I had lunch last week with a guy who runs a city web site (geo-domain… whatevercity.com).  In the course of our conversation, he presented an idea for an advertising partnership that they had been exploring with growing enthusiasm.

Not unlike many collaborations between businesses, I got the feeling that this one sounded logical and attractive to the businesses involved, but lacked any particular appeal to the consumers that the partnership was intended to impact.

The following is my over-a-sandwich attempt to turn a seemingly sterile marketing collaboration into a concept with potential consumer appeal…

In a nutshell, the idea was for a collaboration between the city site and the city’s outdoor advertising (billboard) company. The city site (which has a significant flow of local area traffic) would somehow display the billboards online.

The pitch to the advertiser would be pretty simple… By displaying the billboard on the city site, the ad would produce incremental exposure for which there is some incremental value. The two partners would sell this billboard enhancement and split the proceeds in some fashion.

A few thoughts come to mind immediately.

1. Billboards aren’t designed to be web banner ads.

2. Where will the online billboards be placed on the city site?  Will they simply be treated as banner ads? (The partners had considered a billboard gallery – begging the question of why anyone would elect to browse a gallery of billboards.)

3. Would the online billboard have a response component? (i.e. what happens when someone clicks the billboard?) Suddenly the effort required on the part of the partners begins potentially to balloon as the outdoor and online facets of the campaign begin to share less and less in common.

I could further belabor this, but you get the point.  The idea has merit at a glance, but as you drill down into the execution, it begins to unravel a bit.

That said, intuitively, there does seem to be something to work with here if a few key points can be addressed.  First and foremost, is there a way to draw online consumer attention to the outdoor advertisers’ messages on the site? (Translation – can the program yield incremental value to the advertisers?) Ultimately, if the audience doesn’t notice the ads, nothing else really matters.

Second, can the program be implemented at a profit to the partners? And third, can the partners sell the advertisers on the program?

Now for my idea… Feel free to use it yourself if you like.  I would only ask that you let me know if it actually works.

Create a consumer quiz.

People love to test themselves – especially their memory.

I frequently drive down interstate 64 from point A to point B. Show me the billboards along my route (actual photos) MINUS the advertiser’s identity (with the help of Photoshop). Turn each billboard into a multiple choice question listing five potential advertisers (i.e. five local jewelry retailers for that diamond billboard).  I choose which one owns the billboard.

My reward for a high score on the quiz (or maybe simply for taking the quiz) is a coupon of some sort redeemable at any one of the advertisers featured in my quiz that I choose.

So, what have we done here to give this partnership a fighting chance?

First, we have reason to think we can engage the attention of the consumer audience. People love to test themselves, and this is a simple, fun, unique memory test. Properly promoted online, I think people would take the quiz.
Second, we are forcing people to really THINK about the billboards they are passing every day and who the advertisers are. This can only help the advertisers.

Third, it is a fairly easy program to implement online after some initial programming to build the game (low incremental cost per new advertiser).

Fourth, the game produces interesting and valuable data about consumer recall that will be particularly useful to the outdoor advertising partner.  How well do people in this city really recall outdoor ads?

Fifth, the coupon reward could actually drive business to the advertisers in a measurable way – not something you generally expect from your outdoor advertising.

Will it work?  Who knows.  I hope you’ll try it and let me know.  One thing I know for sure is that the concept was better by the end of lunch that it was when we started.

This entry was posted on Saturday, February 10th, 2007 at 4:43 am and is filed under Direct Marketing, Web Marketing. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.