When I hear the words “guaranteed engagement” I cringe a little. Immediately I think of pop-ups and other advertisements that hijack pages and strong arm people into viewing a message, leaving more resentment and hostility than goodwill toward a brand. While VideoEgg’s new video ad bar, Twig, offers a more benign solution to engaging users on social networks, blogs and other web pages, it isn’t something most Internet users will appreciate.
VideoEgg announced this week that Twig will appear at the top or bottom of 1,000 blog and site pages in key advertising and publishing categories over the next several weeks.
Sites like ICanHasCheezburger.com, RedOrbit.com and NFLHouse.com are expected to have this video ad bar, which follows users as they scroll the web page. Hovering on the ad bar for three seconds gives users a short video ad that supposedly engages users by taking over the entire web page.
Twig isn’t as invasive as typical pop-up ads (the ones most sensible people have blocked), though which “X” closes the ad bar is a bit (perhaps purposely?) non-intuitive. That said, there are better ways to engage social network users. Compare MySpace and Facebook, for example. I would argue that poor design and heavy-handed, intrusive video advertising is one of the reasons MySpace has lost market share to Facebook.
Social networks create communities of like-minded individuals, which makes a company have to work a little harder, dig a little deeper, for more meaningful ways of interacting with each key demographic.
An advertising bar that distracts users isn’t meaningful; it’s irksome, if not downright annoying. The key is to engage with, not intrude upon.
In general, creative advertising needs to take page from Albert Einstein, who said “you can’t solve a problem with the same mind that created it.” In other words, rules that have applied to online marketing in the past don’t necessarily apply to social media marketing, and that means marketers need to step outside of their current perspective to truly have an impact in this new arena.
This point was reinforced, in part, by the British trade publication, Marketing, which interviewed executives from Google, Microsoft and digital marketing agencies about the impact of social networks for established brands.
Nick Blunden, managing director of Profero, an international digital marketing agency, said “The key to success is open-mindedness, a willingness to engage in debate, and the persistence to maintain conversation with users for as long as they feel it is necessary. People will embrace brands if they take the time to interact, and placing such an emphasis on consumer respect will be rewarded with invaluable levels of loyalty and trust.”
Perhaps I’m being a little harsh, but I would really love to see social network advertising become more engaging. Twig offers little more than another tool bar that follows me around.
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