Putting the 'I' in "IMC" - From Support Media to the Internet

The term support media is used to describe a wide variety of ways that marketers can reach a target audience.  Often, support media is used to supplement broadcast and print media by increasing impressions or reaching target audiences that are hard to reach with more traditional media.  Outdoor advertising - including billboards, and branded entertainment are two of the categories found in support media that I want to talk about today.

Billboards - we all see them.  They are geographic-targeting at its best.  As local newspaper and radio consumption falls, billboards still offer marketers a local audience.  Women's marketing Inc.'s website, billboards.com, not only showcases billboards, but has extensive examples of other out-of-home media encompassing everything from transit advertising to aerials.  They highlight their work on the Yellow Tail wines billboard campaign that utilized color and spectaculars as the means to gain consumer attention.  The Blue Blots blog also highlighted some creative billboards.

Branded entertainment includes product placement, branded integration and advertainment.  Product placement occurs when a brand is placed in any entertainment media including tv shows, movies, music videos and video games.  Typically product placement is paid or barter for by the brand company, but sometimes it is a happy shout-out from the creators to a favorite brand.  A recent example of the later was The Bark's mention on NCIS: Los Angeles that the magazine didn't know about until the show aired.

Jennifer Lopez is seen sipping Coke on American Idol, but in her video I'm Into You, Koma is what she is sipping.

Product Placement News reported that this is one of many product placements for Koma who is integrating ten more into their campaign.  Sadly, they do not showcase their product placements at all on their badly updated website.  They obviously forgot the 'I' in 'IMC.'

The New York Times reported yesterday (October 27, 2011) that ESPN Deportes is premiering a series "El Diez"- it's first scripted show. The show has branded integration with American Airlines, Burger King, Chevrolet, Coors Light, and HomeDepot.  These brands have staring roles in the show's storyline. Chevrolet and Coors were interested in the opportunity to work with the show's creators to have the brand integration more organic and natural for the viewer. 

Also included in branded entertainment is advertainment. One classic example of advertainment BMW's The Hire films. They starred Clive Owen as a James Bondish character and highlighted the performance of BMW within the context of a short film plot. Recognizable directors (Ang Lee, Guy Ritchie) and actors (Madonna, Gary Owen, Marilyn Manson) participated in the films. BMW took the films down when they changed ad campaigns and agencies. You can watch them on YouTube - because someone ripped them for us :) - abmwfan.  One of my favorites is Hostage directed by John Woo.

Some current examples of advertainment include the websites of Crayola and Doritos. These two brands have integrated their advertainment into their IMC.

Direct Marketing is another part of the promotion mix that extensively utilizes integration. Let's take a look at Empire Today. In their commercials, they integrate tv advertising with a direct marketing component (call -1-800-588-2300).  Once you call the 1-800 number they will connect you with a sales person to learn more about their products in your home. It's easy to measure success of direct marketing by the number of responses you receive from a particular direct marketing effort. 







Several of you used examples that integrated the internet/interactive component of the promotion mix with other components.  Caitlin brought up the use of e-mail as a method of direct marketing - which integrates the two.  Many companies ask us to sign up for their mailing lists offering us either the option to 'opt in' or 'opt out' of receiving email from them and other parties they sell our emails addresses to.


Jordan mentioned Super Bowl commercials and that their true impact extends beyond broadcast during the game on TV.  Many people will watch the commercials on-line again after the game.  At over $2 million dollars for a 30-second spot, the true value is in how much are you talked about after the game. Is your commercial mentioned in social media and linked?  The internet provides a way for advertisers to get potentially exponential bang-for-their buck.  GoDaddy does a particularly good job of integrating its commercial creation process into its blogs and website.  For a commentary on how Steve Jobs and Apple changed Super Bowl advertising, read this FoxNews article.


Amanda posted and commented about a video "How the Internet is Changing Advertising" by Epipheo Studios.




Tiffany and Kimberly brought up the importance of the changes between Web 1.0 and Web 2.0.  In Web 1.0 we were consumers of information that companies put on the web, but by the time Web 2.0 came around, we were no longer passive informations receivers.  Collaboration and creation are the forces behind Web 2.0 and consumers new interactions with brands.  Let's return to the Doritos' website and look at their 'Crash the Super Bowl' campaign.  Here consumers are asked to create ads for Doritos - and this isn't their first time with this concept.  You may remember this Super Bowl ad created by consumers from this year:




Marci mentioned the increase usage of YouTube by advertisers.  Doritos has a YouTube site that integrates its Crash the Super Bowl campaign into its YouTube channel.  YouTube offers marketers a place for consumers to see commercial advertisements as well as how-to videos and behind-the-scenes content.  Zyrtec used YouTube as a channel for its Parks Unleashed campaign. The campaign included games and contests.


Collaboration and consumer creation of content isn't always a bed of roses for a company.  When something goes wrong into today's social media driven world, it can go viral very quickly.  Tamara discussed how Delta's baggage charges of returning soldiers quickly went viral.  Here's the original YouTube video:




11Alive reported on the incident, and AirTran used it as a way to get good publicity by its policy.  The link has several videos connected to the article and how social media effected the spread of the news.


I'll leave you with a video about social media and how it is changing our world - marketing and otherwise:

2-page Magazine ads

I found this great blog/magazine with a bunch of examples of effective and innovative use of a 2-page magazine spread.  Many have an element that must be added to the magazine (like a pull cord), but many accomplish being unique without any added cost. 

Take a look - I have to admit I think the wonder bra one is both hilarious and a great example of demonstration.

#1AdTrend magazine's - effective 2-page magazine ads article

Heineken and The Most Interesting Man in the World

I wanted to provide you some links for the Heineken ad I spoke about in the Test 2 Review podcast.  Here it is:


And here is Dos Equis:

Commercials galore!

After reading your posts for Chapter 11, I wanted to share with all of you my thoughts about some of the ones you chose.  I've provided youtube links, but be aware they can get broken at any time.

Let's start off with one from 2011's Super Bowl commercials - Chrysler:



This commercial left me speechless when I first saw it.  First off, Eminem doing a commercial was surprising to begin with but given the content of the commercial I can see why he would.  This commercial is an emotional appeal that focuses very little on the product and more on 'made in Detroit.'  Inherent drama is created because until the end you aren't sure what the product is or even what the commercial was about.  The ad was cut down from its original 60 second to 30 and 15 second.  On Chrysler's youtube page, you can get some behind the scenes footage from the making of the commercial.

I had never seen the Kate Walsh Cadillac CTS ads that a student mention, and I hate that I missed them!  They are a great example of positioning based on product user.  Here's two ads that a fan posted on youtube:





In both these ads, they paint the picture of a successful woman who most likely works in a "man's" field.  The first commercial does mention the attributes/benefits of the car, but the end is all about the emotion appeal - winning at the take-off.

Transformational ads show us how a product can take us away from our everyday world and transform us.  Perhaps the best example of this is the Corona Extra ads that have been playing lately:




Here's another one:




Both of these ads focus on how Corona can take you away - transform you, so you feel carefree - like you are on the beach.  Listen carefully to the background - what is missing?  If you said, "music," you would be correct.  The sound of the waves crashing is the soundtrack for Corona.  The first ad also has a bit of the 'slice of life' execution style as a part of it as well.


Let's look at two travel sites - Priceline and Expedia.
Priceline has used William Shatner as their spokesperson for some time now, with various characters coming and going.  The latest - Naomi Pryce:



Here's another of their latest commercials:




Clearly, Priceline is positioning itself against the competition - but it never mentions the competition - just the other travel sites that took advantage of the poor man in a trench coat.  The commercial also mentions Naomi Pryce last - to remind consumers of what is different about Priceline - their USP.

Expedia focuses more on its benefits in its commercials:



Pauley Perrette is the actress hired by Expedia - she is Abby from NCIS.  Last year she had a reported Q Score of 50 (the same as Tom Hanks and Morgan Freeman - who topped the list) but only a familiarity percentage of 42.  What does that mean?  It means, not as many people know who she is compared to Hanks and Freeman - but those that do know her, love her.  Shortly after the Q Scores were published, she got the endorsement deal with Expeida.  If you want to read more, check out Entertainment Weekly's Pop Watch article.

Here's another Expedia commercial:



Expedia, like Priceline, has used a celebrity to market them, used a humor appeal and positioned themselves using the competition - but the execution is drastically different.  Expedia focuses much more on the attributes and benefits while Priceline focuses more on humor and their USP of 'name your own price.'

Let's look at one company - Covergirl - and how it uses celebrities to target different demographic market segments   In all cases, the product is positioned by user with benefits/attributes being used as well.  The commercials are also good examples of the combination of informational/emotional combination appeals.




This ad also utilized demonstration.  It uses Drew Barrymore's appeals to a wide age range of women.



Now, Taylor Swift is telling us about lipstick while targeting a younger tween/teen market for Covergirl.


Now, Ellen is targeting a 40-something target market for Covergirl.  What does it say about American culture and how it has changed that a lesbian is a 'covergirl?'  Covergirl and Olay have teamed up to offer products to deal with aging.  There are many other examples of Covergirl targeting different ethnic markets using female celebrities such as Queen Latifah.

Let's close our run down of commercials by looking at the latest from Kohls and Sears.







Kohl's has teamed up with the Marc Anthony and Jennifer Lopez couple.  Previously, they have hooked up with designers such as Vera Wang.  Now, let's look at what Sears is doing:



Sears is following Target (who first used celebrity designers to set itself apart from other mass merchandisers - WalMart) and Kohl's in using celebrities.  The softer side of Sears - sears style - will hopefully find some takers with the Kardashians.


Sears is also using a seasonal push to highlight it's USP amongst department stores - layaway:



I hope you enjoyed all the commercials.