The
dynamic trio of Microsoft, Starcom, and Milward Brown have conducted a study
which unveiled a new villain in the movie of online advertising: the Ad
Avoider. Mike Shields of Mediaweek reports
that between 10 percent and 15 percent of adults 17-35 fall into this category.

The
active avoiders are young, they’re tech-savvy,
and they have a DVR to cut out the unwanted content. The passive avoiders go a simpler route – they tend to use media that
is untouched by ads, like books or board games. Well, I don’t have a DVR, and I
haven’t played a board game since it became uncouth to cheat at Chutes and
Ladders, but let me tell you something. The Ad Avoider? It’s me.

I’m
the one who “can’t be bothered with ads.” I find them “annoying.” No, worse
than just annoying; I think that advertising is evil and that whole industry
should be banished down to the eighth circle of hell to play with the other
falsifiers.

This
may sound extreme, not to mention hypocritical. But the point I’m trying to make
is that even the people who declare themselves the least likely to be affected
by media are still consumers, and they still have eyes and ears and fingers and
toes. (We hope.) Just because I am an Ad Avoider doesn’t mean I don’t know that
pork is the other white meat, that barbie is a babe, and that smoking
cigarettes will make me cool. (Too cool for school, in fact.) It doesn’t stop
me from buying products and services that I see advertised in the Right Column
or that coveted Shaded Row when I do Google searches, and it certainly does not
keep me from engaging in modern media.

What
it does do is make me more selective
about what I pay attention to, and in this sense, I am an advertiser’s dream.
Beth Uyenco Shatto, research director of Microsoft, reacted to the study by
saying, “This is the kind of stuff that keeps us up at night.” But honey, this
should be the kind of thing that makes you sleep like a Ambien-filled baby –
after a few glasses of wine. Don’t stress out about the fact that I don’t like
you. Use it to fuel your creative juices. You should wake up in the morning and think, how am I going to get Ana to buy my product today? Answer: my making it more customized, more relevant, and more interactive. (She already kind of said this; I’m just taking credit for it.)

Greg
Sterling had a really interesting post
on the subject. He said that in order to work through this issue of ad
avoidance, we have to change our focus and

Reach the right audiences when
they’re ready through directional media/targeting
Produce quality content: the
“product” must work or deliver as promised
Offer usability: accessing the information/product must be
simple and effective

and finally, the most critical point:

Take advantage of the recent rise of community and social
media: the community, especially trusted circles, filters noise but also
creates, in some circumstances, “social pressure” around adoption or product
use.

It’s
easier to get my attention if you’ve got the attention of or “sold” someone I
trust. People are using each other as filters for efficiency but also to cut
through the noise and clutter of all the marketing messages — which have less
and less credibility.

As
my ESL students used to say, “I am agree in a way that is total.”
Ad avoiders
like myself are a strange breed, but we’re not aliens. Come get me!

P.S.
In an effort to see what else was out there in terms of confessions, I did a
search and found some interesting results. Confessions of a… Community College Dean, a Hockey Fanatic (aka Bruce Carlisle?),
and a Cardamom Addict. I also
found some more savory results here.

An email
recently popped into my inbox like so many forwards do; a hastily gift-wrapped
laugh in a box – should you, of course, be in the right mood for it. It was the Washington
Post’s annual Mensa Invitational which asks readers to take any word from the
dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and then
supply a new definition. Preferably a funny one.

Some
of this year’s winners were:
Intaxication
(n.): Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it
was your money to start with.
Decafalon
(n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that
are good for you.
Dopeler
effect (n.): The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you
rapidly.
Sarchasm
(n.): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn’t
get it.
Inoculatte
(v.): To take coffee intraven ously when you are running late.
Foreploy (n.):
Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.

Osteopornosis (n.): A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)

Now,
I’m no linguist, but I think that the Internet has definitely created some new
vocabulary words, some of which are not recognized even by the latest, most innovative Microsoft
programs. For example, this morning, the following was overheard in our office: "Hey, did you know that
Word doesn’t recognize the word blog?  (I’m typing this in Word, and he’s
right.) What about blidget? Wiki? Nope, nothing doing.

So
here’s what we’re doing. We’re sponsoring our own Menso Invitational Contest – Internet
Vocabulary Only. Here are a few to get you started:

Blagger
(n.) Someone who blogs just to show off their intellectual prowess.
uPod
/ uTunes / uPhone (n.) The altruistic version of Apple products.

So, if you’re feeling particularly clever today, and your colleagues are not appreciating your humor nor your creative genius, enter our contest!  We only ask that you follow the same format as above, using the Comment space provided, and that you keep it relatively clean. (We have a fresh & innocent web designer on staff here, and we’d like her to stay that way.)

Check
out the 2006 DoubleClick TouchPoints IV survey
which finds that “influencers” – those who actively network themselves, share
opinions, blog, and participate in online communities – cite online
advertisements as a source of information about a product, second only to
actual websites.

Influencers
spend more time on the Internet – 39% responded that they were online 5 or more
hours per day – and are more finely attuned to advertising, both positively and
negatively. They’re more likely to delete or clear their cookies, but also more
likely to, say, visit a website or store after seeing an Internet ad than
non-influencers. “They notice it and they value it, and they want to have
control over it,” concludes the study, noting further:

Considering
the impact that influencers have on the buying habits of the rest of the public,
advertisers have more to gain, and more to lose, when trying to sway this small
but important group
of people.

If
Malcolm Gladwell
was right, then these are the people that online advertisers have to convince to
buy their product – so that they can go ahead with their job and convince
everyone else to do the same.

This Wired article details that Sony’s grafitti marketing efforts may actually be backfiring – as real grafitti artists are tagging over the ads.

Okay, so I’m way late to the party – in fact, the party’s been over for a while.

I guess there was a buzz created via viral emails, games, mock rallys, and this website – where a group called "The Great Pointed Archer Society" launched a mission is to change the name – and negative perception – of "Rats" ("the R-word") to "Great Pointed Archers."

It turns out that this entire effort was the work of PR firm, Cohn & Wolfe – who launched this campaign to demonstrate their branding (in this case, "re-branding") expertise.

Very clever at first blush – but I’ve read/heard some criticism that the solved mystery was a bit anti-climatic. Creative: Yes. Funny: Yes. Bottom line: What has it done (will it do) for C&W’s bottom line? I guess we’ll (they’ll) see.

Check out this Hollywood Reporter article on the increasing popularity of advergames; the focus of the piece is on the recently launched "King Kong Jump" – a Pringles/King Kong movie-sponsored game that you can play here.

Advergaming isn’t a new idea. For my money – these games are a great idea – but still almost too simple – after a minute or so I basically lose interest. Looking forward to the future of more robust interactive  gaming brand experiences.

On a tangentially-related note, does anybody remember this classic flash snowball fight game from about 5 years ago? Still a good one.

Commercial Alert – a consumer advocate group – has put a request into the FTC to decide if stealth marketing violates rules of deceptive advertising. (Mediapost) The request states:

"Fraud is fraud, and a harmless-sounding name such as ‘buzz marketing’ doesn’t change that."

WOMMA is on the case – with their take – essentially that most "buzz marketing" isn’t deceptive/stealth, and that stealth marketing – defined properly – violates WOMMA’s rules of ethics.

Like the ever-elusive "Life Time Value" formula, supposedly P&G’s Tremor division, after four years of work, has cracked the code on measuring "word of mouth." Check out the article here. Wonder how online plays into the formula? Did P&G attend WOMMA’s (Word of Mouth Marketing Association) event in Chicago a few weeks ago?

Continuing today’s "viral" theme, here’s a story that we first saw on Ad Rants: Seattle resident Jeff Tweiten has been waiting on his couch outside the Pacific Science Center IMAX theater for FIVE months for the opening of "Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith." He’s been chronicling his experience on his "Waiting for Star Wars" blog. But Brenner Thomas wonders if Jeff is a Lucas marketing plant? Here’s to hoping that Jeff is getting paid, otherwise, that’s just kind of impressively sad.

Amusing "How to be a creative" infomercial: Ad Guy Starter Kit.