“Advertising will go poof”

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Does it do me (as an advertiser) any good to force someone to watch or listen to a commercial for my product or service, if they don’t want to? I can argue that my commercial is what paid for the free TV show they’re watching so it’s only fair that they watch it. Doesn’t matter. If the ad is about something I don’t care about (most of them)…Tivo fast-forward.

If you can find a way to show me ONLY the ads I care about, I’ll probably watch them. But Dave Winer says the end of advertising (as we know it) lies at the end of that road:

“When they finish the process of better and better targeted advertising, that’s when the whole idea of advertising will go poof, will disappear. If it’s perfectly targeted, it isn’t advertising, it’s information. Information is welcome, advertising is offensive. Who wants to pay to create information that’s discarded? Who wants to pay to be a nuisance? Wouldn’t it be better to pay to get the information to the people who want it? Are you afraid no one wants your information? Then maybe you’d better do some research and make a product that people actually want to know about.”

I think what Winer is saying is that once you get the right information…about the right product (specifically for me)… you won’t HAVE to pay someone to put it in front of me. I will already have made that happen or have facilitated it. I WANT to know more about your product/service. At that point, it’s no longer advertising.

The point he’s trying to make is a subtle one and hard to grasp if you’ve grown up bombarded by radio and TV ads. For better or worse, we won’t have to wait long to find out if he’s right.

Google makes ad deal with XM

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“In its biggest offline media play to date, online search giant Google this morning announced plans to begin extending the reach of its online search advertisers to the nation’s largest satellite radio service, XM Satellite Radio. The deal is the latest development in Google’s push to expand beyond the Internet into the traditional media marketplace, and follows a series of tests with print media and radio outlets.”

— Media Daily News [Thanks, XM Ben]

State radio networks

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I spotted this in the monthly newsletter of StateNets (formerly the National Association of State Radio Networks): The Tennessee Radio Network has 66 full time (?) affiliates and only 11 have websites.

Of all the surveys and data and research I’ve read, this simple fact, unscientific as it is, speaks volumes to me about the radio business in 2006. If every one of your advertisers (okay, most of them) has some kind of online presence…why wouldn’t you?

In the same issue, Tom Dobrez –the head sales guy for the association– writes about “The New Media Blitz”:

“…we are all starting to feel its impact. A trip to 3 major markets in the last few weeks confirms the low level of respect radio is garnering from the nation’s major marketers. It’s just not hip. Its not now its so yesterday. The onslaughts have come from everywhere. First it was satellite radio, then Ipod and internet now its product placements etc. … It will be near impossible to get any media decision makers attention with spots only. The old way we sell it are GONE!”

Here’s my advice to my old StateNets buddies: Go down to the basement…set the Time Machine for 2000…and call me when you get there.

References available upon request

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My buddy Morris left the radio news game this spring. After 30+ years. Tried his hand at the newspaper business but that didn’t work out. He says he wants to try something online. Blogging, podcasting, etc. I think he knows it will be a tough row to hoe (as momma used to say) but he sounds very positive. In his latest email he observed there just weren’t that many “serious news operations” (he was referring to radio, I believe) in Missouri.

News GuyMorris’ situation raises a good question. If you’re a radio news reporter, and you had to go out and find another job tomorrow, where would you look? Another radio station? Group ownership has reduced the competition (and need?) for your services. The local newspaper? They’ve got their own problems. A traditional fall-back has been PR for some company/association/department. But I always wondered if that wasn’t based on the notion that you could get all of your radio news buddies to run your press releases. On the other hand, I was in a room full of PR folks back in January so the jobs seem to be there.

Radio reporters have what seem to be some very marketable skills. They can do interviews. They can write stories. They can read well aloud. So, where do they go when it’s time to go?

Podcasting with GarageBand 3

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Podcasting with GarageBand 3That’s the tile of a video training CD from lynda.com. The instructor, Scott Bourne, is really good. GarageBand a piece of Apple software most noted for making music but the latest upgrade includes some nice podcasting features. I have access to very good recording and editing hardware and software but I’d like to see what I can produce on the MacBook. The two CD set runs about $50 bucks but I think it’s worth it. I confess I got hooked by working through the first few lessons on the lynda.com website. I think it was at the end of Lesson #3 that I realized I’d have to subscribe or buy the CD to get more. By then I was hooked. Well done lynda.com. Let me get through the two CD’s and I’ll put something together, post it here and you can judge for yourself if the training is any good. [Amazon]

Web Content Strategist

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For the past 6 or 7 years, I have been working with our company’s websites. Sometimes that means designing from scratch. Sometimes we outsource the design and/or development and I manage the project. I support usesrs –internal and clients– on various content managment tools. And a bunch of other stuff. And from the beginning, I’ve struggled with a title for this position.

Some of our folks introduce me as “web guru.” Hate that. Implies a level of mystical knowledge I will never posses. Same for “webmaster.” I’m not even the master of my domain.

I’ve used Online Editor and that’s not bad. Funky Web Monkey and Pile-Drivin’ Digital Daddy are fun but I’m really not funky nor a driver of pile. I fall back on “Web Guy” (Web Boy wasn’t working) from time to time.

Today, I spotted this title: Web Content Strategist. “Strategist” seems a bit grand but I do think a lot about what we’re doing and where we’re going with our growing number of websites. So, maybe.

Why don’t CEO’s blog?

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Randall Stross has a nice piece on CEO blogging in Sunday’s NYT. Features Sun Microsystems Pres/CEO, Johathan Schwartz:

“C.E.O. blogging should no longer be viewed as extreme sport. Mr. Schwartz’s example shows that blogging fits quite naturally into the chief executive’s work week. In an exhortatory piece, “If You Want to Lead, Blog,” published in The Harvard Business Review last year, Mr. Schwartz predicted that “having a blog is not going to be a matter of choice, any more than having e-mail is today. My No. 1 job is to be a communicator,” Mr. Schwartz told me last week. “I don’t understand how a C.E.O. would not blog if committed to open communication.”

The Times story starts with: “Chief executives are inclined to avoid activities generally deemed to be high-risk: Sky diving. Cliff jumping. Motorcycle racing. And blogging.”

Learfield Top Guy, Clyde Lear, was born minus the risk-aversion gene. He’ll try anything and encourage others to jump with him. So blogging doesn’t scare him even a little. He’s been travelling a lot this summer and it’s cut into his posting but I think we’ll see it pick up as the summer winds down.

Prediction: Don’t know when… don’t know what… but a day will come when our company will be glad we have the forum that GrowLearfield.com is becoming. You can say you read it here. [via Buzz Machine]

This is how all events will be covered

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AgWired’s Chuck Zimmerman shares a story that illustrates the power of the blog. Syngenta (a big biotech company) had Chuck come in and blog a “media day” event a couple of weeks ago:

“This event started around 8am and was finished around 3pm. I posted 20 times including over 20 pictures and 5 audio interviews and they were all on AgWired before the end of the day (same day). Many of the posts were done during the actual presentations.

At the end of the event I burned all the pictures and audio to a CD and left it with them. They can post them onto their own website and it’s my understanding that is exactly what they plan to do. Their investment in this is minimal and yet they have immediate multimedia content that’s online before the other media attending even get home to their offices.”

No studio. No camera crew. No editors. One guy with some consumer grade gear and a truck-load of hustle. Is this journalism? I have no idea. And the people at Syngenta don’t care (as long as what Chuck posted is accurate).

If I were in charge of media at Syngenta, I’d ask everyone that covered the event to send me a link to their coverage (or a copy of the magazine article or a video clip of the TV piece, whatever). Then I’d make up a little matrix showing the coverage; when it got “out there”; and what kind of Google ranking it produced.

Help me score and I’ll buy your lawn mower

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I maintain a website called Missouri Death Row. No official connection to the Missouri Department of Corrections but it has become the de facto “official” website for capital punishment in Missouri. I struggle to keep the site current and was doing some research on one of the inmates currently sentenced to death:

“On December 9, 2002, Earl Forrest, who had been drinking, and his girlfriend, Angelia Gamblin, drove to Harriett Smith’s home. Forrest and Smith apparently had a falling out over a dishonored agreement with Smith to purchase a lawn mower and a mobile home for Forrest in exchange for Forrest introducing Smith to a source for methamphetamine. Forrest demanded that Smith fulfill her part of the bargain. During the ensuing melee, Forrest shot Michael Wells, a visitor at the Smith residence, in the face killing him. He also killed Smith, shooting her a total of six times.

Forrest removed a lockbox from Smith’s home containing approximately $25,000 worth of methamphetamine and returned to his home with Gamblin, where a shootout with the police ensued. The local sheriff was wounded and a deputy was killed. Forrest sustained a bullet wound to his face. Gamblin was shot twice, once in her shoulder and once in her back. Forrest finally surrendered and was charged with three counts of first-degree murder. He was found guilty on all three counts.”

Let me see if I have this right: I’ll introduce you to a source for meth…if you’ll buy my lawn mower and mobile home. How would two people ever come to that agreement?

“Come on, hook a sister up, will ya?”
“Well, I know this guy, but…”
“Look, help me score and I’ll buy your lawn mower AND your mobile home.”

Let’s skip the comments on this one. One of the arresting officers was killed and another wounded. One more sad, white trash story.