Where Viral and Spam Meet
There has been a lot of chatter about Agency.com’s Subway pitch. Some love it, some hate it, most find it trite and simply moved on. At first, I fell in the trite camp and was well on my way to moving on. Then I took a look at the heated debate raging in the comments on sites like Adrants, Adfreak and blogs such as Experience Curve and The Next Wave.
If you don’t know what I’m talking about, check out the Adfreak link for a summary and to watch the video.
I don’t want to jump into the fray and argue whether the video is viral (it is) or whether the idea was great (it was) or whether it was well executed (it wasn’t).
My point is that it has become very obvious to me that old school advertising mentality is sadly alive and well in today’s supposedly forward thinking “Interactive Agency”. It seems the majority stand on the video is that, while Agency.com comes off looking like a bunch of cardboard souled wanks, you can’t deny the fact that the video has made big waves. Some people have even stated that they would be happy if their agency can generate the kind of traffic that this stunt has created.
This mentality makes sense in a world where “Reach and Repetition” is king.
The problem is that we live in a different world online. The Reach and Repitition mantra is useless. In the online world it’s all about focus. Who cares about reaching a million people when only 100,000 of them are the people I want to talk to? If I can guarantee that I can reach those 100,000 at a time and place where they welcome the message, don’t you think advertisers will pay me more to do it? Welcome to permission based marketing.
We have a word for a marketing message that strives to reach as many people as possible, as often as possible regardless of whether or not the recipient is part of the target market: SPAM.
What Agency.com has created is the viral equivalent of spam on Subway’s behalf.
In striving to show that they are at the vanguard of trendiness, they ended up showing that they are cool, edgy and fashionable, but lack any sense of strategy.
Take a look at the brand impact of the video. How has the video helped build the Client’s brand?
Subway’s Brand:
At the end of the day, the fact that the pitch was for Subway was incidental. There was nothing intrinsically “Subway” about it. You could easily substitute any company for Subway and you’d have the same video. In fact, I bet within 6 months time most people will remember that Agency.com posted a video of a pitch, but they won’t remember (or care) who the pitch was for.
Agency.com Brand:
Well, here’s where I could see some room for debate. They definitely made a splash. However, the entire effort lacked any sense of “big thinking”. What I got from it is that they would probably be fun to work with, may probably be able to execute very well, but I would not go to them for any real strategic thinking.
YouTube’s Brand:
Here is the real winner. The video re-affirmed YouTube’s positioning as the place to go for the bleeding edge of video goodness. They should send Agency.com a box of Subway cookies.
A Booby Prize goes to Coudal Partners for coming up with something that does a great job of differentiating Coudal’s positioning by piggybacking on the hype of agency video without coming off as the “Mee too!” also-ran.
By the way, want to know how to make a viral video that isn’t spam? Focus on making a great video. Quality will always be passed around and it will build the brand of all involved. Don’t believe me? Fallon did it with the Making of the Sony Bravia Ad. Come to think of it, I bet this was what Agency.com was hoping to mimic.