During a NYT panel discussion on the future of advertising, Lars Bastholm from AKQA gave this great example of conversational advertising:
EA Sports, the video-game company, is a good example. On YouTube, someone posted a clip of himself playing the company’s Tiger Woods golf game. He put it up as a joke, laughing at EA Sports, because he had discovered a glitch in the programming that allowed Tiger to walk right out onto a pond next to the golf course and shoot his ball from there. So the company saw the video, and in response, it uploaded this ad to YouTube that said: “It’s not a glitch. He’s just that good.†The ad showed the real Tiger, in live action, actually walk on water and shoot a ball. That’s a great example of responding to how consumers interact with your brand.
Extremely smart. If you haven’t seen it, here’s the gamer’s video of the glitch and what follows is EA’s clip posted in response…
Of course, conversational advertising a lot more challenging than buying a 30-second spot on TV or a medium rectangle ad on the web. You need web-savvy creative minds, a heightened awareness of your brand in user-generated media, a good sense of timing and a little luck.
