Amelia mentioned this to me when I met her yesterday and I wanted to put it up for discussion here. AKQA BBDO created a viral ad for Pot Noodle as a spoof on the Guinness Tipping Point ad. It required a whole creative team and the effort that is usually reserved for a TV ad, but was made for YouTube initially. When the ad was released and they realised how successful it was online, they considered putting it up on TV. Would that kind of an ad be considered a digital one (because it required the same amount of effort as a non-digital TV ad) or not?
I didn’t answer this as well as I should have at the time, but my answer is yes. The ad was created as part of a digital strategy for Pot Noodle. The fact that it did not go up on TV first is irrelevant, because the thought process behind the initial creation was digital-oriented. The ad wouldn’t even have been created if it wasn’t envisioned for YouTube.
Later in the evening, I was talking to Jamie and she said something I thought was very insightful. If a client wants an ad to be created to target X number of people, that outcome can be much more easily attained by putting it online as opposed to the TV. It’s cheaper, it can be measured by click-throughs and it will in all probability reach your target consumer much quicker and in larger numbers than traditional TV ads.
Only goes to show that if brands want to have a real impact on consumers today, they cannot afford to ignore digital.
One Size Fits One 