Commentary

The Genius of Yogi Berra

Did you know that Yogi Berra was a genius? Yogi not only played for my beloved New York Yankees, but he also foresaw the issues that would face us in 2002 in the Online Advertising space.

Let us reflect for a moment…

“You can observe a lot just by watching”

This tactic has been employed by the larger traditional advertisers for the last few years as they sit back and wait for us to “figure it out.” The problem is, we still haven’t figured it out for them and they may be starting to lose interest. We need to put our words into action. The publishers who are selling online media need to get together very soon and adopt standards for selling ad space. The agencies don’t have the power to force this change and the clients, though they may think they do, do not. The publishers need to unite and limit ad sizes, terminology and terms and conditions in acceptance. If the top 20 publishers all speak the same language, everyone else will follow.

“This is like déjà vu all over again.”

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Do we really need to explain this? It’s the 4th quarter and everyone seems to have a rather dismal outlook on ad spending for this period. Personally, I think Q4 is going to be slow, but I think Q1 and Q2 will be much stronger, though not as high as some analysts are forecasting. The market affect on our industry is certainly being felt, but more importantly I don’t feel we can expect to see improvement unless we make some radical shifts in thought. Until we can polish up our acts and provide strong data and a united front, things will not improve. If 20% of the U.S. feels that online is important in their everyday lives, why can’t we improve regardless of how the market is performing. Just a gut feel, though.

“Baseball is 90% mental, the other half is physical.”

No, these numbers do not add up to 100%… but sometimes I feel that my day is adding up to more than 100% as well. We spend so much time rationalizing why advertisers should spend their money online that we sometimes forget how to make it work once its here. Strategy is key to advertising, and I think that most campaigns online would benefit from a little more thought and analysis of their target audience prior to launch. Utilize the research tools at your disposal, perform focus groups, understand consumer behavior online before you throw your media dollars to the wind. Remember that “Tonnage” is not really a strategy. It’s a cop-out. Just because you can buy something cheap does not mean that you should. Strategy is the art of working smarter, not harder, and if you are employing strategy in your media planning, then your campaigns will be more effective all-around.

“When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”

This may not sound very useful at all, but what it means is that you should not have to over-analyze the issues. If the objective of your advertising is to drive leads, analyze the campaign based on leads. If the objective of the campaign is to drive traffic, analyze it on a cost per visitor. Action tags placed on the client’s site are very useful and can help you understand the stream of action for site visitors, but don’t let yourself get lost in the numbers. There is an old hockey-stick-shaped graph that depicts the optimization curve. Focus your efforts and time on the changes that will affect the highest boost in results. Don’t waste your time on minor tweaks when more obvious actions can be taken. You would be surprised how many campaigns are ineffective due to process paralysis. Make a decision and act upon it.

“I didn’t really say everything I said”

This one is so important because it deals with the issue that has already been addressed: terminology. We need to speak one language. We need to come to terms that are universally understood. We need an interactive glossary. If you read the glossary of a textbook, you know that those terms are universally accepted definitions. Not so with our industry. This is important and worth being stated again.

“The future ain’t what it used to be”

Yogi’s genius was in stating the obvious. The future is bright, but it’s not what we thought. The future is not “push” media. The future is not in-store kiosks. The future is not some magic bullet app. The future is in the past… it is targeting. It is based on clear advertising objectives and established fundamentals for growth.

You may think Yogi Berra was just a dumb catcher in Major League Baseball, but he was a prognosticator. He was a man of forward thought and a man of immense passion for his profession. No matter what happened the day before, he kept going back for more. He didn’t get paid much, but he did what he liked to do. You and I are doing what we like to do, and we have taken our lumps and come back for more. I just hope that someone will be quoting us in years to come.

And remember… “It ain’t over till it’s over”!

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