TV Commercials On A Blog... Done Right?

from the make-'em-viral dept

Fri, Jun 16th 2006 2:26pm — Mike Masnick

One of the drums we've been banging on for a long time is that since the captive audience is dying when it comes to things like TV commercials, advertisers need to recognize that ads are content too. Once you realize that, you no longer need to worry about things like TiVo or other distractions taking away from commercial -- you just have to figure out how to make the commercials good and entertaining, so that people not only seek them out, but get others to go looking at them as well. It looks like ad firm JWT is taking the plunge, buying up all the ad inventory on the Huffington Post, where they'll be putting a bunch of their more entertaining TV commercials. However, to push the viral nature, each commercial will get its own page, where people will be encouraged to pass around the URLs to get more people to view the commercials. It's an interesting strategy that probably will depend on the quality and entertainment value of the commercials themselves. However, it is good to see at least some people recognizing that even if the captive audience is going away, that doesn't mean the concept of a commercial needs to go away. It's not about being intrusive, but about getting people to seek out the ads directly.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

18 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

FIRST ONE!!!, 16 Jun 2006 @ 3:25pm

Wow...
Let me grab a Diet Pepsi... Be right back....
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Starky, 16 Jun 2006 @ 3:28pm

Makes sense
I'm surprised. This idea actually makes sense! Most of the ideas that come out of advertisers (such as 1 sec. adds and making the TV lock during commercials) are stupid. It's nice to see that some people are still intelligent.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Curtis Breuker, 16 Jun 2006 @ 3:37pm

nice
They definitely picked a good site to start with. Huffpost gets tons of visitors. Also it wouldn't be hard to actually pick advertisements/commercials that would actually fit the audience. I would watch them if they sorta pertained to what was on my mind at the moment, or if they are at least mildly humorous.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Valerie Anderson, 16 Jun 2006 @ 3:44pm

Since people in real life do not think in 2D, it is only natural for the Internet community to encourage growth and development such as embedding advertisements within their blogs and web sites.

To design videos or music specifically for an Internet audience seems like another enhancement to the connectivity goals between the end-viewer and the designers/promoters/owners. And as with any piece of art, (including a web site) the advertisements published via the Internet will sink or swim on their own merits as mentioned above. If people find value in the advertisement/commercial, the URL directing others to the content will circulate via e-mails and other various means.

What this does is hopefully create a more competitive environment for artists to compete within, which is a direct benefit to both their clients AND the audience their clients are trying to reach.

Which, by the way, did the first poster ever come back with his Diet Pepsi or should I send over one of the Diet Coke's in front of me? ;>) (just curious)
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 16 Jun 2006 @ 4:00pm

Re: Makes sense
Finally,

Who dosent remember the honda commercial where they used the parts from the cars to make a rube goldberg type machine? I know I sent that to all my friends who were watching it over and over just like I was...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 16 Jun 2006 @ 7:19pm

I already pass around good TV ads. Sites like Dragon Head Almost Destroyed Me LINKY and others are great resources for finding good ads and discussing them.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
MEoip, 17 Jun 2006 @ 9:59am

Change
Some things shouldn't change (Garfield Comics), some things shouldn’t be adapted (Garfield movies) and some things should change and be adapted (tv commercials). If these fools want my TV to lock when commercials are on they need to do a few things,
1) Give me a free big screen HD TV with Surround sound that has the device
2) Let me keep my old tv so I can sell the free one on Ebay
3) Not make commercials that suck, (pretty much every commercial on the WB)
4) Make it worth my while to watch the commercial (give me a discount if I saw the commercial or something

Really if they want that device they would have to start giving away TVs sorta like google gives away email capacity so you can read their ads.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Shubie, 17 Jun 2006 @ 12:49pm

quality
What happened to making a quality product that people actually WANT to buy? Make a $10 pos and then spend millions trying to sell it. I guess there just aren't enough commercials as it is. If we didn't want to buy your product off TV, what makes you think we want to see it repeatedly on the net?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
4General, 17 Jun 2006 @ 1:17pm

Very important (for me) A question
Maybe someone can help me finding info about online revenue models on sites like youtube.com etc'
I need to submit a paper (university) analyzing the potential income channels for such platforms (business model/analysis). Subscriptions average cost, what's the minimum traffic to start and sell ad's, etc’/other alternatives?

Please advice

4general.research@gmail.com
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Rick, 17 Jun 2006 @ 6:25pm

Wouldn't it be cheaper to just use YouTube and Google Video?

Showcase your best commercials, get a few writeups and let the viral craze do the rest - IF they're good enough.

It is nice to see an ad firm realize we all hate commercials, but if they ENTERTAIN us, it becomes more than a commercial...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Anonymous Coward, 17 Jun 2006 @ 6:28pm

Re: Very important (for me) A question
You might start by learning better English. "Please advice"???? "etc'"??? "ad's"???
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Duane, 18 Jun 2006 @ 9:56am

Con-tent?
Makes sense but I am not overly optimistic about this. The general TV industry is failing due to their inability to create good content. Film is following. Other than movies like Everything is Illuminated, Amelie and Syrianna, most of what comes from the industry is boilerplate crap. If advertiser's can do it better, power to them. I think this is why the market will vastly de-centralize and fragment giving new indie sites like YouTube the mainstream reach.

Remember- you can't spell "content" without using the word "con"...think and you will succeed!
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Michael, 18 Jun 2006 @ 12:02pm

I like this idea - but some advertisers seem to ha
I really like this idea - but it seems not all advertisers see the light. For example, the Bud Lite "Real Men of Genius" radio spots are hilarious, and I love each that I hear. But it's funny, if you search for some of the sites that used to host copies of these advertisements for people's entertainment they now have cease and decist letters posted in place of the audio file.

Why would an advertiser want to stop the proliferation of their ad content? I don't get it...
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Eric, 18 Jun 2006 @ 4:52pm

remember..
Hello? Anyone remember adcritic.com wherre you could rate the commercials? That site was great! And it used to be free. If they would have had support from some of the major advertising firms, they'd still be huge today. I'd love to see another site like that come back around.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
William C Bonner, 19 Jun 2006 @ 3:59pm

Look at the Folgers Commercial!
Anyone who doesn't believe that ads are content, and good ads people will seek out hasn't seen the recent folgers commercial.

http://www.boardsmag.com/screeningroom/commercials/2971/

I'd love to know what the bandwidth of people sharing that ad has been in the last couple of days.

Wim.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Tim Yang, 21 Jun 2006 @ 10:51pm

Here's a TV Commercial blog
It gets a lot of hits and it's among the top 15 results for "tv commercial" or "tv commercials" on Google. People DO like to see TV commercials on the internet.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Joe Herbert, 14 Jan 2007 @ 7:07am

Funny commercial
Hello, I was part of the team that created DUCT TAPE, a current top five finalist in the Doritos Super Bowl Commercial contest. We're honored to be in this position, as first time TV commercial makers we're up against some pros... and we're asking people to please support us by casting their vote for DUCT TAPE at http://www.crashthesuperbowl.com -- thank you for blogging, I enjoyed your post. Joe Herbert.

http://www.jumpcut.com/view?id=79EA4040802C11DB8702266C9A2E700D
[ link to this | view in thread ]
carlos, 8 Feb 2008 @ 8:37pm

selling tv commercial ideals
this is to any soft drinks or beer companys got great ideals hit me up
[ link to this | view in thread ]