No Man’s Blog

I don’t watch TV often but I recently noticed what I can only hope to be a growing trend inmarketing where brands develop useful online applications or services which simply have built in ‘advertising’ in them.

once upon a time there was the ‘big advertising idea’ which was then ‘extended’ digitally in the form of banners, stupid flash games, downloads etc.

Increasingly, brands develop utility applications for their consumers to enjoy or benefit from. And these applications have ‘advertising’ embedded in them or in other words, the application is the ‘big idea’, the service is the advertising.

The ultimate example and best practice is, of course nike+. It is so damn good you want to get married to it. And from an advertising point of view there is no need whatsoever for a ‘big’ idea. it is the fucking biggest idea.

kudos to tesco for their newly refurbished price checker (can’t believe I praise the devil). They wisely embraced the transparency of the web and rather than wait for a third party to create the definitive supermarket price checker, they did it themselves and this service stars in their TV and outdoor advertising.

Lastly Boots’ “get beach gorgeous” campaign which can win this year’s “best idea-worst execution” award. Boots offers personal plan to get your skin ready for the summer [poor ladies, is this really such a dreadful moment or is it yet another self-hated campaign? I thought this stuff was over after dove's real beauty campaigns] Anyway, whoever is doing their digital needs to be hanged from a tall tree for killing good idea with such appalling execution.

The best way to do advertising today (IMHO) is first to develop amazing products and services, and then to think about it as the stimulus, or the ‘invitation’ - the real experience, or ‘event’ (apart from the product or service itself, of course) is taking place online.

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