Six Digital Marketing Insights from Ad Age Digital in San Francisco

Ad Age hosted its Digital conference in SF for the second time last week and – after opening to a video montage of viral hits, including Psy’s omnipresent “Gangnam Style” – speakers from top brands, along with Facebook, Twitter and Google, danced around the latest digital marketing trends and hot topics. Below are six insights from the conference that marketers should consider when crafting digital engagement programs, or quite possibly, the next video to generate 280 million YouTube views:

1) There’s a lot of sameness. Break the mold.

Lesya Lysyj, CMO, Heineken USA, spoke about the company’s marketing philosophy in the attention economy, and immediately caught our attention when she casually mentioned that men love beer more than women love chocolate. After raising my coffee cup in agreement, Lysyj displayed a homogenous look of beer ads that shouted out to no one – which was exactly her point. She then highlighted several brand campaigns, including “The Legends” for Heineken, “No Bollocks” for Newcastle, and “The Most Interesting Man in the World” for Dos Equis. Who better to emphasize the importance of creating interesting content than the creators of The Most Interesting Man? Lysyj noted that Heineken is the top beer brand on Facebook and the leading beer brand on Twitter in terms of share of voice. In addition, Newcastle was able to reach a 25% Talking About This score among its Facebook fans after introducing its “No Bollocks” campaign, where a good score is close to 5%.

2) Give users a choice with your paid media.

If there was one speaker at Ad Age Digital that was going to dance to “Gangnam Style,” it would have been Brian Shin, founder and CEO, Visible Measures. He definitely expressed intent, and if the attendees were given a choice, we likely would have made him dance. Shin emphasized that when viewers choose what sponsored videos they want to see, there is a 300-450% brand lift for advertisers. The intent also drives earned media with Shin highlighting a choice economics model of E/P or Earned Media / Paid Media. He highlighted how 53 brands enabled pre-game viewing of their Super Bowl ads, while 22 brands didn’t allow pre-game views. As a result, the 53 brands who supported their paid marketing efforts with earned media experienced nearly a 7x viewership of their ads. Those marketers appeared to have made the right choice.

3) Your brand isn’t here. It’s out there and being co-authored all the time.

Valerie Buckingham, head of North America marketing, Nokia, addressed digital decentralization and a brand’s social core. Buckingham emphasized that the brand – and its marketing department – is not the only source of content. With the shift in how media is consumed combined with a new content-sharing paradigm of “from one-to-many-to-many-to-one,” brands need to listen 24/7 endlessly; and accept the co-authoring of the brand and any resulting conversations from it. Buckingham views this as an opportunity and noted, “If you love your brand, set it free.”

4) Mobile devices are on pace to become the consumer’s primary portal to the world around them.

Mobile and the increasingly mobile consumer were dominant themes – whether a discussion was about the Nth screen or about 110% mobile penetration in the U.S. market. Jonathan Alferness, director of product management and global head of mobile ad products, Google, spoke about the new customer journey and offered several mobile stats to show mobile’s important role in our lives: 50% of U.S. smartphone owners used mobile commerce apps in June 2012 and $159B in retail sales will be influenced by mobile this year [Source: Deloitte, The Dawn of Mobile Influence, July 2012].

Virginia Suliman, VP of digital design and development, Hilton, shared her perspective on how to create experiences for the mobile consumer; while also philosophically reminding the audience that human behavior flows from three main sources: desire, emotion and knowledge [according to Plato]. And more often than not, our behavior flows through one primary source – our mobile devices.

5) A really interesting conversation can spark a campaign.

Gather around the Twitter stream. Joel Lunenfeld, VP of global brand strategy, Twitter, informed the crowd that with 400 million tweets per day, there are opportunities for inspiration from the collective. Lunenfeld mentioned that the conversation is the canvas on Twitter, and it’s up to brands to paint it with the stories they want to tell their customers. In other words, marketers should listen first before launching their paintbrushes. A tweet from an Audi fan in 2011 generated a full campaign after she tweeted #WantAnR8 and the automaker surprised her with her beloved car for a day. Lunenfeld also discussed how Morton’s Steakhouse greeted HARO-founder Peter Shankman at the airport after Shankman tweeted his desire to have a steak waiting for him. These brands saw opportunities to surprise and delight their fans, resulting in not only amazing smiles and stories; but in Audi’s case, a long-term engagement strategy that has sparked a follow-up campaign.

Are you listening? Lunenfeld wants you to know that hashtags on Twitter are a modern day campfire.

6) Now is the time to experiment with storytelling.

Once upon a time there emerged a new storytelling medium called the Internet. A panel featuring Jamie Byrne, global head of content strategy, YouTube, Jon Avnet, producer, WIGS, Matt Mazzeo, business development, CAA, Shira Lazar, host and executive producer, What’s Trending, and moderator Michael Learmonth, digital editor, Advertising Age, addressed the online video economy and YouTube premium channels. Avnet, with decades of movie and TV experience as a director, producer and writer, noted that in the digital world, content creators are constantly forced to face a new story every day. Byrne highlighted how Hollywood has been much more open to participating in this evolving and dynamic world of production, distribution and monetization. Lazar, who hosts a show that examines the pulse and popularity of YouTube videos, echoed what the panel all seemed to agree with – that there is a tremendous opportunity for new forms of storytelling and now is the time to experiment with them.

Can you be the most interesting marketer or storyteller in the world? Stay creative my friends.