Why ad tech needs to evolve to become brand tech
In a series of blogs over the next few months Wunderman chief Chris Perry will look at the application of technology for marketers and the opportunities, pitfalls and ways in which technology might just make for a better life.
Could Toast Media become a reality?
In today’s age of programmatic advertising and Internet of Things (IoT) the opportunity for increasingly personalised advertising is everywhere.
The technology that powers pre-rolls, suggested posts and over-zealously targeted display ads is getting more and more sophisticated, but the focus is primarily about advertising pervasiveness, rather than brand saliency.
Given that the 2015 Ad Blocking Report identified ad blockers in the UK has increased by 82 per cent to over 20 per cent of total users in the past year, we’re at an interesting point. In fact, we’re in danger of being locked into an arms race with consumers looking to screen out clutter, whilst we as advertisers continue to look for a way around the edges, or over the top.
There is a need for technology to evolve to create what Byron Sharp, author of ‘Why Brands Grow’, refers to as both physical and mental availability for our brands and products. Mental availability being the ability for a brand to be remembered for a variety of psychological reasons. This is more than awareness. It’s the memorable associations with a brand consistently over time, everything from brand experiences to content and service. Ad tech needs to evolve to help us engage with consumers emotionally across all these structures and experiences.
No longer ad tech, but brand tech.
Technology that helps our brands becomes more meaningful, relevant and memorable for consumers. Technology that is able to find patterns in consumers’ lives and target them in exactly the way that reinforces the brand consistently, and in the most interesting way.
The best analogy for this sort of technology is an air traffic control system for brands, content and experiences. A system utilised across every channel, powered by a rich and comprehensive view of the consumer and able to sequence a brand’s content, promotions and messaging in the most timely and empathetic way. It’s an extension of today’s programmatic thinking, but applied both to the targeting, the narrative, the messaging and the brand experience.
If programmatic advertising is discernibly better than non-targeted advertising and able to deliver 30 per cent uplift simply from retargeting, or excluding, existing customers - just imagine the capability of these types of technologies. However, the intrinsic challenge of this type of technology is that it requires technology and innovation at the heart of the brand organisation to truly deliver it. The technology and the brand experience have to be symbiotic and interlinked.
Whilst accelerators and VC funds within large-scale corporate structures do exist to encourage this sort of technological thinking, the more pressing need is to move the technology thinking to the middle of brand organisations, so true innovation can take place. This realisation struck me hard the other day when the idea of 'toast media' came up in a brainstorm.
The toast media idea, (which doesn’t exist yet) is an IoT enabled toaster, which would print a personalised ad message on your toast every morning. Potentially interesting if consumers were given it for free, funded by advertising. Perhaps even an interesting new lifestyle channel, especially if the significant potential for tailored messaging using butter and jams was fully explored.
Aside from whether this is a good or bad idea, the question at the heart of the problem is who in a brand team structure would you go to with this sort of technology innovation?
If toast media were ever to go live then it would need a team able to collaborate around a technology driven idea. To nurture it through the minimum viable product to something that truly worked. This would be a tough road for most marketers today.
If this process, according to most VCs, can only be expected to deliver one in 10 successes then our brand teams understanding and love of technology will need to step up a gear.
Each cycle of internet-based technology promises marketers better relationships with their consumers. As marketers, we hungrily eye the way consumers profoundly benefit from technology in terms of immediate service, immeasurable choice and more perfect views of products and services and assume we can achieve the business equivalent.
If we’re to achieve this we're going to need to retool our organisations and ourselves. Otherwise we may condemn the future of tech to finding the most invasive targeting of consumers possible, without fully realising the emotional potential of a brave new world of brand tech.
And perhaps if this becomes a reality, then toast media may actually have a future.
Chris Perry is chief executive officer at Wunderman