|
Watch This Listen Up Click Here: Inside the 300 Billion Dollar Business Behind The Media You Constantly Consume is a great primer on advertising, and media buying across multiple platforms.
Have you ever wondered, what is the price for a 30 second commercial on American Idol ($340,000), or how much it costs to run a full color printed page in Sports Illustrated ($128,683) or what Yahoo! earns from the 25 million unique visitors to its home page every day ($250,000 - $425,000)?
By comparing old market ideals with emerging technology, this book gives us insight into what drives these numbers.
The days of passively waiting, reading, watching and receiving information are gone.
 Watch This Listen Up Click Here was co-written by David Verklin, CEO of Carat Americas and Chairman of Carat Asia and veteran marketing writer Bernice Kanner (d.2006).
Bernice Kanner originally intended on writing a book about the nine men and one woman who control all the media bought and sold in the world, after her first meeting with David, they decided to write it themselves. I couldn’t resist buying this book about media written by someone inside the world’s largest media buying companies.
The book is divided into three sections:
(1) The Lay of Medialand - discusses the current state of traditional media and how it is struggling to remain relevant. One chapter is titled “Why Newspapers Hate Craig and His Infamous List”.
(2) A Whole New Ball Game - gives us some insight how companies are adapting and innovating, some of the chapters included are; “Why Google has Upset the Apple Cart”, “Why Wikipedia Ticks Off Other Media”, and “Why Oprah Gave Away Pontiacs”.
(3) Tomorrow - Is a short teaser section with a single chapter “What’s Really Sexy about Porn? (A Peek at What’s to Come)”
This book has a lot more to offer than just clever chapter titles, it is a thoughtful look into the media buying industry and how the products we are being sold are playing a part in shaping what we hear and see. But more importantly, it acknowledges the impact consumers are having on their own media environment.
Here are my two favorite excepts from the book, the first about search, and the second about my favorite subject video.
Search represents exactly where civilization is going. People are learning to get exactly what they want when they want it. Optimizing search may be the real definition of broadcasting - sowing seeds everywhere on the web for consumers to click on.
Fuji Film abandoned the sitcom-like ads it once ran in favor of direct response television commercials that propel viewers to a phone number or their web site. The traditional 30-second TV spots were too short to explain Fuji’s technology. One and two minute direct response ads gave it enough time to describe how the picture stabilization feature on the cameras makes the pictures less blurry…
What struck me most about Watch This Listen Up Click Here, was how two veterans of traditional media were very sharp and accurate with their assessment of new media. I never once felt that what I was reading was no longer relevant.
Spread the word:      
If you like this post, then consider subscribing to our full feed RSS.
|
