• by October 16, 2007

We all know that the top brands have become increasingly comfortable in using the Web, not just for direct response, but to help build image as well. After all of the work they have done to establish their "love marks" offline, the next logical step to ensure universal presence is by building a sustainable online relationship with their customers.

Unfortunately, this is easier said than done.

With online media buyers stretched to the limit, sometimes the brands that have so much invested in them are treated with less than kid gloves online. Media plans that have been deliberately constructed to be only in the hottest programs, and hippest pubs tend to lose their way online where placement often seems to be an afterthought.

Blind networks, inappropriate context and questionable content tend to be the norm for brand adjacency as opposed to the exception. Shouldn't they be treated with TLC? Specifically:

Transparency

Do major brands always know exactly where their ads will show up online? You've heard enough stories and seen the examples to know the answer to that one. The dirty little secret is that many online ad networks -- even the ones that claim to tell you exactly who their partners are, will never give you an exact accounting of how many of your impressions really show up on the premium sites and how many on the "also rans".

There is too much risk for big brands in any media buy that is not fully transparent. The recent Ann Coulter.com fiasco is a great example. CNN.com quoted the brand manager from Verizon as stating "I didn't even know we were on this site". Shame on the Network that bundled that in with their sale without telling their customer.

"Locality"

Everyone is talking about local today. Making brands relevant to a certain part of the country, and tailoring offers to particular locales can show that a brand understands the environment where their consumer lives and cares about what is important to them. However, misguided targeting can have the reverse effect.

See a great offer for a cheap flight from Boston to Paris, but you live in New York? Ouch. Or a slick ad for a cool product that isn't available in your market? Arrgh. Web audiences have said in survey after survey that advertising that is relevant is OK; ads which aren't are beyond ineffective and can be actually detrimental to a brand.

For top brands it is also important to make a distinction between "geo-targeting" and what I call "locality". Geo-targeting is a term that tends to be thrown around by many ad networks, but can refer to many different, and highly variable, technological solutions to determining location.

The old standby, IP-based geo targeting, is fuzzy at best, providing significant "spillage" that is usually built into a lower ad price. But, at what cost? How much brand damage is done with misdirected offers? Safety lies in finding Web sites that live and breathe a community and are truly local, like newspapers, radio and TV station sites.

Content

A click is a click, right? Whether it is on some kid's blog or the New York Times . . . but is it really? What is the comparative value of that customer on each? Does all the money spent to build up your brand on the "coolest" shows and hippest magazines get wasted when your online support shows up on "ihateparisandlindsey.com"?

The rub-off factor is obvious. Quality content breeds a quality brand relationship. Like the "transparency factor", buyers and marketers need to take a close look at the kind of content their brands abut.

I am sure many CMO's would be aghast if they saw where their hard work at premium brand building was showing up next to -- profanity laced diatribes on the message boards of gawker.com. I love Gawker, but do you think Ron Lauder would really approve of a Clinique ad next to the post "Britney is Bonkers". Blogs, user generated content and other free forums are the current "rage" on the Web, but unmoderated, they are very dangerous places for brands to live.

Brand dollars will continue to move toward the Web but premium brand marketers will increasingly require the same TLC online as they demand offline.