There has always been a saying in the
media “Bad news is still news” or is it “Bad news is good news” either way that
logic seems to be abused and over applied to sponsorships. In the sports media
world sponsorships have become increasingly invasive and downright annoying.
What is the difference between a
good sponsorship and an invasive sponsorship? A good sponsorship can be defined
as being successful if it reaches its target audience, target goals, and target
market. All three can be mutually exclusive.
What is an invasive ad or
sponsorship? When logging on to ESPN.com or another sports website, have you
been bombarded by a huge flash video trailer, or some flash video advertisement
for something you don’t plan on buying? It has happened on numerous occasions,
and I actually think to myself, I don’t want to buy this product. I don’t want
to have to go and find out how to disable the ad option; it’s annoying and
tedious. I’m on this site to read about sports not see an old spice ad.
Unfortunately those ads and sponsorships are what keep these sites going.
Despite the ad being annoying, they are getting full exposure. I’m even
discussing it right now on my blog. That’s free press even if it is negative
press! This is still not invasive sponsorship.
Invasive sponsorships and ads can be
seen mostly in social media. Facebook is a good example. The program actually
fishes through your Internet cookies and history and sees what you have been
doing lately. It then posts ads to you, and from you to your friends. Let me give you an example, I was writing a
scene in a book and it had to do with a ring. I did some web searches on
engagement rings for visual aid to describe the ring in the book. Next time I
went on Facebook all my ads were geared toward getting married or getting
engaged.
Recently,Facebook lost Coco Cola as a sponsorship partner because of these practices,
and was forced to change their tactic. Now a user must “okay” Facebook posting
ads on their behalf.
Why
is it important to know about Facebook’s methodology? Well, I foresee a day
when Sports Media websites begin to employ the same technique. Instead of going
after just standard sponsorships and ads, why not have a bunch of little
companies pay to have their ads on ESPN.com. You are ring shopping for your
girl friend, and you log on to ESPN.com and see Jared’s, or Kay Jewelers in the
background. This is the true nature of
an invasive sponsorship or ad. It will be coming to a website near you, the
near future.
I’ll
leave you with one last thought. In a study done recently on Internet ads, consumersresponded that online ads were “annoying” (US 68%, UK and Germany 62%).
Sadly it is only
going to get worse.
Josh,
ReplyDeleteIn this technology era where we live, sponsorships has been to take advantage of social networks. However, as you said before, is very uncomfortable to keep going to websites where there is nothing more thatn advertisings. In sports just as other channels is the same thing.
We must see ads that maybe we dont want to.
I believe that the audience is very smart and the industry realize this. For this purpose, legislation and different regulations have been trying to stablish the market.
Maybe its a matter of time to get things in different order.
Regards,
Dario Chelala