The Future of Advertising is Here

And even bigger changes are in the wings as television starts to morph into a more Internet-like experience. Cable provider Comcast offers advertisers in parts of Florida the chance to buy ads that run only in specific neighborhoods, so that, for example, ads for a Spanish-language newspaper appear only in heavily Latino communities. The technology to target cable ads all the way down to specific homes according to household viewing habits already exists, with deployment largely awaiting the resolution of privacy concerns. Cable companies are also experimenting with interactive channels that let viewers enlist their remote controls to click on banner ads and onscreen buttons. Video games are getting with the program too. Some are already packed with ads integrated into the cyberscenery, and a New York company called Massive has developed a technique for changing those ads to match an individual player's moves and preferences.

As more networked display screens permeate our homes -- on appliances, walls, even furniture -- each one will become a potential medium for tuned-to-your-lifestyle ad services of the sort that Accenture's Fano and others are dreaming up. Think of this new breed of advertisement as "smart," in that these ads know, in a sense, to whom they will be playing and under what circumstances.

Smart ads, it turns out, won't be confined to the home and office. In three Massachusetts Stop & Shop supermarkets, an electronic tablet attached to the shopping carts asks for a swipe of the shopper's loyalty card -- and in return provides a shopping list that the store's computers have prepared based on the shopper's past purchases. Oh, and by the way, the tablet also offers targeted electronic coupons that pop up when the shopper turns down the aisle with the featured product. "Why offer a discount on your yogurt to someone who usually buys it anyway?" asks Fano, whose lab helped develop a similar technology. "You want to pitch someone who's about to buy a rival brand."

Computer screens are popping up everywhere, and more and more advertisers are thinking up ways to make sure those screens don't go to waste. Take elevators, which now often sport displays above the floor buttons. These screens are becoming prime advertising real estate as marketers grab the chance to catch businesspeople or affluent tourists on their way to the street. Targeting elevator ads to the location, time of day, and audience is not rocket science, notes Larry Harris, who heads up multicultural marketing at marketing agency Draft New York. "Bloomingdale's could boost sales 5% if it put up an ad for a one-day sweater sale in my building at lunchtime," says Harris. "Everyone in the elevator will see it because they're desperate to not have to look at anyone else."

Taxis are becoming smart-ad vehicles too. Some New York City cabs have screens inside, and some taxis in New York and elsewhere have electronic messaging signs that are tied to GPS location sensors, so that a cab can pitch a nearby store or restaurant wherever it roams. Even your own car will get in the game. General Motors has been experimenting with location-aware sponsored messages tied to its OnStar communications system -- and all the major auto manufacturers are looking into ways to hook car-based displays up to the Internet, ads and all.

Not that drivers of nonwired cars, or even pedestrians, will miss out on the fun of targeted ads. Digital billboards and posters, which function essentially as large video screens, are already popping up alongside roads and sidewalks, adjusting their displays to different audiences -- a commuter crowd during morning rush hour, moms running errands midmorning, and young couples on dates in the evening. For even more precision, Smart Sign Media in Sacramento operates digital highway billboards that detect the radio stations playing in passing cars and flash up client ads that best match the profiles of those stations' listeners. And Mobiltrak in Herndon, Va., places car-radio-station-identifying sensors in the parking lots of retail clients so they can tell if people driving into the lots have been nudged there by their radio ads, allowing them to adjust a radio campaign to get the most traffic for the least cost.

 PREV  1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6  NEXT