Mike Seiman's Blog

So, while watching TV last night, (on DVR of course since I rarely have time to catch my shows when they're live), I decided to see what commercials I was skipping and if I was the right audience for them.  So, instead of fast forwarding through the commercials during 60 Minutes, I watched and saw the following:

• Commercials for drugs I don’t need, and symptoms I don’t have.
• Commercials for food I don’t eat.
• Commercials for cars I won’t buy.
• Commercials for the kids I don't have.

Seeing how this is clearly ineffective marketing, and the broad audience of 60 minutes is wide enough to include people who would respond to these messages, as well as lots who won’t, it would make sense for these companies to turn to the Internet. But, the truth is, very few are, and even those aren't spending significant dollars.  Not only were these ads not targetted properly but notmally I would have just skipped over them.  In addition, when these brands do come online, they will want to just advertise on 60minutes.com, since that is what they are comfortable with, and even though I am a regular 60 minutes watcher, I have never gone to the website.  In fact, I’ve seen more relevant ads on my USA Today Ipad app, as well as a few of the websites I regularly view.  Taking that into consideration, as well as the wealth of data available for targeting online today, why would brands continually choose to advertise on such an inefficient medium?

On TV, they can try to hit a type of audience that watches a certain type of show. Online, I can target a guaranteed consumer who has previously shopped at my store, or been to my site, someone who has personality traits similar to others interested in my products, or even demographics that are similar.  Yet, these big brands waste their dollars, and since they are mostly public companies, their share holders dollars, on completely wasteful advertising.  One day, there will be no TV and we will all be watching on our portable devices with efficient advertising, but until then, I’ll keep begging these big companies to try something new, well, newer than TV anyhow.