Attended a good session today at the Association of Online Publishers at IPC. Chris Mooney (Topgear.com) chaired an informative afternoon, introducing speakers from Starcom, Bauer, AOL, CBSI and Dunhill to present their views on maintaining a healthy relationship between editorial and partnerships.
Transparency was heavily emphasised, users need to understand exactly what they are interacting with at all times with the use of ‘signposts’. There simply is no point in compromising the long-term integrity of your editorial product for the sake of short-term financial gain.
Here are my notes and links from the session.
- Nike Plus: Example of a brand that vetoed the use of an agency to connect directly with their audience, with great success.
- Hovis: Example of a brand that has a great connection with it’s audience. Over 80k fans to their Facebook page already.
- Did you know that 16-24 years olds define themselves through their choice in music and actually listen to what Celebrities say?
- Grazia TV: nice original production from the Bauer team
- Coming down the pipe from AOL: More video, tailored for local markets. Like this.
- AOL’s new ad platform Pictela coming to the UK this autumn
- A very cool site from Dunhill – demonstrating editorial integrity and advertising working together nicely. I loved the way they focus on a series of exceptionally clever non-celebrity types to leverage their brand. It’s still an advertorial, but it’s not directly selling to you. It is, dare I say it, very cool content. Plus, I’m not entirely sure if they used a marketing agency for this at all. ‘Build it and they will come?’. Exceptionally brave, or incredibly naive?
You can read full summary on the AOP website here
Thought for the day: What’s the actual difference between sponsored links and natural search links in a world where everyone’s SEOing their content? Answers on a postcard please.
*PS: I met a 14 year-old today who said they played games more than watching TV. That makes me feel about 102.
