I’m going to put my cards on the table. I love metal. Ever since I heard Black Sabbath when I was 12. Just obliterated by it. And the heavier and darker the better.
I tried to get away from it, I really did. I put away my Iron Maiden t-shirt during my first year at a New England prep school. Stopped playing air drums to The Trooper. Stopped gushing about discovering Metallica on 2 am underground radio. Ground to a halt my obsession with War Pigs. Started digging on punk rock, folk, and whatever else was palatable to my Ivy League-bound peers. Oh, the things we do for acceptance. But by the time I hit college, I could no longer deny my deep and abiding love for headbanging. I returned to the fold just in time for the creative zenith of Thrash and the rise of a million new amazing metal styles.
What’s it got to do with some new creative marketing ecosystem?
Well, a few weeks back this e-mail hits my inbox.
Maybe it was because of my online activity and this video channel called Blank TV bought my info off some list out there. Or maybe I watched one of their videos and signed up for a newsletter I promptly forgot about (which happens all the time for anyone who’s digitally engaged). Whatever the reason, receiving this e-mail didn’t piss me off the way a telemarketing call would or even your garden variety spam. ‘Cause they wanted me to check out some new Brazilian space metal band. Brazilian space metal? Hell yeah!
They got me.
So, I click the link and wind up at their YouTube channel. But the first thing I see is not this cool new space metal band. It’s this “Search Story” from Google.
Now, I’m in a great mood. It’s not like my favorite TV show just got interrupted by some ad I’m going to mute without a second thought. So, feeling good, I check out the Google thing. Turns out it’s awesome. Actually a great little story that helps maintain my good opinion of the company.
Then I get my video.
Okay, so this band is alright but they ain’t no Ufomammut or Sons of Otis. Too bad, they might have had a sale. But still, now I’m aware of this cool online channel where I can check out all kinds of punk and metal bands I never heard of before. Bookmark!
In the afterglow of all this excitement, I get to thinking how different this experience was from a lot of the usual ways marketing hits us, even in this advanced digital age. A banner ad. Some online PR piece masquerading as news. A TV spot interrupting my Pandora session. Some crap Facebook has thrown up on my page because their algorithm thinks I’ll dig it.
Jonathan Gardner recently posted an interesting article on Mashable, claiming that Context is the new King, with content being Queen. And maybe there’s something to it. Because I like checking my e-mail. It’s not a bother to me. And, since the content interested me, they got me to click through in a way that not only benefitted their video channel, but also YouTube, Google and, potentially, the metal music industry. Without the right content, nothing would have happened. But with it, my attitude was totally different than it would have been if some intrusive marketing had stymied me from doing something I was trying to do. All because of context. As a result, stuff sunk in. I checked out their other videos. I went to Google’s Search Stories page on YouTube and viewed some more of that content. I got an idea for one of my clients.
All these interlocking and mutually sustaining connections between the infrastructure of e-mail, websites, content management systems, online platforms, data-driven placement, and classic direct mail maneuvering were able to get me engaged in several different activities – whereas, if it had been during my favorite show or while I was trying to read my favorite online pub, the chances of my caring would have been massively diminished.
So the next time you shoot a great video for a client, remember there’s a whole ecosystem out there to embed it in. It may just get better eyeballs than it ever would have if it showed up unwelcome and alone.
Okay, Mastodon anyone?