Put Branding Online In Context
“In a nutshell” is a term to which I gravitate frequently because concision in marketing and public relations, when it comes to messaging, is one of the most critical factors of success. The proverbial sound bite. So here is another “in a nutshell” about how to effectively build brands with online interactive advertising as a significant component of your overall strategy: put it in context. Advertising is all about using emotion to create value and ultimately drive commerce. As Ms. Wenda Harris Millard puts it in the recent AdAge article (which got me thinking about this subject) regarding her now infamous pork bellies comment; “If you think about what does advertising do, it creates desire and eventually causes transactions.” Very well stated. She was providing new insights into what was founding her comment. She points out that ad networks and exchanges who are simply aggregating a critical mass of inventory without considering the context are basically just creating volume which will drive down prices over time. But to me, the future of online brand advertising has it’s cart inherently hitched to value, emotion and desire and that is not found in pure volumes. The only way we can address that aspect of advertising online with the technology that is readily available today, especially when you take into account the now inhuman scale of the web, is through advertising in context. While several types of targeting might work well enough for direct response, when you really want to elicit an emotional reaction for a brand you need to do it in context. When your online advertising approach works in concert with your branding campaign goals instead of working for your campaign, that is when you begin to squeeze the maximum ROI from your online advertising dollar.
Tags: AdAge, branding, context, Wenda Harris Millard