• by Ken Liebeskind , May 1, 2001

MyNetGreetings.com, an Afrocentric e-cards site, has come up with a new advertising idea: product placement.

Everyone's heard about product placement ads in movies and TV shows, but not in e-cards. The site, owned by Stormcrow.com, plans to place product placement ads within the e-greeting cards users come to the site to send.

The company's e-cards have flash animation that will be used to support product placements. "We'll develop flash cards around the product and embed them with a link to the sponsor's site," says Johanna Garrick, Stormcrow's CEO. As an animated flash, the products will move, making it a live action ad format.

Links could take card recipients to a sponsor's home page or another page where they could purchase the product. A button in the corner of the card could provide an additional link to a sponsor's site.

At this point product placement ads are just an idea, with Garrick admitting no clients have been signed yet. She says the company will begin presenting the idea to ad agencies next week in an effort to sign a major client.

She thinks it will be possible because e-cards are "the most accepted multimedia file online. Product placement in online films and animated shorts are unlikely to reach many people until broadband becomes more widely adopted. The average 56K modem surfer frequently sends and receives flash e-greetings, so it's the most obvious choice for online product placement."

Advertisers can use MyNetGreetings.com cards to reach an Afrocentric audience. The site was launched late last year, offering artistic e-cards with Afro themes. Garrick says companies are targeting blacks online now because they are signing on more frequently. She won't accept tobacco or alcohol placements, but thinks clothing, food, cars, electronics and other products will go over well.

She says no other e-card sites have tried product placement ads yet, although Beatgreets.com, a site linked to Egreetings.com, which is owned by Americangreetings.com, sells music in its e-cards. Users send musical greetings on the site, which are clips of songs from 165 top artists. Recipients can click on a link on the e-card to go to a retailer's site and order the music. The company earns a commission from every album sold, according to Americangreetings.com president Charlie Fink.

- Ken Liebeskind may be reached at kenrunz@aol.com