This was the question of the hour at AWNY’s “What’s Hot in Media for 2012?” breakfast panel at the New York Hilton Thursday morning.  Chaired by TargetCast’s President and Director of Client Services Audrey Siegel, the panel featured notable industry leaders including TargetCast’s President of Interactive Marketing, Steve Minichini.  The panel shared their expert insight on how they see the advertising industry evolving and what major trends we can expect to see in 2012.

1) A more refined advertising style in the mobile world

With the increasing popularity of smart phones and tablet products it is more important than ever for advertisers to be thinking about how to build and optimize our advertising in this ever evolving mobile world.  As Steve Minichini pointed out, there is no unified voice in how we advertise through tablets, and over the next year, advertisers will begin to figure out how to most effectively communicate with the consumer.

2)  What privacy really means in our increasingly social world

With all the recent online privacy and piracy debates, consumers are more aware than ever of how companies are accessing their personal information and using it to target them with specific advertisement.  Despite this, we can expect to see a more concrete definition of what privacy really means and what rights an individual is entitled.  This will have a major effect on where advertisers are able to communicate with consumers.

3)  A continued emphasis on social media as a way to engage with consumers

And speaking of communicating with consumers, companies are finally finding a winning model of how to successfully interact with their consumers in the social world.  Many companies are hesitant to invest in social media since there are often no tangible results, but with sites like Tumblr and Pinterest now gaining popularity, companies and consumers alike are finding new ways to express themselves, and connect with each other beyond a Facebook “like”.

4)  And finally, thinking beyond TV

Between interactive TV, and the introduction of 3D into the consumers’ home, marketing is headed in a much more dynamic direction.  During 2012 we will see advertisers experiment with the most effective way to communicate with consumers through these new mediums as they stop thinking about TV as TV, and instead as video everywhere.

With all of these trends in mind, it is clear that the leaders in the advertising industry will be those who are willing to experiment and take risks on both new technology and the fresh young minds who already use this technology in their day to day life.  2012 will definitely be an exciting year!

I was watching television and a commercial for a product I had never heard of before came on the air.  The ad was for a Skanz bracelet or band as they call it, with a QR code containing personal information.  As I watched the commercial I was totally confused – the message was that it would now be easier, than ever before, for me to share my personal information – but was this something I’d been missing in my life?   

Hmmm, do I really need a QR coded bracelet with my personal information?  And if I don’t, who does?

Skanz is a new company that allows you to put your entire online persona, contact info, Facebook page, Twitter feed, LinkdIn profile, Tumblr account, etc. in one place accessible via QR code. You can place your personal QR code on an iPhone case or Skanz band in any of the styles below:

Sporting one of these turns you into a walking advertisement for yourself. When you meet someone new, all they have to do is scan your code and they have instant access to everything you want them to know about you.

I knew immediately that that this was not going to work for me.  But still, I was intrigued, and I quickly identified a handful of uses for the Skanz technology.

One thing that came to mind is the ease with which medical history would be made available for emergencies.  It certainly could replace the current medical alert bracelet.   For marketers, if an ad contained the right code, the wearer of the Skanz band could flash their personal QR bracelet and either order the product or get more information about the product without much effort.   Two truly one-to-one experiences brought to you by Skanz.

From a research viewpoint, we are still hungry for source data that can more closely connect the consumer, their media behavior and product purchase.  Today, there are research companies that are asking their participants to carry pagers and even a specially modified Smartphone with which to record their behavior.  Perhaps we could take advantage of the QR code technology to tell us which media, and more importantly which advertisements, the wearer is exposed to on a very timely basis.  

Skanz has created a product for a problem that never before existed.   But I wonder if some smart research company is not thinking how they could take advantage of a respondent’s willingness to wear their own QR code and truly change the measurement of all advertising regardless of the medium used to convey the message.  All it would take would be for the medium to have the technology to read the Skanz information on the research participants’ hand.

There are several barriers to widespread adoption of Skanz and other QR Code-based technology.  As a research instrument the technology would have to be easy to use for all age segments of the population.   For marketers who are familiar with the benefits of using BAR codes this technology might offer more immediate return path information about their customers.  It took some time for the now familiar BAR codes to gain widespread adoption and only time will tell if there is interest in moving to Skanz QR codes to enhance our information on consumer behavior.

Social media makes it socially acceptable to be super-intense about our favorite things—I’m talking singing-with-our-eyes-closed passionate about our favorite foods, pictures of dogs frolicking in leaves, workout routines, limited edition action figure collections, and especially TV shows. 

People are watching more TV than ever—35.6 hours per week according to a Nielsen estimate.  That’s an average of 5 hours per day.   Yikes. Recently, a spate of sites similar to Foursquare have cropped up in response to our ravenous entertainment appetites allowing users to “check in” to their fave shows.  Like checking into a restaurant or bar on Foursquare, these sites—Miso, Getglue, Philo, Comcast’s Tunerfish, and IntoNow—enable users to let friends know what show their boob tube is dialed into in real time. The Intonow app, kind of like Foursquare and Shazam’s love child, lets users check into a specific episode by having their Smartphone listen to the program on TV.   The goal of all these sites, of course, is creating connections—connecting show watchers to each other and to new content.

Another way to up the ante on our favorite shows is through social viewing.  At Adweek’s Targetcast-hosted discussion Phoenix Rising: How Technology is Transforming Foundational Media, panelists presaged that social viewing would be the next big thing.  Gabbing to your best friend on the phone after the show’s over? So archaic—nostalgic as a Rockwell painting!   Social Viewing sites like Paltalk enable people in different locations to watch the same video at the same time AND chat about it.   Paltalk offers video chat rooms, which they refer to as screening rooms.  The screening room streams the same video to all attendees and enables them to chat.  With social viewing sites, there’s no need to mentally file away that witty commentary for later—viewers can share their shock, outrage, laughter, sadness, and elation in real time too.

We’re proud to announce TargetCast has been named to Inc. Magazine’s 500|5000 List of 2011 Fastest-Growing Private Companies for the fourth time since 2007.

Thank you to our dedicated staff and strong client partnerships who have helped us achieve continued success and healthy growth. We’ve come a long way and anticipate an even brighter future for 2012 and beyond!!

If you spend any time on Tumblr, chances are you’ve encountered an animated gif. They may look scary and complicated to do, but with Gif Shop, you can churn out gifs in a mere matter of seconds. While this app isn’t the first of its kind, the interface is very user-friendly & even entices self-proclaimed “non-creatives” to create works of art. After playing with this iPhone app non-stop for the past two weeks, its quickly become my new favorite app. Gif Shop is available via iTunes App Store for $1.99.

See a quick demo about Gif Shop here.

A new 3D technology called Unlimited Detail showcases how their technology will greatly improve in all genre of 3D. Using point cloud data, it can improve the amount of details by 100,000 times than the current standard. Point cloud data give artists unlimited freedom on how much details they can put into their 3D models. This technology eliminates the limitation on polygon count given to the artists and eliminates the need to create multiple detail levels of the same model. This will be the next break through in 3D technology. Check out the video.

These viral favorites definitely had the hook! Check out the top 10 best viral videos from YouTube remixed and better then ever!

David’s new masterpiece (original video to date has 97,735,029 views) can also be found on iTunes!

Just one question, how did Antoine Dodson not make the hot list?

It’s funny how enraged I was back in March when NFL talks broke down, and the lockout began.

Why can’t seemingly intelligent people figure out a way to share $9 billion?

Don’t they realize that they are lucky to have this, and they are disillusioning their fans?

How greedy can they be? 

Selfishly, I was also dreading what effect this would have on the upfront marketplace. What if significant amounts of NFL dollars got re-expressed in entertainment, news, other sports, etc ?  We’d see even greater increases in already anticipated  aggressive CPMs!  

After a month or so, panic seemed to subside. People generally felt that too much was at stake for there not to be a settlement. Deep down, no one really thought that there would be no NFL season. Interestingly, there were no ultimatums.

Sure enough, the NFL situation did not have an extra damaging affect on the market. No one dumped large ad funds into alternatives. Things were healthy enough.

Issues were finally worked out. Both sides got elements they wanted, and both sides seem satisfied. Further, advertisers could continue to take advantage of high-rated, engaging programming. 

If only those entrusted with running our government could take a clue from the NFL and work out a reasonable compromise.

Now I am really enraged.   We’re not talking about greed here. We’re not talking about a game to watch on Sunday and discuss during the week.

We’re talking about potential and long-term damaging economic effects on the lives of the American people.   Maybe these politicians need to take a page from the NFL playbook and get serious about working out a compromise that has the interests of the public front and center.   

I’m pretty sure we all believe that a deal will be reached.  I just think it is irresponsible to play “chicken” with so much at stake.

The world of illegal downloading and file sharing is finally getting what it deserves. Today Group M, WPP’s Global Ad buying unit, the biggest spender of advertising dollars in the world, added a new policy that prevents money from being spent on a list of banned sites that offer pirated content. Group M spends an estimated $76 billion dollars per year and now they no longer want to condone the copy-right infringement that occurs on these sites. Among some of the more well known names on the list is The Pirate Bay. Currently, there are 2,221 banned sites that offer pirated content on Group M’s “list”. Without the money flowing from WPP into the hands of the creators of these sites they will most likely struggle to stay afloat, seeing as they do not charge their visitors for content.
However, in today’s world where there seems to be an infinite amount of sites that offer the same illegal content, how will Group M decide who makes it onto their list of banned sites? According to AdAge.com, they’re using a number of technology vendors to seek them out. In addition they plan to cross check their list with similar lists kept by Time Warner, Paramount, Universal Music and Summit Entertainment.
While we believe WPP’s list is a good starting point, we feel that a more technologically based approach is necessary. Currently, we do not spend money on these sites and do not work with them directly. Furthermore, we advise any ad network that we do business with to exclude any pirating sites on buys we place. Still, we recognize that these properties are led by creative individuals who consistently find ways to get ad dollars. As such, truly eliminating these pirating sites from the media mix will require a large amount of time and resources. So while Group M’s latest effort may not be a “sure thing” when it comes to stopping the flow of money to those running file sharing site on the internet, it does a great job of sending a strong message that our industry will no longer tolerate any illegal activity on the web.

It has been two weeks since Google announced it would expand Instant Preview, initially launched in November 2010 for organic search listings, to paid search ads as well.  Just doing a quick search for Instant Preview for Ads generated over 3,600 results (now plus one!)  For the unaware, IPfA presents a magnifying glass icon adjacent to the headline of a paid search ad, and upon click and subsequent mouse-over, gives users the opportunity to preview an ad’s landing page.  Searchers are able to quickly review the content of the potential landing page to see if it is relevant to their search prior to clicking.

Google asserts, and I would have to agree in theory, that this tactic will send even more qualified traffic to customer sites since users have the ability to pre-screen the result.  However, is it a stretch to assume the average searcher may not be aware of this icon’s utility?

While results, reviews and opinions continue to accumulate, some initial feedback seems focused on the SEO quality of the pending landing page.  Is there enough informative text on the displayed landing page?  Like a supermarket product label, is the displayed landing page eye-catching enough?

This new feature is a good one in many ways.  Among other reasons, it continues to push the “relevancy” proposition that Google espouses.  Advertisers must continue to make their destination pages more relevant, now not just because of the punishment of a wilting quality score, but because of a user’s ability to choose relevancy before clicking.  That being said, it would be interesting to see the relationship between icon “previews” and actual clicks.  Could that be a new metric?