Kristina from BrainTraffic and I were discussing podcasting over lunch today, specifically – relationships between advertisers and podcasters. As always, we concluded the most logical, credible solution is the conventional, NPR-esque, announcer-mentioned sponsorship IT Conversations is exploring.
As Kristina stated, this model helps guarantee the both podcaster and advertiser are interesting and appropriate to the listener. In the best case, the result is a “peanut butter in my chocolate” combination like IT Conversations and GoTo Meeting. This combination raises the credibility of both brands. I might even be able to use GoTo Meeting to create an IT Conversation. Everyone wins, including the listener.
Worst case scenario, it’s an advertiser trying to buy street cred like:
- Wal-Mart underwriting NPR, or
- Wal-Mart buying 8 pages in Vogue to fix its reputation.
In this case, the opposite happens, both brands are discredited.
From Laura Reis at The Origin of Brands Blog:
I am not sure if you are entertaining comments on Walmart-NPR note here. I listen to NPR, I pay them subscription and gave my old car as well. Every time I hear Walmart is contributing to NPR I do not think any less of NPR. All I need is good programming and news it does not matter where the money is coming from. Unless the supporting business is local I do not go out and support the business. One somehow learns to filter out all Ads, like Human Tivo.
Uh, I think you’re reading too much into this stuff. Re vogue, sometimes an ad is just an ad Vogue makes money by selling ads. Walmart wants to re-establish some brand attributes a little upmarket. They both win. For what its worth, I saw the 800 page Vogue where where Wal-Mart had its ads. In the midst of all the shitty, overblown, pretentious ads, Walmarts fit right in. Which is to say, Vogue will take money from anyone. In the case of NPR/Walmart, however, I don’t think less of NPR for accepting underwriting from WalMart. And, I haven’t noticed any positive (or negative) news pieces related to WalMart since then. Sometimes an underwriting is just an ad.
Jim, thanks for great points. Makes me wonder – if an ad is just an ad, is the money well spent?