Googley Tube

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In yesterday's Search Insider column I pontificate on the ideal ad format for Google TV.

As you might guess, I advocate for taking lessons learned from SEM and applying them to the big screen.

Let's hope Google doesn't act like a bunch of n00bs when incorporating ads onto the boob tube.

Here's the blurb....

What Will Ads Look Like On Google TV?
Posted by Aaron Goldman on Jun 2, 10:18 AM
As many of you know, Google introduced Google TV a couple of weeks ago at its I/O developer conference. Details have been posted via Google blog post , intro video, and developer guide. Conspicuously missing, though, was any information about advertising via Google TV. So, on the off chance Google hasn't yet figured out the proper ad format for Google TV, I thought I'd share some suggestions.
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Is Social Media The New Search?

I caught this Sears ad yesterday with a social media call-to-action at the end. I can't remember seeing anyone else doing this on TV. Looks like social's finally made it!


Reminds me of the Google Pontiac ad from a few years ago that signaled search had truly arrived...

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Heck, I can still remember those TV spots that featured AOL Keywords.

Fortunately for my Good URL Bad URL hobby, Sears still opted to include the URL in the frame. Let's hope other advertisers do the same -- not just to fuel my URL-aholism but because it really is a best practice.

I mean, who is really that passionate about Sears that they're going to run to their computer to find their Facebook page or Twitter account? The most Sears can hope for is that their spot will have inspired someone to find the Sears near them and, for that, the URL will get them that info a lot quicker than their You Tube channel.

While it's great to see social media coming front and center, let's not forget that is has it's place. And that place is not directional. That's what search is for.

Social media is a great engagement platform. And if you want your consumers to engage, your best bet is to capture them through search and then direct them from your website to your social media content. Or advertiser in social media spaces. If you're going to use TV to drive social, either focus your entire spot on the value prop of your FB fan page or run a twitter feed along the bottom showing what people are saying about you.

It's gonna take more than an icon to move the needle on your follower count.

No Signal: Why Google Shut Down Radio and Print

In February, I penned a post pontificating about why Google ceased its Radio and Print operations -- Google Cans Print & Radio: And Then There Was One.

Last week, in an interview with Financial Times, Eric Schmidt offered some insight behind that decision...

"In both cases they didn’t work well enough. We measure our businesses very, very carefully and in both the print and the radio businesses we could not seem to invent or get enough of a signal back to make the network or value really spin – that’s one way to describe it. In our model what happens is as people click on ads and as they use our services we get all sorts of ways to improve our products. And with all that customer feedback we can make it better. But because of the unique structure of radio where it’s a broadcast to a relatively unidentifiable radio, there’s not very much information of what the radio is doing, and similarly for print ads, we could not get that signal. And that’s, ultimately, I think why we have moved on."

What really stands out to me here is this idea of a signal. Google needs a signal from its users to continually improve its products and, without that, it can't effectively add value.

I suppose this explains why it's proceeding with its TV initiatives. Tapping the satellite boxes enables a 2-way interactive dialogue and, thus, provides Google the signal it needs.

Importantly here, the signal is not just about measuring response. Both Google Radio and Print had built in systems to track response to ads. (Print even had those fancy bar codes.) Rather, the signal that Google needs is engagement with the ad itself.

This is the point I was trying to make in my post on the MediaPost Raw blog titled, "It Ain't the Blue Links." Google shouldn't/won't automatically rule out embedding display ads onto its search results pages just because it thinks they might annoy consumers. Instead, Google should/will test them out and see what signal comes back.

Red means stop. Green means go. It's as simple as that. Behold, the power of the signal!

Google Cans Print & Radio: And Then There Was One

This past week, Google announced it was signing off from the radio space just a week after closing the books on its print division. I can't help feeling like these decisions were a bit short-sighted with Google caving to investors' insatiable demand for increasing immediate profits, rather than riding out the recession and readying to rule the traditional ad roost.

dMarc was a $102 million cash (with earn-out up to $1.13 billion) acquisition just 3 years ago. How do you just throw in the towel? I can't imagine the burn-rate was all that high. In its announcement, Google said it will have to lay off some 40 folks and sell off its "Radio Automation" technology. This company has nearly $16 billion on cash in hand and over 20,000 employees! Google Audio Ads was but a drop in the bucket. And radio advertising is still a $20 billion industry.

In the post-mortem on the Google Traditional Media blog, Susan Wojcicki's said, "Deciding to close products is never easy, but we will continue to focus on advertising products that provide measurability for advertisers, and are relevant and useful for users, listeners and viewers."

So what was the problem with Google Audio Ads?

It wasn't measurability. Per the Audio Ads AdWords homepage -- "Using call reporting and integrated Google Analytics tools, you can track customer calls, website conversions, revenue, and other metrics to measure the impact of your radio campaigns."

So was it the relevant and useful piece? Hard to quantify but Google seemed to have plenty of case studies showing positive consumer response. After all, the fundamental promise of opening up traditional media to the long tail was that consumers would receive more targeted messages by having smaller/local advertisers able to play alongside the national bigs.

As for Google Print Ads -- those were hella-measurable what with their 5 trackable calls-to-action and even a 2D barcode. Here's what the bottom of the ads looked like...



Perhaps the real problem was that neither division was able to secure sustainable sources of prime inventory. With publishers and networks leaning more towards Google as enemy than friend, it wasn't able to procure the type of space that would hold up against the mass budget cuts happening all around us right now.

And that whole bit about accountable advertising being the last to go from the media budget? Not so much. At least not when it came to Google Print and Radio, given that they were still somewhat experimental platforms being tapped by the types of advertisers that are likely feeling the brunt of decreased consumer spending.

So this leaves Google TV as the last traditional format standing. They seem to have had moderate success here, lining up partners such as NBC Universal. But, by many accounts, most of the inventory it has access to is remnant. And, with TV advertising still a roughly $50 billion indsutry, you can bet the folks holding the keys to the prime space are not going to relinquesh them to Google anytime soon.

So is it just a matter of time before Google tunes out of TV and gets back to what it does best -- "organizing the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful?"

Or will it continue along this parallel-ish path to disintermediate, er... streamline the worldwide advertising ecosystem and make it inherently measurable and valuable?

Or, perhaps the real question is, will Google continue to pander to the Street's demands to stay profitable today or build for the long-term by continuing to gain share one point at a time in traditional media so that, when the recession clouds clear, it is poised to be the top beneficiary from increased ad spending?

Ahhh.... to borrow the old NBA tagline -- I love this game!

Anecdotally, as of today, Google was still running paid search ads for its Audio Ads division:





I always wondered who manages Google's in-house campaigns. And how does the algorithm rank their ads? Does Google get a quality score like everyone else? How do they tie back ROI to their campaigns? Could it be that the decision to shutter its Audio Ads division was that the opportunity cost of showing house ads instead of paying advertisers got too high? :)

Traction in Tracking

MediaPost has coverage today of Nielsen's new "Convergence panel" that monitors TV and web usage in the same household. Here are some of the tracking features cited in the article:

* Time spent by consumers on television and Internet on a daily basis.
* Simultaneous usage of television and Internet.
* The relationship between viewing content on television, streaming content, and surfing the Internet.
* Cause and effect - how usage of one media drives usage of the other.

Tracking the interplay between TV and digital marketing has been a hot-button for advertisers for some time. Today we use metrics like search query volume to attribute impact of TV campaigns on web activity. While the sample is small (a few thousand households) and panel methodology is always suspect, this is nonetheless a step forward in enabling holistic marketing analytics.