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Preparing for WeMedia & SXSW Interactive
March 10, 2010 |
Over the past few weeks, between conversations with people and agencies at the intersection of digital strategy and sustainability, the LoudSauce team team has been preparing for the WeMedia PitchIt Finals in Miami, and talking with potential partners and supporters of LoudSauce, a new social way to buy ad space for your favorite causes.
WeMedia is gonna be the best opportunity we've had so far to share our vision for LoudSauce, and receive feedback and coaching from experts in the areas of venture funding, social entrepreneurship and media.
We'll have some workshops with the judges and the other finalists, which should be collaborative and helpful for everyone, and then on Thursday morning we'll each have 10 minutes to pitch our venture to what I hope will be a room full of media innovators, producers, funders and fans.
Crowdsourced Creative Partners
Over the last few weeks of preparation, a few key new learnings have emerged. First, I had a conversation with James Sheratt, the CEO of the crowdsourced creative service Adhack. Since I have always seen LoudSauce as a compliment and not a competitor to crowdsourced creative sites, I had researched sites like 99designs, Crowdspring, and Zooppa. We even experimented with 99designs to create the LoudSauce logo (which I got a lot of flack for from my designer friends).
After talking with James, he made a clear distinction between the contest driven services like 99designs, where everyone works and only one person gets paid, and Adhack which partners buyers and creatives for each job, paying designers along the way variable to their input along the path to a particular piece of creative. I think the Adhack model is more sustainable and will attract better talent, recent partnerships with major agencies like Crispin, Porter & Bogusky and DDB are a good sign. I'll continue to talk with James about how LoudSauce and Adhack could partner on one of our campaigns in the coming months.
Gathering the Best Existing "Good" Ads
Secondly, I have discovered the amazing quantity of social TV and print ads already online at the Ads of the World archive. While it needs to have better filtering for ratings and issues, the public interest collection is the strongest I've found to date, and hopefully we can partner to offer Ads of the World users an opportunities to "Go Loud" once the LoudSauce service is up and running. I will be talking with someone from the AdCouncil later this week to see if they would be interested in leveraging the LoudSauce community to help extend the life of their ads, which they already get placed for free across the United States.
The Google TV Revolution Begins
Lastly, and perhaps most exciting, I spent some time digging into the new Google TV Ads service, which is already starting to revolutionize Television advertising. Not only does the service make targeted TV Advertising drastically more affordable for small businesses and nonprofits, but they also partnered with Spotmixer to make it easy and affordable ($150) to make a reasonably professional 30 second ad that can be submitted.
It seems like some small and medium sized businesses have already taken advantage of the service, but (as usual) non profits and social groups have yet to jump on board. One exception is the Hanley Center, which has an amazing success story about what their Google TV Ad has done to the success of their business. Hopefully LoudSauce can help social organizations start using the service.
At LoudSauce, we believe that many non profits and social causes will be similarly surprised by the amazing support and credibility they will receive through traditional offline advertising. For all of the criticism that digital folks (myself included) have thrown at the old ad model, it still is a great way to reach a big audience to create awareness. For all the power of our social networks, the reality is that most people in the United States still have never heard of innovative projects like Kiva and Green for All.
Imagine if Green for All could edit a 30 second or 1 minute version of their great "New Sound" video, and we could put it on TV during March Madness through Google TV Ads. Understandably, Green 4 All's current funders would not appreciate "wasting" money for TV advertising, but what if we chip in to help make it happen?
According to Google, in order to make a reasonable impact, we would need to run an ad for 4 weeks, and spend about $750 per week. That's about $3,000, or only 150 people giving $20 each. What do you think? Would you help make it happen?
Posted by Colin at March 10, 2010 3:06 PM
