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Intelligence
Rules for User-Generated Advertising

Intelligence

Rules for User-Generated Advertising

Jun 08, 2007By Michael Stoner

Anyone who’s read some of my commentary can imagine that I might have some issues with the “user” part. But, semantics aside, user-generated advertising inviting people who interact with your brand to create ads or contribute their insights or observations to a blog or other public space. For MasterCard, this meant the Priceless campaign, in which real people were invited to contribute content (images, comments) about real experiences that were “priceless” to them—and, of course, facilitated by MasterCard.

Why would anyone do this, particularly companies like MasterCard that are giving up control of their message in the process. Note that there’s a disclaimer on the Priceless website that states:

The opinions, activities, and businesses featured in Priceless Picks are not necessarily endorsed by MasterCard, or third parties that may be
leveraged within the content. Use of this information or content is at your sole discretion and risk. Priceless Picks may be moderated and will not
be posted until approved by the author/submitter.

Well, for one thing, people place a high value on authenticity these days. And they value the opinions of their peers. This week, there was some interesting reporting on sites that facilitate “group shopping”—which is sort of an extended version of what you can do on Netflix, where a recommendations engine looks at the movies you rank and how you like them and then compares your choices with those of other viewers, suggested movies that they liked but that you haven’t seen yet. Or the reviews on Amazon.com or eBags or any one of dozens of other websites.

User-generated content is much more authentic that the work done by marketing copywriters. Often cheesy, it’s also refreshing because it is so unpolished.

Colleges and universities are already taking significant advantage of user-generated content—most often in student recruitment, where blogs by current students offer an insider’s (often) unvarnished view of what life is really like on campus. Though I know it’s a scary step for admissions offices, I’m all for unmoderated, unedited blogs. Remember that the buzzword is authenticity. The best example I know of is Ball State’s multiple award-winning blogs.

The Ball State bloggers started off with text and still images, but are increasingly using video. Here’s another, often unheralded, example of user-generated content, this time in video: Duke’s Froshlife videos, which is what you get when you turn students loose with video cameras and iMovie and let them share their experiences as freshmen. What’s more impressive is that Duke students have been doing this since 2003 and it’s turned into a real film festival (or, that would be an iMovie festival to be completely accurate).

Entering the area of user-generated advertising is not for the faint of heart. Here’s a top ten list of principles for consumer-generated ad campaigns. There are all important, but my favorite is “Keep it authentic.” 


  • Michael Stoner Co-Founder and Co-Owner Was I born a skeptic or did I become one as I watched the hypestorm gather during the dotcom years, recede, and congeal once more as we come to terms with our online, social, mobile world? Whatever. I'm not much interested in cutting edge but what actually works for real people in the real world. Does that make me a bad person?