Political Ad Parody May Influence Potential Generation Y Voters From “The Wrinkly Old Guy, Presidential Candidate, John McCain
The John McCain camp just received the sting of a Viral Video Release that has potentially influenced over 5 Million Americans, suggesting John McCain may not be the best choice for presents from the most unlikely source on political influence on the planet, Paris Hilton.
Paris Hilton, hotel heiress, celebrity socialite, and natural-born narcissist, was made famous from her first viral video release of her 2003 sex video, dubbed “One Night in Paris”. Since then she has been a favorite of the paparazzi. In the eyes of the general public, Paris Hilton is like a bad accident, you can’t bare to look, but your can’t look away. For any Man Men (Ad Professionals), like myself who thrive on sensationalism to drive consumer opinion followed by consumer consumption, she is a rare and beautiful commodity.
The video released on Funny or Die, last week Paris Hilton starred in a spoof on McCain’s “celebrity” advertisement released last week that compared Barack Obama’s popularity with that of Paris Hilton and claimed the Democrat was no more than a celebrity candidate who was not ready to lead the nation. Paris Hilton laying poolside delivers a flawless bikinilog announcing her nomination for President, her National Energy Plan, and decorating ideas for the White House while dressed in a tiny leopard print bathing suit and gold stilettos.
More interesting, a recent online poll suggests that the general public’s consensus has swayed in favor of the socialite. In less than one week, Paris Hilton’s video has transformed from her image from that of a spoiled little rich girl which gave such memorable quotes as,”Wal-mart, is that where they make walls?”, to political activist, intellect, and a likely presidential candidate for the Generation Y. Moreover, Paris’s presidential parody has created a ground swell of support for the Obama campaign. In a recent query on Googles Blog Search there have been over 11,900 blog posts on “Paris Hilton Responds to McCain Ad” which is fueling the videos popularity which has received over 5,654,351 views
The damaging mistake made by the John McCain camp is underestimating the power of social mobilization through viral videos. The lesson learned, try to avoid to mocking those that can most effectively wield such viral power into a cause, or forever be known as the Wrinkly Old Guy.
I manage a fairly significant portfolio of both small and larger advertising clients, but it seems that it takes and act of congress to get my ads approved on the MSN network.
So, why do I go through the trouble of advertising with MSN?
It converts, when you can get your ads approved. I have found it to convert about 20% higher than Yahoo and 45% better than Google, though its traffic is MUCH lower than either engine.
MSN ad center has less competition on various key word groups, I assume its because my competition has less patience than me continually resubmitting traffic requests.
Once it set up it takes very little maintenance to maintain paid search rankings. Again, I assume this is because of the previous reason. Their approval guidelines work against MSN’s best interest.
My advice to marketeers looking to advertise on MSN ad center
Start with a good glass of Merlot and soft music, because soon my friend you too will be frustrated.
Spend time in exploring the MSN ad Center. Not all of the links you were looking for will be in easy to find places, so take a little time and explore each page.
Below are my Top tips to solving your Ad Center woes…
When creating your key terms be careful with plural/singular terms – MSN sees many of them as the same. Though this only seems to hold true with English terms.
Use a suggestion tool like word tracker, Google, or Yahoos word suggestions to compile your list.
Limit your key words too many keywords will be rejected. It appears that Ad Center has a limit of 10,000 per submission.
Though I do not see MSN’s Ad Center being as picky as Google in directing clicks to a contextually relevant landing page it could not hurt. Especially when trying to convert visitors into buyers.
Avoid Duplications – MSN “sees” words such as “of”, “for”, “an”, “a” as dupes.
Export an existing order and use that as your base template.
Keep your ad titles and keywords under MSN’s limits. Check your character lengths especially if using {keyword} and {params} as you might dynamically insert a phrase that’s too long. As a reminder the limits are as follows: Ad Title = 25 chars. Description = 70 chars. Display URL = 35 chars.
When doing a mass upload to the Ad Center remember that the file size limit. Check that your .xls or .csv is no larger than 2mb.
If uploading a “.xls” file check that the other tabs in the file have no data within them.
If your title or description contains a comma then make sure that you encase the data within that column with double “quotation marks, like so”
Add the MSN Ad Center domain to your list of trusted domains within your browser settings to avoid any security issues.
Use Internet Explorer as your browser when spending a lot of time in MSN’s Ad Center. For some reason the MSN ad center and the Firefox browser doesn’t play well together. There could have been other factors at play, and I would never say that MSN would ever not play fair, but it seems I encounter less online submission errors or browser crashes when using the IE browser over FireFox, when it pertains to the ad Center.
If your ads were denied, try try again. If there explanation of disapproval made no sense, its not suppose to, welcome to the world of off shoring your customer service . In order to fast track the approval process try 1) resubmitting the ad after making any modification to the copy. If there is any consistency with MSN’s editorial approval process, it is the inconsistency of their approval process that can work both against or in your favor. 2) Contact support at 800-518-5689 (from 9 am – 9 pm PST), trying to email them is a VERY big waste of time. Though the person on the other end sometimes seems like they have better things to do than service your account, it pays to me overly polite. If you can find the right person to answer your call, they will even give you insight and suggestions to improve your search campaign.
Steve Ballmer, if you REALLY want to compete with with Google without getting your ass handed to you, please, take the following suggestions to heart…..
Your ad review process absolutely sucks. I appreciate the fact that I have received numerous apologies from Ad Center staff concerning the inconsistent, arbitrarily disapproving of my key words, but it seems that a little standardization in ad approval training world go a very long way.
Please drug test the team or individuals that put together your Ad Center interface. Pretend that web masters would like comparative traffic pricing and history on the search ability of key words. If your at a loss for creative ideas, copy Yahoo’s interface.
Start acquiring additional search partners. You have great traffic, just not enough of it. There are 45 potential acquisitions of smaller search networks that would make a big difference to your bottom line. Call me for a good M&A list, for a nominal fee … sorry started the selfless plug early.
Embrace vice traffic sources. Google makes huge profits in catering to vice, I personally know several individuals that spend $10 million+ dollars per year in gaming, dating, pharmacy, and more. Taking such categories off of your flag list would do wonders for your revenues and traffic partners.
Follow Google’s method and bot the target site. If the site is very relevant than set a lower base. If the web master is just key word squatting, then charge a much higher base. This will make web masters choose key words more wisely, and more importantly, give them higher e-commerce conversions if the landing page matches the contextual content that it was targeted for.
I have lots of other suggestions for your Ad Center, but I am not feeling the love since I have had a few more ads disproved this morning, and its too early to drink…… damn.
Can the application of perfectly targeted advertising go as far as predictable behavior modification?
“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times. In the year 2015 people have access to a breath and depth of information, unmanageable in an earlier era. Everyone contributes in some way, participating to create a living breathing media scape,“ is the opening of one of the most compelling media presentations who’s plot consists of a series of real life events from 1989 to 2005, and continues through a series of hypothetical events to 2015 AD.
As an connoisseur of all things adverting, I am compelled to believe the more relevant and individualized content is package and delivered the more meaningful it would be to the end user. Though in 2008, most media is fairly generalized. Advertisers do their best to put their media messages where they believe it will best convert into potential customers, but I can assure your well over 50% of most media campaigns are wasted regardless of medium.
But the winds of change are upon us. People are becoming more free with their personalized data, whether they know it or not. Reminiscent of Minority Report, which depicted John Anderson, played by actor Tom Cruise, walking through a Subway where all of the advertisements were specifically targeted to his character that identified him by rental scan that seemly accessed a database of his consumption habits, lifestyle, demographic, and geographic, and served his advertising which was most relevant to him through a series of holographic billboards. Precursors of this technology exist today, though not at the point that would make it cost advantageous for agencies to spend the dollars to create the infrastructure to track, store, and disseminate the data feeds to external devices. To fast track a similar ad platform would require an advertising organization (Eg. Google, Yahoo, Interpublic, Omnicom, WPP) to joint partner with both a GPS / blue tooth enabled mobile network(s), and a physical media network that has locations in densely populated areas that could provide close proximity to their target customer (Eg Clear Channel, Lamar, CBS Outdoor).
So how would such a system work you make ask? Initially, GPS tracking via your mobile device would be the most likely choice. Current estimates reportedly suggest that “nearly 84-percent of the US population will have mobile phones by the end of 2008, which is projected 99% percent within the next 5 years,”according to SNL Kagen Mobile Research. GPS tracking would not only tell you where you are, but your continual geographic data feed overlapped with information on venues, business, and time is various locations would begin would build a fairly accurate depiction of your life and consumption habits. Moreover, through the utilization of blue tooth technology, RFID product tagging, could allow a secondary data concerning products of interest. Whereas, RFID tags could transmit every product you hold in proximity to your cell phone, as a suspect product of interest. Thus, a cumulative and combined database of geographic, demographic, travel habits, and interests are tabulated through an algorithm which then finds the most relevant advertisement given your current situation through a media device that is in proximity to your personal “blue tooth” envelope.
The end result of the proper application of timely media could go as far as predictable behavior modification. John always goes to Starbucks Coffee in the morning, but he was running late. Taking the subway to work. John notices the video panel playing a Starbucks commercial that says, “Did you miss your Vanilla Latte this morning (which happens to be the drink John always buys), there is a Starbucks location 1 block from your next stop across from the exit”. What luck John exclaims, I’m getting off at the next stop, its almost like they knew… or did they?!
In NY, a would be customer of a prestigious investment banking firm CANCELS his buy order for $500,000; In Atlanta, a would be SUV driver, decides NOT to buy his $58,000 vehicle; In Boston, A California, a publicly traded company losses millions in stock evaluation and revenues; In Texas, protesters boycott a large store chain, discouraging thousands of would be customer. Though these events seem to be unrelated the trigger of these events is shared as the result of negative search engine optimization, the dark side of Internet advertising against a brand, product, or service.
With over 200+ million search queries are preformed per day on Google alone, Internet search is one of the most widely used tools for consumer product and service driven research. According to Forrester Research, Internet retail sales are projected to reach $204 billion in 2008. Moreover, a recent study by comScore CEO, Magid Abraham, sited in the Harvard Business review, showed a strong correlation of the off-line impact of Internet advertising impacting a physical store purchase by as much as 50%. This opens debate for the actual impact negative search engine optimization may have both in Internet and off line revenues, which may total in the billions.
Search engines like any medium disseminate information that is contextually relevant to the user’s search. So what happens if the search engines turn against a corporations product or service? The results could be devastating. Negative Search Engine Optimization, is the process of using major Search Engines such as Google, Yahoo, and MSN to display unfavorable results that would potential prospects not to buy, based upon key terminology used to describe the product or service. Case in point, Google “Walmart” to find Wake Up Walmart, which drives over 65,000+ visitors to its site monthly, that lists sites anti-family and worker stories. This grass roots campaign is gaining ground and is currently supported by over 400,000 individual members and growing. Potential damage is estimated in the hundreds of millions given a combination of effects it may have for both investors and consumers doing research on the mega-store giant.
Less direct than attacking a company, but equally devastating, is attacking an individual product. The Hummer H2, was portrayed as the ultimate driving machine by General Motors. Almost trumping General Motors website in search engine positioning is FUH2, which shows a less than favorable view of the H2, calling it “the ultimate poseur vehicle”. Given that more than 24% of consumer research their auto purchases prior to purchasing, Hummer’s H2 is potentially loosing 2-3% of potential sales given this type of negative search engine advertising attack.
Attacks on a brand name could also be a cumulative result of a companies or products existence. For example, most consumer based investment banking firms receive customer complaints as their client loose money in the stock market. Some of the complains are justified other are not, its just the nature of the business. If the customer writes his opinion on the Internet, or files legal action against the company, or rants a blog, it becomes part of the Internet ecosystem, making it potentially findable for potential future customers.
So where do fluffy bunnies come into the mix? Fluffy bunnies is synonymous with positive “fluffy Internet content that buries potentially damming content off of the first few pages of the search engines, in essences down the rabbit hole, which will limit its exposure to over 80% of those searching for key words related to the product or service, given that most Internet searches do not go past the first few pages. Fluffy Bunny Strategies varry depending upon the situation and severity of the negative search engine optimization, but could include website redesign, the launching 1000s of blogs, Internet video campaigns, and mini-web sites.
So what steps can you take to protect your brand online:
First see if any negative articles exist. Type “your company name, products, and C-level officers” in to top search engines.
If no negative data exists, you can actually protect yourself by creating an internal online search engine strategies to make it more difficulty for future issues to arise with your brand online.
If negative data does surface try to resolve the problem with the individual or organization privately.
BEWARE OF SEARCH ENGINE EXTORTION. Think in terms of hostage negotiation. If you pay them off, other may come to extort your brand later.
If it can not be resolved, cut contact off immediately, do not give them ammunition or incentive to continue.
Hire and Anti-SEO professional, see my shameful plug, to identify how and why they are ranking in the search engines in relation to your key terminology, and protect your brand using a positive search engine optimization campaign.
Whatever you do, DO NOT IGNORE, take action to protect your name and company reputation.
The BIG Media Advertising Question on Ad Exchanges
Will ad exchanges commoditized all that is left unsold? Personally the branding campaign that your direct sales force sells will still be around for many years to come, branding campaign will not go away, and so is your direct sales force. I see value to custom campaign that deals with cutting edge ideas, like social applications, widgets, and custom web / cellular integrated campaigns. EG. Yahoo Right Media RMX, DoubleClick AdX, Microsoft AdECN, ContextWeb ADSDAQ, and etc. But can an ad exchange provide this value from a single application?
I have been following on this subject matter for 3+ years and the product offered is getting better every quarter, so where will ad exchanges be in a few years? – Thank You, Benny Radjasa, Past exec at Freewebs & Vizi Media
The BIG Media Advertising Answer on Ad Exchanges by John Cataldi
I think that you are currently underestimating the ad exchange market place. A true media exchange should be agnostic, thus allowing any media type to be integrated on a as needed basis, yet bringing able to integrate a comparison engine, making all media measurable based upon targeted frequency and reach.
But a media exchange that focuses just on media placement and purchases is a small part of a much needed larger picture. Not to mention remnant media space (unused) gets bumped often, is usually at a crappy slot, and is overall has little value.
The media life cycle is the convergence of the entire media life cycle. The ultimate ad media platform will unite all media on a single exchange (traditional and interactive) and would provide 1) advertiser information on what advertising medium(s) is best for their customer base, 2) allow them to purchase those media channels, 3) allow the advertiser to create their commercial, radio spots, billboard, etc, (creative assets), 4) deploy those assets across multiple networks, and 5) monitor the effectiveness of the media in terms of ROI for the advertiser, and 6) give smart recommendations on what to do next.
I know of one such company that is beta testing this type of Ad exchange engine, get back to me if you would like to be involved their beta test.
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