Spring 2008
Music For Ads Hits The Charts
Music, as a means of marketing, has gone through many variations. Since the dawning of radio, advertisers would hire song writers to create custom songs or jingles that sang the praises of their products. The catchy tunes were popular, but never made it into the Billboard’s hit parade.
In the late 1980’s, jingles fell out of favor. Rather than writing custom music, advertisers began conscripting existing songs by popular recording artists to promote products. Every recording artist imaginable from Bob Seger, Led Zepplin, The Rolling Stones and even the Beatles lent their songs for selling.
Recently, a new twist of music and marketing has appeared. Music from lesser known artists is being commissioned or selected for commercial use, with the hope that the song’s popularity will translate onto the Top 10 charts.
The insurance company, Allstate, was one of the first companies to have a song used in a commercial go viral and top the charts. Jason Wade, lead singer of the band Lifehouse, wrote an unreleased song for an Allstate commercial.
The commercial focuses on teenage drivers, which connects the appealing song written by Wade. The song highlights Wade’s experience of a friend who died in a teenage car accident. Following the commercial debut of the song, “From Where you Are,” increased iTunes downloads and put the campaign jingle in the billboard top 100.
Computer and electronics trendsetter, Apple, promotes new products like the iPod with music from new artists. Starting with the iPod Nano release, Apple incorporated the song “1, 2, 3, 4” by Feist, which gained popularity. Apple’s recent commercials for their MacBook Air laptop helped launch an unknown Israeli artist, Yael Naim. After the TV commercial began airing, she hit Billboard’s Top 10 with the song “New Soul.”
Advertising Hits The Road
Advertisers are constantly searching for new media outlets to reach consumers. In their latest efforts, marketers are focusing on airlines and taxi drivers to provide the next generation of non-traditional advertising.
Recently, airline carriers began to sell advertising space on backs of tray tables and overhead luggage compartments. A European airline, Ryanair, added the ad space in an effort to offset rising fuel costs and to promote their airplanes as a marketing vehicle. Just like bus placards, passengers are unable to avoid the marketer’s message. The airlines believe that the ads deliver to audiences who
may not be influenced by television and newspapers.
Airplanes are not the only form of transportation to display advertising to influence their passengers. The company 888.com has expanded their marketing outside as well as inside on London taxi cabs. The online gambling company has used many taxi cab exteriors to promote their website, but breaks the typical advertising approach by involving the taxi cab drivers.
Taxi drivers provide information about tourist attractions and local information to their passengers. 888.com felt that if drivers were already being asked to provide information to passengers, then they could also help to persuade them. The London taxi drivers are being coached about conversational tactics to pitch. As the growth of this program increases, drivers are working with marketers to learn new ways to converse with various audiences.
Ad Monitoring: The “Do Not Track” List
The “Do Not Call” list has made a major impression on consumers and advocacy groups. A new “do not” is now sought after by many advocacy groups with the intent of stopping tracking of online activities. The proposed “Do not Track” list would prohibit advertisers from using tracking of consumer’s web visits for individuals who do not want their information reviewed.
The proposed regulation would also require tracking advertisers to register with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) before they would implement tracking procedures. Government regulations would apply to all companies that track online habits and the information that is stored. The “Do Not Track” List could prove to be problematic for many advertisers as the Internet grows. Individuals could obtain a list from the FTC of which sites are trackers and then block the tracking cookies from their web browser.
Advertisers claim that online tracking can be helpful to consumers, since it focuses on showing advertisements for products and services that web site visitors enjoy, as indicated by their web visiting patterns.
Contradicting this idea, consumers and privacy groups advocate that consumers should at least have the option to block ad trackers. The privacy groups spearheading the issue — Electronic Frontier Foundation and Consumer Action, Consumer Federation of America, the World Privacy Forum, and the Center for Democracy and Technology — believe that the expansion of web tracking could provide a larger threat to consumers, since most tracking is kept secret.
