Commentary

An Ironic Solution To 'Fake' Advertising: Virtual Ones

That’s what a team from Momentum Worldwide suggested while presenting at OMMA Chicago this afternoon.

“Advertising feels fake,” said Matt Denten, Midwest executive creative director at Momentum, said while making a presentation that made the case for using virtual reality instead.

Interestingly, Denten made this point while presenting via real reality -- using a podium and a PowerPoint on screen, but his point is that “the future of advertising is experiences,” not ads, and VR, when used properly, is an experience. And sometimes it feels realer than real ones.

“Altered reality helps us with persuasion,” he said, because consumers can become part of it.

“We’ve evolved from the TV spot to where you can actually be part of the action and participate,” he asserted.

Of course, it all comes down to the execution. And the real problem with TV commercials may not be that consumers can’t immerse themselves in them, it’s that there are so, so many of them. VR is still pretty novel. What happen when there are thousands of virtual reality brand experiences vying to persuade consumers?

On that note, Denten’s co-presenter -- Melissa Hamilton, Director of Integrated Production, Momentum -- conceded, “VR is just another tool in our arsenal to persuade.” That point-of-view seemed a little more real to me.

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