Results Are In. Blog Ads Work, But...
June 15, 2004
Tom Hespos from Underscore Marketing discusses on his blog the positive results his client received with a blog advertising campaign. He says blogs get the job done. His message to media planners is if you're not considering advertising on blogs that deal with topics of interest to your clients and their target audiences, you're doing your client a disservice.
Although I agree with this, I don't agree with his approach to weblog advertising.
Here's another thing...I like the concept behind BlogAds, but major advertisers are going to want to run larger size GIFs, Flash and rich media.
And I'm looking for something that's persistent, so that every person who visits the blog is exposed to the ad. That means sponsorships, locked-in positions on the home page, and possibly ads on every archive and story page.
Tom's mass marketing approach is dead. Consumers are speaking up. If other agencies enter blog advertising with this method, soon blogs will be littered with pop-ups, annoying flash, and other disruptive advertising shouting for our attention. The true spirit of the medium will be lost and consumers will get fed up peeling away the ads just to get to the content.
Publishers also need to take responsibility with their weblogs and consider the long term effects this disruptive type of advertising has on your audience. RSS advertising has even bigger concerns with its one-click unsubscribe.
Blogs are about conversations. Blog advertising is conversational advertising (vs. disruptive). How many times during a conversation has someone unknown to you, interrupted the conversation with a commercial break? Most likely not many. Why would you do it with a blog?
Tom, let's think about the long term results not just short term client success. We did that with email, telephone and web ads. The government had to intervene and tell us marketers to cool our jets. Now, we are scrambling to find a new medium that delivers better results. Soon we’ll be doing it again if mass marketing reaches the blogging medium.
Do you think there is a better approach? I do.
Posted by Bill Flitter on June 15, 2004 9:49 PM
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Bill
I agree and share your concern about cluttered bothersome advertising polluting pages and disrupting a visitor's experience. But doens't Tom have a point...''major advertisers are going to want to run larger size GIFs, Flash and rich media''. Don't you think that, eventually, the market demands of major media planners and buyers along with the financial needs of promiant bloggers will serve as the pivot point for advertising on blogs? Maybe not today, or in the immediate future, but eventually?
Posted by Jonathan Trenn | June 16, 2004 8:23 AM
Posted on June 16, 2004 08:23
Jonathan,
Bigger isn't always better. I think the market demands better advertising. The point I was trying to make is we need to re-think how we work with webloggers. The traditional banner is easy to integrate. It is used well for mass marketing on website, but I beleive mass marketing is dead. Mass niches are the new kid on the block. Blogs provide mass niches and are the perfect medium as we transition from away from mass marketing. Weblogs can be effective but larger sized banners with flash in my opinion are not the answer.
Posted by Bill Flitter | June 21, 2004 10:07 PM
Posted on June 21, 2004 22:07