TV Commercials Shrink to Match Attention Spans

An article on Yahoo, "TV Commercials Shrink to Match Attention Spans," by Emily Fredrix, explains that commercials are now shrinking in length to 15 seconds to save money and match attention spans. The number of 15-second commercials has increased by more than 70 percent in five years to almost 5.5 million last year, according to Nielsen. 15-second commercials made up 34 percent of all national ads last year, increasing from 29 percent in 2005. In the article, John Greening, associate professor at Northwestern University's journalism school and a former executive vice president at DDB Chicago, says, "It used to be that the most valuable thing on the planet was time, and now the most valuable thing on the planet is attention." With digital video recorders, laptops, and phones, viewers have shorter attention spans, so advertisers feel like they can save money and repeat the ads more often. Instead of 15-second ads mostly being edited versions of 30-second ads, advertisers are now making shorter commercials to stand alone. The shift from 30-second commercials to 15-second commercials is mostly coming from the big advertisers, like Procter & Gamble and Walmart.

Recently, in my advertising literacy class, we've been watching commercials on the Gunn Report, and talking about how international commercials tend to be longer and less pushy than commercials in the United States, weaving in a story in commercials that tend to last a minute. In general, the more creative commercials tend to be longer and less explicit in their references to brands, so this shift to 15-second commercials seems to contrast the general consensus when it comes to creativity. I'm used to watching 30-second commercials, and then seeing the edited 15-second version, but since they are going to make 15-second commercials to stand alone, I'm curious how they plan to fit in a story in 15 seconds, and I wonder if it will just contribute to the ad clutter. However, as media becomes increasingly mobile, it will be important to get to the consumer quickly.

The article makes reference to this 15-second commercial for Old Spice:



http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20101027/ap_on_bi_ge/us_shorter_commercials

Start a Movement

Charmin has started their Charmin Go Nation campaign, which is a movement to get people talking about their toilet paper. As their site says, "We're calling it the Charmin Go Nation. It's made up of people who actually enjoy going to the bathroom because they have Charmin bathroom tissue."



I'm not exactly sure what to think of this campaign. While it is true that it is a part of everyone's life, I'm not sure where talking about potty humor gets too personal. "Enjoying the go" doesn't seem like something they should be uniting the country to talk about. Then again, approaching bathroom tissue from such an honest angle may help them. As I searched the site more, I started to become more comfortable with the idea. I still think it's weird, but as long as the video submissions remain acceptable for a general audience, I say enjoy the go.

It's amazing to me to watch ads from other countries. You can tell a lot about their culture from the actors and the themes in the ads. Just because it's translated into English doesn't mean the cultural aspects translate as well.

In fact, certain aspects of culture are completely incompatible from country to country, and ads from one country could say something completely different in another. It could just be that the audience doesn't understand the ad, so your message doesn't get through to them. However, it could also be very offensive. It's important to consider not only the audience you're trying to reach, but also the way their society and language work, so you can create an ad that they understand and are comfortable with.

For example, this ad has been featured as one of the best ads of 2009, but I don't really get it.

An article from today's AdWeek, "Study: Ad Spend Underpins 20% of Economic Output," by Mark Dolliver, explains that a report commissioned by The Advertising Coalition says that "ad expenditures 'account for $5.8 trillion, or 20 percent, of the $29.6 trillion in U.S. economic output' and 'support 19.8 million, or 15 percent, of the nation's 133.4 million jobs.'" The article goes on to say that "putting it another way, 'each dollar of ad spending generates, on average, $8.77 of additional sales' and sets in motion a 'ripple effect' as a company buys goods from its suppliers, which in turn purchase goods from their suppliers. Thus, each $1 million in ad outlays 'supports 69 American jobs.'"

As an advertising and economics double major, I find this really interesting. This is an example of the multiplier effect, the idea that a dollar spent ripples through the economy to have a greater effect. This shows how important advertising is to the economy, providing many jobs, and helping during the recession. Twenty percent of the U.S. economic output is substantial. That means that a lot of people who work outside of advertising depend on advertising for their job. Whatever the arguments against advertising are, the economic argument is clear.

http://www.adweek.com/aw/content_display/esearch/e3id03412c644d4e5cdabbcbd48410e43c1

The past few months, we've been getting political advertisements almost everyday for the state senate elections that are coming up, as well as various county elections. We haven't talked much about political advertisements in my advertising classes, but they seem to follow different rules than advertisements for products. Is the role of these political advertisements merely to inform, or are they also supposed to entertain? It seems to me that the distinguishing factors between these candidates should be their positions on the issues. What I see in these ads is a focus on one or two issues concerning the other candidate which may or may not be true, but not much information on what the candidate actually supports. For example, especially for the state senate election, the flyers for one of the candidates tend to focus on a recent scandal concerning the other candidate, rather than saying what the candidate that is sending the ads would do for the state. This type of strategy seems to go more for entertainment and is less about informing the voters about the issues. I'm not sure this is fair, since the opposing candidate cannot defend himself.

How do pancakes relate to advertising?

Well, they don't. At least not directly. An art director of a small agency started blogging about his adventures making elaborate pancakes for his daughter, and some of his creations are amazing. I read an article that puts his website into an advertising perspective, referring to his tagline for the site, "just trying to make some cool pancakes for my daughter." It's interesting to see how you can relate advertising to almost anything. He's even got his own social media campaign, with about 25,000 Facebook fans. I love how he even makes the pictures he posts look like ads, complete with the logo in the bottom right-hand corner.



I don't know if he's planning on making this a business venture, but if so, I think he's got the advertising covered.

My friend posted a status today saying he saw an ad that said, "If you are between the ages of 0 and 68, please call us right now."

It's things like this that make people hate ads. Between 0 and 68? Really? As my friend said, unless you expect a call from Baby's First Phone, this ad is ineffective. Are they just trying to attract attention? I don't think this kind of attention will help get them business. Then again, I don't know the response they've gotten from the ad, but this doesn't make me want to call them. I automatically assume it's a disreputable business. Either way, I don't want my friends thinking this is the kind of stuff we do in advertising.