Mo 4/24 - Why Programmatic Ads Suck | Google's New AI Ads | Why I Preach Brand Marketing
serving. Finally a fully flushable flus our programmatic ads good or bad?
Google's new AI ad tool gets put in the test. And why do I preach brand marketing? It's q&a Monday, April 24 23. Let's nerd out. Podcast. The ad nerds podcast delivers ad industry news every weekday. We are the go to source for people who spend money on advertising, covering Big brands, small businesses, and the latest marketing trends. It's me Spanky Moskowitz, the show's host and a nearly 40 year veteran of the ad industry. I've created campaigns for Budweiser m&ms, Frito Lay the NFL and NBA, I have created over 100,000 ads generating hundreds of billions and client revenue. If you're in or interested in the world of advertising and want to stay up to date with the latest news. The ad nerds podcast is the perfect place to start. And I'm starting today talking about period pads. Yes, I took a sip of my coffee while you spit yours out. That's right ad agency mother has launched a new campaign for flus. A period pad brand that is entirely flushable. Developed by a group of young ecopreneurs flus is the first brand of its kind providing a solution to a huge global problem. Around 30% of non flushable traditional sanitary pads get flushed down the toilet. These pads often end up clogging drainage systems and ultimately pollute the ocean. flus pads are made from biodegradable micro plastic free materials, making them 100% flushable. So how does the pad break down? I know you're wondering the same thing. Well, the motion of the water starts breaking down the pad the moment it's flushed, pulling the layers apart and loosening the fibers as it moves through the pipes. And then the pad is just treated along with toilet paper, sewage and all the other stuff and turn back into you know, water and renewable energy and fertilizer at your local water treatment plant. So why am I talking about period pads on the ad nerds podcast? Because the simplicity of messaging that Mother has developed with flus is phenomenal. And I need to tell you this, because if you're a small business owner or a small brand, it doesn't matter what your product service or business is. The message has to be simple and understood by everybody. You shouldn't have to explain your messaging. Because the moment you have to explain your messaging, you've lost your customers. And the simplicity of their messaging is phenomenal. And it's even on their FAQ page flew says most period waste will hang around in a landfill for over 500 years. Our pad is gone in a flush. I want you to get the clarity and simplicity of that message. Now, you may think you can't come up with something as simple for your business. But I guarantee you can. And I know this because I've done this for hundreds if not 1000s of businesses. In my almost 40 years of doing this. It can be done. And the message has to be clear. The brand campaign by the way is being delivered through PR digital marketing and oh H or WH Out Of Home Marketing. By the way that's like billboards and bus stops and car toppers for if you ever hear the term out of home, or WH that's what that is. And it's happening in London by the way and its goal is simply this to educate consumers about this breakthrough technology. flues head of marketing, Fran Morrison said quote, we want them to stop in their tracks and ask why hasn't anybody invented this already? Watch the space as we get the UK flushing and make a genuine tangible impact on the dangerous levels of plastic packed products flushed year on year and quote. So if you are interested in the topic, check out flus if you are interested in clarity of message, I strongly recommend you go to their website and look at the simplicity of their messaging because it is brilliant and every small business should learn from it. sliding into my DM this question from Tyson G leads aos leads us off on q&a Monday. Hey, Spanky, dig the podcast. It's super dope. Thank you, Tyson. I appreciate that. What are programmatic ads and why do you hate on them so much? Can you help me understand? Thanks, brah. Okay, Tyson. Let me start with all the reasons I hate programmatic ads. When I was three, no, I'm kidding. I'm just joking. So first, what are programmatic ads? It's when a company uses computers and software to buy and sell ads online. No, I'm not talking about someone placing their own ads on like Instagram or Tiktok or or Google. You know, that's a direct placement ad or a direct ad placement. And I use those daily by the way, and that's when your ads are in the feed, right? You're picking who sees them when they see them, what they're seeing. If you let the apps use the partner network, and you let like AI, run everything, then you're getting into the programmatic side of things like ad roll, MediaMath, PubMatic, these are all trade desk. There's another one, all programmatic platforms. And it's supposed to be really helpful because it's faster and more efficient. But it also has tons of problems. So one problem is that not everyone measures things the same way. So some companies aren't sure which numbers to use to tell if their ads are really doing well or not, right? So there's, there's a lot of vagary there. And this can make it hard for them to know if they're spending money the right way. Another problem is, is that some companies that help with programmatic advertising don't often tell their clients everything. So they might charge more than they showed or put their clients ads on websites that aren't great for the brand. And this is not a great experience for the user, not a great experience for the company. Because if the ad shows up in the wrong place, like a porn site, and you don't want to be attached to that, suddenly, you could be attached to that. So there's also a problem of ad fraud, which is when fake ads are made just to look like more people looking at them. So like literally cloning fake ads that increase impressions and ad count. This is bad because it makes it hard for a company to know if a company's ads are actually being seen by people who want to buy its products. Right? There's no transparency here. Another problem, and I mentioned it earlier is that there are some websites that aren't safe for ads. And if your ad doesn't align with that website, and I used porn as the as the example before, but it could be anything. You know, the brand safety that you as a business owner need to maintain. That's your choice, your decision. And when you let programmatic make the choice for you. You don't have any control over that safety. But let's get a little deeper into my why Tyson. I hate programmatic ads because no one watches them. And they're a waste of valuable ad spend. In fact, last week, I emailed Gary Vaynerchuk and I said give me a sentence helped me clarify this for my audience, Gary, because I literally am pounding my head every day. techie telling clients like this is the dumbest thing. Don't waste your money here. Stop wasting your money here. Stop wasting your money here. And Gary wrote back a very simple email. No one sees them. He said no one sees them. Tell me how many times you watch a video. And a preroll comes up with the option to skip and you simply hover over the word skip until the thing lights up. Right? I'm telling you programmatic ads create a bad a bad user experience. And they're terrible for your budget. So this ties in is why I hate programmatic ads. And thank you Gary Vee for being awesome and always answering my emails. You are absolutely the best. Coming up. Google's new AI tool is being put to the test and some thinks it failed. But it's time to just say thanks some things. I gotta get my brain check. Are you great at running your business? Well, how about Mark marketing it? If you're like most small business owners, your greatest thing your business does, but not so great at figuring out how to market it. That's where ad zombies comes in. We help your business sell more. Ads zombies writes ads, emails, web copy sales pages, radio and video scripts. If it needs words, had zombies has them. Go to Add zombies.com today use promo code nerds to save 20% Add zombies words that sell anything for businesses anywhere.
Podcast, Google recently announced that it plans to use artificial intelligence AI to create a new new ad products for marketers. Now this has got some marketers a little concerned about the level of transparency they'll receive over campaign efficacy and has sparked some concerns around again brand safety and suitability, which I just talked about. The new AI tool is going to be integrated into performance Max. It's a tool that gives uses algorithms to find the best Google environments to running ads such as search or YouTube, and how much should be spent, Google plans to create a novel, novel ads based on creative content supplied by marketers, including images, videos, and text related to a particular campaign. The campaign will then use its magic AI to produce ads based on objectives like target audience and sales targets. This comes as big tech companies race to roll out workable AI products. However, marketers need a little more convincing before they dedicate more budgets to Google's tools. Their concerns are that AI tools can be a little black boxy, meeting a diff making it difficult for brands to understand how the inventory is showing up and what is driving success. Performance Max, which has been out what since 2020 has already raised concerns over whether marketers should choose transparency over effectiveness, as they don't always learn exactly what made a campaign successful, leaving advertisers with little oversight to work with. Despite this, the amount of money flowing towards performance Max appears to be growing daily. Google says they do plan to put guardrails in place to combat any errors that may arise from the new generative AI features. However, some experts have raised concerns about toxic or hallucinated content that could leak out despite the guardrails. On the positive side. Generative AI ads are likely to increase ad spend on Google over time, and these tools have proven to be effective in generating high performance ads for them and their customers. John Morgenstern, the EVP and head of investment at VaynerMedia, predicts that an increasing conversion rates and return on adspend will lead to more ad dollars towards Google VaynerMedia, by the way, has been trying this new tool out and say that it might help them make better ads that make more people want to buy more things. But they also say they need to be careful to make sure that the ads are appropriate for everyone who might see them by the way, as of 20 to 28.8% of total industry digital spend, was dropped on Google. And that is a declining number by the way, dropping from 34.7% in 2017. That said, if this new technology proves to be effective in generating high performing ads, it could potentially attract more advertisers back to Google's campaign, Google's platform rather, which will lead to increased ad spend. So while the industry is combating signal loss, the generative AI tool from Google combined with performance Max may drive attention metrics for brands, but the question remains whether AI will achieve other goals like conversion events. I fate that's the big unknown and the part that's a little bit scary for everybody right now.
It's important to protect your skin from the sun's harmful rays and sunscreen company Supergoop is doing just that through their latest campaign called solar powered freedom. The campaign encourages people to embrace the sun and spend more time outside while using SPF products daily. supergroups solar powered freedom campaign is their latest and largest investment in brand marketing so far, and it features ads influencers and augmented reality Snapchat lenses. The lenses use the phone's front facing camera and places the user in different backgrounds related to outdoor activities like hiking or going to the beach. With the AR lens. You can see yourself against the different backgrounds and even add fun effects like a beach towel or sunglasses. By celebrating real people who enjoyed doing what they love doing outside. Supergoop hopes to encourage more people to use SPF products to embrace the sun while staying protected. And I can tell you as someone who's undergone than been under the knife for skin cancer. Sunscreen is a lot easier than surgery.
I got it Email when I was traveling a few weeks ago, that led to a really great conversation with my client who has multiple brands. Laura Kay asked, Why do you preach brand marketing? Alright. Let me break it down for you. When it comes to marketing, there's one thing that builds long term viable, healthy businesses. It's brand marketing. And yes, there are other types of marketing like data driven performance marketing, but nothing beats the power of strong, recognizable branding. So what exactly is brand marketing? It's about highlighting your brand's values, the emotion, the the way a brand makes someone feel when they see their ads. It it creates a sense of trust of loyalty in the consumers mind, if you take a look at the big brands that are that everyone knows about, like, let's just use Nike and Apple as an example. They have literally spent years creating public images and perceptions of their brand through advertising, sponsorships, celebrity endorsements, and it works. You don't see brands needing to market a price point or a special deal. They build such an indelible mark in their consumers mind that they don't have to, you'll never see an ad word Nike is running a price point based sales ad. They sell on a feeling aspirational, not a special deal of the day. Consumers are drawn to these brands because they believe in their values and they want to be associated with them. That's what brand marketing is and does. performance marketing, on the other hand is all about measurable outcomes and immediate actions from the campaigns. Now, it could be useful in a squirrely economy in conditions like we have today. performance marketing, though, is not a long term solution for building a brand. Brand Marketing and performance marketing can absolutely work together as part of like a comprehensive marketing plan. You know, you can inspire consumers with your brand message and then give them clear information about your products and your offerings with your performance based ads. And with the rise of all these new TV performance TV platforms, it's even easier to launch and measure the success of your advertising campaigns and combine both. But my long held belief backed by decades of work in the industry and having helped generate hundreds of billions of dollars for clients is when it comes to marketing. Brand Marketing is the way to go. Nothing beats the power of a strong and recognizable brand. You can subscribe to the ad nerds podcast on Apple, Spotify and whatever app you like to listen to please give it a five star rating and if you feel like dropping some kind words to I'd appreciate that. That does it for the ad nerds podcast for Monday, April 24 2023. Spanky out thanks for listening and have a great Monday.