.
Bilingual Hispanic consumers tend to relate to advertising in a different way, Bottger said.
“The Hispanic consumer is not as jaded toward advertising,” Bottger said. “There is still the idea that advertising is a source of information. We have that going for us.”
,Sarah Tolkoff
