Creating inspiring advertising moments isn’t easy. One step further, creating these moments and then making sure the right people see them is even harder. We are taught in school how to create a brand image, position it and have an insightful, effective strategy associated with it. I personally take pride in developing advertising campaigns. Evening so often becomes morning as an idea grows and the plan is refined. But is the big giant making it all a moot point?
It is no secret that digital branding is key, key to image, position, audience and the life of a brand. Advertising can really be broken down into digital strategies and everything else, digital presence and the rest of it. This is not to say that they need not live cohesively, rather that each need equal resources and thought put into them.
Just as quickly as the job of a digital media planner proliferated the friendly giant Google is on the verge of steeling it away. AdWords (Google’s advertising expert) has the insight and manpower of all the ad agencies in the world. This advertising engine knows the insights, trends, positions, and strategies of every know Web site as well as every one of its 60 million unique users a month. With this knowledge adWords can perfectly and precisely target an ad to any user and actually make it worthwhile for them, the advertiser and the publication serving the ad.
Although some disapprove, Google watches us. From the first search until the moment that perfect Web site is discovered the ads are all calculated to make them as useful to the user as possible. That is where adWords gets its edge. Not by deliberate Meta tags to mine for ads relevant to the site. Yes this is part of the equation, but Google knows what is being searched for and places ads on a participating Web site based on that. What could be more accurate? No media planner can compete with this.
Media planners however are still an integral part of advertising; they are just being called on to be nimble because like it or not Google is stealing their jobs as advertisers opt to place the media planning responsibilities, at least those digital, with Google. The position of ‘keyword planner’ is up and rising. Google still needs to know what the ad in its grips is about. Perhaps less exciting a keyword planner is responsible for coming up with every possible word and phrase associated with the advertising and passing it along to their successor, salt in the wound isn’t it.
