Posts tagged TIVO

There was a point in my life when I felt it was totally lacking in meaning.  People asked what I did and I’d respond that my job is to help make advertising more effective.  Crap that sounds lecherous doesn’t it? Advertising is a glamorous job to those in the B2B world but outside of that world, in the homes of your everyday consumer, it’s seen as an invasive, hateful practice that you need to battle every step of the way.  The funny thing is that even us media cheerleaders, when we get home or are exposed to the fruits of our labors, we’re still inclined to fight against ad messaging.

Just take one recent example of my own from last night.  My wife and I were watching the office on NBC and managed to stay hooked for the first 12 minutes.  Once the second pod of commercials started up I asked her, "would you mind if we switched to a previously recorded show to let some FF time build up?"  Here we are consciously stopping  a program midway through to let enough time pass so that when we re-engage we’ve plenty of buffer to fast forward commercials without catching the live signal.

So what gives?  Here I am during the day working diligently to help people improve their advertising while at night I’m fast forwarding commercials, installing ad blockers, and blocking 3rd party cookies.  I’m sure I’m not the only one making these incongruous work/life choices, and yet no one seems to have found a workable solution for the advertising model that changes this dynamic.

What is the evolution of the ad model to become.  I’m not sure I’d survive in a minority report world where everything is sponsored.  Does advertising have to be intrusive?  Should we have to plead our case to consumers…"please don’t block my ad targeting cookies.  You’ll always get advertising, at least with my cookies you’ll get advertising you like."  It’s a lose, lose scenario.  Advertising is what consumers hate, whether it’s targeted or not, it’s just painting the pig. 

Perhaps if we could measure all of the inputs into a purchase (word of mouth, advertising, experience, etc.) we’d find the secret sauce to worldwide product success.  The consumer side of my brain prays that advertising isn’t a driving factor.

Photo by: jurvetson