Time to adopt storytelling in mobile/online ads more closely

Most online and mobile ads, specially the mobile ads are quite invasive in nature where an ad interferes in the space where we are playing a game or browsing through some interesting content. As I watched the television tonight I realized that traditional advertisements are invasive in nature too. Advertisement is inherently invasive in nature, what matters is how you strategize to design the ad to engage your users. Sometimes, I think it is a bigger challenge to direct an ad which engages users within 10-30 secs rather than other content in the television space which last from 20 mins to more. What makes commercial ads on TV stand out is the story-telling technique which involves good ideas being churned out by creative teams and then translated into video by involving matured film producers. An example is the latest ad by ICICI bank called "Love Surprises?".

The story behind the ad or the concept is seriously awesome and it has been executed very well. The settings, characters and the background score actually captures the joy of surprises and rewards. Its a simple story, told very well. Vodafone had also captured the surprise concept very well through a series of ads called "Vodafone Delights".

From a consumer point of view, when such ads interfere your movie or tv-series watching, the irritation of having been intervened is far lesser than a poorly conceptualised or executed ad.

My opinion, if we are able to adopt such innovative ways of storytelling on the mobile and online space then the ads would not appear so invasive and may have higher returns as well. This however does not mean hosting video content in the ad space. The online/mobile advertisement players have to innovate to think of ways to tell their brand-stories in an interesting manner without making their content too heavy. Technology has a big role to play in the online/mobile advertisement segment and it needs to be integrated more closely.

Ethics in digital marketing

Long time no posts and finally I have a topic which is of paramount interest to me. Back in my MBA we had to submit a thesis on the last few months and guess what was the topic of my thesis. Ethics in Marketing. Almost 4 years down the line now as a hands down digital marketeer I have a heated discussion with some of my colleagues on what should be the best practices in digital marketing in terms of ethics.

Where did the discussion start? At creating virtual ids for corporate brands. Yes, a lot of well-known, top-class & well-trusted brands create virtual personas online and blog, FB, Tweet etc online. These virtual personas act as influencers in the industry to which that the brand belongs. Lets say for example there is a brand ABC in the mobile industry. They might create some 10 virtual personas whose id will be created in FB, Twitter and some blogging sites and some marketing firm/team will update all these 10 or so ids with information mostly related to the mobile industry, technology, social media etc etc. In due time may be 3 of the personas will get a prominent number of followers and the persona will be established in the industry as an expert. Subtly the brand will then push their messaging across these followers and try and establish a trust in the industry. I don't know for sure if any of the influencers in my life are such virtual personas or if any company as of yet has successfully implemented this strategy but I know intentions are there.

Product innovation (Levi's)

I might be a marketeer but I am not a strong believer of advertising. There, I said it. But the recent levi's curve id ad has made me think otherwise. It has appealed to me and to may be thousands and millions of other women like never before. I have been watching it on television for last few months and still every time its played during those commercial breaks I just can't prevent myself from listening to the song and watching the video.