So, what's going on with the #

[julian]

I've noticed a growing trend on TV where (big) brands instead of ending the advert with good old www,bigbrand,com it's ending with~

#stupidwordtag or #tryingtobeclevertag

the poor old url taking a back seat it seems..?


Of course, we all know zat zee interveb marketing guru's are trying to drive branding exposure via social media - but to utterly omit any form of website url at the end or during the advert, I think is interesting...

...to deliberately not drive the user to your website where they are semi-captive and undistracted - yet can still go to the clever twatter/FB etc campaigns anyway.

A while back we had everyone using go to: facebook,com/mybusiness instead of the url, perhaps this is twit craze for a while..?

 

[Jamie101]

So it's not just me that has been thinking this?!

Everything is #something now on TV. I actually like it in a weird way. Although I'd very rarely hashtag something because I've seen something on TV, it makes it easy to see what other people are talking about.

It makes sense if you think about it. Let's say you own a sports shop and want to run an advertisement campaign, which is better:

A) The person goes to your website with a small chance of them buying something from you (and if not they'll probably forgot about your site).

B) The person goes on Twitter and follows your account, then probably checks out your site. If they don't buy something at least they'll be reminded about your site/brand when they see your tweets popping up every now and again.

Edit - I probably should've mentioned more things about Twitter since you mentioned Facebook URL's in your post. I think people are only starting to realise that Twitter is actually better than Facebook for a lot of people. I've only recently joined Twitter (months ago) and I've no idea why I didn't join earlier.

 

[Edwin]

Guess so. They're probably paying for the sponsored tweet against that #tag. It's all part of the tendency of larger (read: deeper pocketed) advertisers to chase the "trend of the day" - since they have in-house marketing departments, people have to be seen to be keeping up with the latest craze, otherwise they look a bit redundant.

That's not to say that it's a remotely effective tactic - that's another story entirely.

There must be value in a service (if it doesn't already exist) that "monitors" various media for promoted (paid) #tag references, and explains what each one is pushing. So for example

#makeawill - will writing services
#quickfixit - DIY
#unblockme - drain cleaner

(the above are fake examples)

It would let competitors either market against the #tags by using them in their own tweets, and/or monitor what people are saying about their competitors.

I can also see the potential for "negative tweeting" services (a parallel to "negative SEO") where people monitor the tweetstream for comments badmouthing Company A, then approach the poster saying "Hey, you'll really get their attention if you repost it with the following #tag" (where the # is that of their current paid campaign).

 

[murph]

Perhaps added promotion if they can get it trending on Tw?

 

[AuthorityDomain]

Gets people talking about their brand

 

[foz]

And for some that don't no what #keyword means? A loss to the marketer?

 

[murph]

And for some that don't no what #keyword means? A loss to the marketer?

But some may be intrigued to find out what it means Ask a younger family member who knows about things like this. Again, talking about the brand. I think it's actually quite clever the more I think about it.

 

[Jamie101]

Twitter is even taking over the football tonight on the big screens:

http://twitter.com/LewisWiltshire/status/338352179528212480/photo/1

 

[cc976a]

It's just a fad.

It's just the latest buzz that marketing departments around the country are going crazy about. It's a bit like chasing G PR for site owners. A lot of vanity and no measurable ROI as a result.

I know so many people who don't use Twitter, or certainly not obsessed by it. How many are potential customers are being lost?!

Granted its the fastest way to get brand talked about - but the loss of potential non-Twitter customers for all the marketing spend would surely be measurable.

 

[Jamie101]

There's chance that it could be a fad, but I think it'll be around much longer than most fads are.

Just saw a TV advert for snickers and at the end it had #hungry. That seems quite pointless to me but maybe I'm missing something. Doubt many people would tweet "Just saw an ad for snickers #hungry". Usually brands use their brand in the hashtag, or a combo of certain words - not just a very generic word.

 

[Blossom]

B) The person goes on Twitter and follows your account, then probably checks out your site. If they don't buy something at least they'll be reminded about your site/brand when they see your tweets popping up every now and again.

But with a hashtag - especially if it's not sponsored - they probably aren't checking out your Twitter. They're talking about you rather than to you. I guess it's the brand's job to then follow up with people as they need to via following the hashtag searches. Unless they have people managing Twitter 24/7 they aren't going to be around to keep up - for example if their ad gets shown at 11pm on a Saturday. By Monday morning it's old news, and people have forgotten they even tweeted about it.

Just saw a TV advert for snickers and at the end it had #hungry. That seems quite pointless to me but maybe I'm missing something. Doubt many people would tweet "Just saw an ad for snickers #hungry". Usually brands use their brand in the hashtag, or a combo of certain words - not just a very generic word.

Classic example of brands jumping on the bandwagon without knowing what they're doing. It's useless to have such a generic term as a hashtag because it gets used by so many people who are tweeting their own thing unrelated to Snickers, which makes it even more difficult to track success/engagement. It's so generic that you wouldn't even be able to make the assumption that someone's seen the advert even if they happen to tweet something containing both 'Snickers' and '#hungry'.

Gets people talking about their brand

I think it does if there's a hook. Most of the time there isn't. They should be asking people their opinion or the answer to a multiple choice question or something. Otherwise you just think 'Why tweet?'

I do agree on the talking about the brand point though. I think the main reasons are:

1. Get people talking about their brand
2. Look cool to their target audience (especially if it's teenagers)
3. Loose measure to gauge success/return on engagement with TV ads (though obviously an URL would work a bit better)
4. Because everyone else is.

In conclusion, waste of money unless done very cleverly. I can imagine a brand with a strong seasonal advert, like Coke or John Lewis, doing it well if done carefully (for example choosing how the snowman story ended via crowdsourcing, or adding in secret extra clips only viewable on YouTube).

Works much better for TV programmes rather than adverts though I think. Although that does depend on how many people watch it live and how long it's repeated for.

 

[Edwin]

Classic example of brands jumping on the bandwagon without knowing what they're doing. It's useless to have such a generic term as a hashtag because it gets used by so many people who are tweeting their own thing unrelated to Snickers, which makes it even more difficult to track success/engagement. It's so generic that you wouldn't even be able to make the assumption that someone's seen the advert even if they happen to tweet something containing both 'Snickers' and '#hungry'.

It creates another association between "Snickers" and hunger for those with short attention spans. And IF Snickers have paid to advertise against #hungry then people will see their ad when they search on that hashtag.

 

[Blossom]

It creates another association between "Snickers" and hunger for those with short attention spans. And IF Snickers have paid to advertise against #hungry then people will see their ad when they search on that hashtag.

True.

I wish they would pay to trend so we can compare. I get the feeling though that the results would be very similar but with a sponsored tweet at the top of this very untargeted list:

https://twitter.com/search?q=#hungry&src=typd

Or maybe they're cleverer than we think, since we're talking about it after all