BigShinyThing

We toddled along to an ‘Advertising 2.0′ conference last week. Esther was on a panel discussing the presentations. We thought that Esther makes a lot of sense. An early investor in Google, Flickr and del.icio.us, we think that Ms Dyson — like in the song — knows where it’s at.

She made a couple of excellent points last night. One: if we pay more than lip-service to the thought that users are now in control then we should really face up to the conclusion that pushing ads onto them ain’t gonna work no more. Obvious you would have thought. Not given that the prior presentation had been all about online advertising models that presumed attention as a given. No mention of ad-blocking, RSS-ad filtering and — oh yes — search…

Esther talked a bit about the potentially interesting models being developed in the States by companies such as Root Markets, who are basically bribing consumers for their attention. Not a bad idea when you consider the success of crowd-sourcing and gold markets [as discussed in previous posts]. People love to share an opinion. Hell, we’re overjoyed when someone leaves us positive feedback on our Amazon seller account: imagine trapping that will-to-be-liked for your brand.

Second point: advertising is having a good product. The iPod and very-possibly-any day-now the Wii are bearing this out. Have a good product and your consumers will do the selling for you.

Ms Dyson. We salute you.