The Federal Trade Commission — responding to complaints that “tracking” software can violate the privacy of those using the Web — moved to put the brakes on such monitoring. The FTC called for a “Do Not Track” mechanism that would enable consumers to opt out of being tailed around the Web.
It’s interesting to see how people have recently gotten so miffed by the thought of being “tracked” when this has been happening since the beginning of time! (Well, more like since the inception of the internet, but still…). Every ad clicked, eBay auction viewed, Amazon review read, Facebook like, Google search, retweet… all of these forms of communication are being tracked and logged for statistical purposes.
However, if this “mechanism” is put into action, what does this mean for advertising? I would imagine it would be problematic in the beginning, but I would guess that user access would be severely cut and content would be limited lest the user opts into being tracked. Either way, while this may seem like a huge setback, I feel that it may become more of an annoyance moreso than anything else.
Greece: Just the name of the country itself brings forth ideas of mysticism, adventure, and beauty. However, the with all the negative media surrounding the recent economic crash Greece experienced, tourism rates are at an all-time low. The recession-hit economy has experienced everything from fuel shortages to horrendous riots in the main city square in Athens. Nevertheless, Greece is standing strong in the face of negativity is now gearing up for the summer in preparation for a new wave of tourism. Typically, Greece brings in about 16 million tourists each year, contributing around 15% of the country’s total Gross Domestic Product. Suffice to say, the Greek economy is excited and ready for the onslaught of new tourists.
However, one question is burning in the minds of the executive members at Ο Ελληνικός Οργανισμός Τουρισμού or the Greek National Tourism Organization, the GNTO; should the board focus on business tourism or travel tourism this fiscal year? This question was brought on by the cuts to the advertising budget, and now the GNTO must decide whether they should focus all of their resources on business or travel tourism for the 2011 fiscal year.
In order to fully understand how Greece has acted regarding its tourism campaigns, we must first take a look into the past. In 2004, Greece utilized the tagline “Live your myth in Greece. Wonderful Greece.” This campaign featured beautiful spots featuring various places in and around Greece, yet never made any specific references to how its different locations could be utilized. However, one must note that the 2004 Athens Summer Olympics were going on at this time, and Greece was already expecting a gargantuan influx of tourism and revenue at this time (regardless of how prepared it was to host the game). Nevertheless, for this reason, the 2004 campaign was strictly a tourism campaign.
:45 second spot
:45 second spot [Greek]
Extended reel
In 2005, Greece was the proud champion of the annual Eurovision Song Contest, with popular singer Elena Paparizou at the forefront. With her hit single “My Number One” sweeping the European nations at that moment, all dance clubs alike were playing the song non-stop. This was the very first time that Greece had won the Eurivision song contest, bringing the country an even greater sense of pride, still abuzz from it being the host nation for the Olympics 108 years after first being held there.
Nevertheless, the 2005 Greek tourism campaign reflected the nations pride and joy in many ways, and it utilized Elena Paparizou as its ambassador for the TV spots. The campaign again, focused on tourism and travel, as the spots highlighted on the places, history and food of Greece.
Extended ad
Destinations
Food
History
For the 2006-2007 years, the GNTO completely rebranded its Greek tourism campaigns and debuted the new slogan “Explore your senses in Greece.” While giving the campaign an overall more modern look, this was again a primarily travel/tourism campaign. However, the campaign was overall more aesthetically pleasing, relying on bold copy, beautiful scenic shots, and did not use a spokesperson (or audio commentary) in any of its commercials.
Extended cut
In 2008, a new campaign debuted but this time, the GNTO rebranded itself as well, coming up with a new logo and a new slogan for itself and its new campaign: “Greece: The True Experience.” However, this time, the ad took a more media-centric approach, as it highlighted the used of media and the internet as a means of supplementing tourism. The TV spots had a “amateur-like” feel to them and even showed a mini-player bar (pause, play, stop, rewind) at the beginning of the ads.
General ad
In 2009, the campaign reflected a more budget-friendly feel for travelers as its tagline was “Greece: A masterpiece you can afford.” Regardless of how affordable it made itself out to be, plane tickets and the Euro were at an all-time high, and many felt this campaign tried to make Greece something it wasn’t: affordable.
The current campaign is entitled “You in Greece” and is a new take on tourism encouragement. Instead of trying to entice people via the sites, sounds and tastes of Greece, this campaign is asking tourists why they love Greece and why they keep coming back. This is a perfect example of how brands and businesses are encouraging users to speak up and talk about their brands to one another and share their thoughts and opinions with them.
Regarding the current problem in the POV, I believe that the GNTO should turn its attention from travel tourism and focus more on business tourism. For the past six years, the GNTO has focused all of its attention on building up Greece as the perfect holiday or summer vacation spot, and it has greatly succeeded in that area. Now its time to focus on something new and highlight all of the opportunities and amenities Greece has to offer in terms of business tourism. Greece needs to focus on rebuilding its economy by emphasizing that it capable of business tourism, where people can both work and relax. With many state-of-the-art facilities still gleaming with newness from the 2004 Summer Olympics, Greece can become the perfect destination for business conferences and tourism alike. Seminars can take place near ancient ruins, meetings can be held off the coast of the Mediterranean sea, and lunch breaks will be filled with the wonderful smells and tastes Greece has to offer.
TrueView is not an uncommon concept, but it’s something completely foreign to avid YouTube users. Unlike the normal process of making you watch an ad before the content (a pre-roll so to speak), YouTube is now testing the ad waters with TrueView, a process by which a small timer will be shown on top of the ad (as demonstrated above) and after the time is up (usually five seconds), users will have the ability to skip the ad, even if it hasn’t already finished. While some see this as counterintuitive, this could revolutionize how YouTube shows its ads because it can base the ad preferences on whether or not the user skipped the video but also the actual video the user is watching. Preferences can be matched based on the type of video and the type of ads seen, perhaps even the number of views or the popularity of the video. What does this all mean? Well, in my opinion,there could soon be an option where the most viral of videos (think “David goes to the dentist” or “Charlie bit me”) could incur a higher ad rate because of how much buzz surrounds them. Does that mean the user makes any profit? People, start your cameras!
According to an article on AdAge, the popular men’s network television channel “Spike TV” had ad-breaks lasting almost 10 minutes!
Spike TV has turned the venerable commercial break into a commercial marathon. During certain broadcasts of “Entourage,” the Viacom cable channel has quietly run ad breaks ranging anywhere from six minutes in length to something approaching an eyebrow-raising 10 minutes in total. In some cases, the ad breaks are longer than segments of the show, episodes of which have in recent weeks taken as long as 48 minutes to run.
It’s ridiculous to think that the commercial breaks could in theory be longer the actual content, which lead me to the question: what were we really watching? Were we watching Vincent Chase live the Hollywood life in “Entourage” or were we learning about the newest types of insurance that Progressive Insurance had to offer?
Below is an excerpt of the article talking about the ad blocks Spike TV ran:
What gets crammed into a 10-minute break?
To build a 10-minute ad break Aug. 27, Spike started off with a promo for its UFC programming, then ran spots for DirecTV; Unilever’s Axe shampoo; B.F. Goodrich; Schering-Plough’s Zegerid OTC; Jack Link‘s beef jerky; VF Corp.’s Lee Jeans; Screen Gems’ latest “Resident Evil” movie; AT&T; Miller Lite beer; and Progressive Insurance.
Ads also ran during the break for PepsiCo’s Mtn Dew; Pep Boys; Trojan condoms; Outback Steakhouse; Mobil motor oil; Sony Corp.’s Vaio laptop; Diageo’s Captain Morgan Lime Bite rum; Kraft Foods’ Dentyne gum; a DVD for the FX program “Sons of Anarchy”; and UFC action figures. The break was then garnished with what appeared to be two ads from local cable operators.
Facebook Messages puts texts, chats, e-mails in one in-box [via]
Facebook will soon begin rolling out Facebook Message, an all-inclusive messaging suite, where you can group your messages, emails, chat histories, texts and everything in between all in one place. However, is this too much? Sure, an @facebook.com email sounds cool, but what does that mean for Facebook itself? Will people still need an email address to sign up or will it soon become all self-contained? Furthermore, will it alienate other email clients? Regardless of how big Facebook is, being on the bad side of Google or Gmail does not sound like something to be happy with!
Is Social Media Making Consumers Antisocial? [via]
While the ever-growing popularity of text messaging has taken impersonal communication to new extremes, social media has brought it to an entirely new level. Gone are the days when people call each other over the phone or even meet with friends. Instead, tweeting, poking and @messaging has become the new norm amongst some as a form of communication. However, does this mean we are more connected? Some people may tweet or message back and forth for several hours, even several weeks, yet on the phone, a 10 minute conversation or a 30 minute lunch date comes and goes, and you may never see that person again for weeks. Can this be counted as true social interaction, or is this solely activity over the internet which happens to fall under communication with friends? Are we getting more antisocial? Or are we getting hypersocial? I would contest the latter, as it is a common occurrence to see tweets and status updates about someones new shoes, their latest grades, why they hate their job, what they’re reading, who they’re with, and what they’ve had for dinner. Hypersocial is the new antisocial.
Triumph of the Design Haters: After Facebook and Tropicana, Whose Redesign Is Next to Go? [via]
Customers are now calling ALL of the shots these days, thanks to social media. Gone are the days when customers voiced their opinion about the actual product and in come the days where design MATTERS! But, it’s not like this hasn’t been happening before. I’m sure that in the past, many have been unhappy with various packaging and image changes that some brands or companies have gone through, it’s just that the general public never had a way to voice their displeasure. Social media has completely revolutionized how brands interact with their customers, and they’re quick to listen to them. Once Tropicana got wind of how people were so taken aback by the new redesign, they quickly reverted back to the classic logo and packaging, complete with the red-and-white straw in the orange.
It was plain to everyone that the new GAP logo could only be described as absolutely horrible. In an attempt to somewhat “modernize” the logo, the esteemed brand decided that a rebrand was in order. However, once the general public got wind of this transformation, the world of social media began to explode with the cries of horror from concerned customers and designers alike. What’s the deal with the ugly logo? Why the change? Why those colors? That font?
The website CrapLogo.me even parodies the new logo and gives its users the ability to create their own logo using the tagline “Why hire an expensive firm to rebrand?”
Nevertheless, GAP smoothed the entire disaster over by eventually reverting back to their own logo.
“Since we rolled out an updated version of our logo last week on our website, we’ve seen an outpouring of comments from customers and the online community in support of the iconic blue box logo.
“Last week, we moved to address the feedback and began exploring how we could tap into all of the passion. Ultimately, we’ve learned just how much energy there is around our brand. All roads were leading us back to the blue box, so we’ve made the decision not to use the new logo on gap.com any further.
“At Gap brand, our customers have always come first. We’ve been listening to and watching all of the comments this past week. We heard them say over and over again they are passionate about our blue box logo, and they want it back. So we’ve made the decision to do just that – we will bring it back across all channels.
“In the meantime, the website will go back to our iconic blue box logo and, for Holiday, we’ll turn our blue box red for our seasonal campaign.
“We’ve learned a lot in this process. And we are clear that we did not go about this in the right way. We recognize that we missed the opportunity to engage with the online community. This wasn’t the right project at the right time for crowd sourcing.
“There may be a time to evolve our logo, but if and when that time comes, we’ll handle it in a different way. “
In an effort to re-brand itself into something new and modern, the once popular social networking site Myspace.com has gone under a complete re-design. Everything from the logo to how profiles are laid-out has been changed to portray the website as a more current and contemporary site. Greatly overshadowed by the monopoly Facebook has over social networking sites, Myspace has stated its now focused more heavily on music and entertainment. This is a very smart move in my opinion, as it is capitalizing on something it is already somewhat good at: the ability to showcase music (particularly newer/indie artists). However, regardless of how hard it tries and how much money is poured into it, I feel that Myspace will never achieve the fame and notoriety of Facebook.
Social media such as Twitter and Facebook are rapidly becoming venues where marketers connect with customers and spend dollars that previously may have gone to more traditional Internet ads.
The main question that comes from this article is if social media is killing display ads?
In my opinion, yes and no. Of course, by taking money traditionally spend on regular internet ads and putting it towards social media, one is “killing” the other. However, I feel that everyone will benefit from this shift. No longer will twentysomethings be bombarded by life insurance ads and ads for a retirement home in the Cayman islands just as happy retirees will no longer have to endure ads about the newest gadgets and gizmos now available. All in all, by shifting towards social media, internet ads will be able to speak directly to those consumers who are most likely to care about whats being advertised. Less waste and more ROI will put a smile on any advertisers face.
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Facebook Messages puts texts, chats, e-mails in one in-box [
Is Social Media Making Consumers Antisocial? [
Triumph of the Design Haters: After Facebook and Tropicana, Whose Redesign Is Next to Go? [
In a world of media 