adcritique

__**Online Ad Critique**__
 * Campaign:** Apple iTouch: All Kinds of Fun
 * Advertising Agency:** TBWA\Media Arts Lab, USA

Apple’s iTouch: All Kinds of Fun advertisement was released in late 2010, that mimics the same marketing approach previously done in 2009. The product in this online banner advertisement is the newest generation of the Apple iTouch, being displayed on the MTV.com homepage.

The advertisement banner employs rich media like video to encapsulate the viewer into being engaged with the advertisement. Once it plays, it becomes interactive with the site it’s housed on and manipulates the header so it’s incorporated into the commercial. The dynamic animation of the video ad draws in the viewers’ attention because it is not restricted to the space of conventional advert sizes, but steps outside the perceived boundaries to control and integrate with its surrounding space once the video plays (Stokes, 2008).

The Apple iTouch ad campaigns are directed at youths and young adults. It has been apparent that they target younger demographic as opposed to PC. So housing this advertisement on MTV.com is really effective because of the demographics that visit this certain site. MTV is based around teens and young adults, accessing the site to listen and watch music videos. So the iTouch advertisement is appropriate because it fits into the needs of the incoming users. This is a form of contextual advertising because the advertisement reflects the content of the page (Stokes, 2008). The advertisement highlights key aspects of the product that will appeal to the youth demographic, like video recording, apps and games.

This advertisement compliments the campaign Apple has developed over the years because it adds to their brand. The overall effectiveness is in promoting the lifestyle that Apple represents. It’s having the newest and latest technology and this idea is reflected in how this advertisement innovatively used the medium of video while seamlessly incorporating the site design. The success of this advertisement cannot be measured directly because this advertisement has been launched with an entire campaign. But it can be monitored by amount of clicks that are directed from MTV.com.

IKEA’s Facebook showroom is a social media campaign that took place in Fall 2009 for the promotion of the new store in Malmo, Sweden. Forsman & Bodenfors are the creative minds behind many print/video advertising for IKEA, so they had a clear understanding on how to target audiences with a limited budget. Forsman & Bodenfors created a Facebook profile for the store manager, Gordon Gustavsson, where they would upload images of new showrooms created by IKEA. Using Facebook as a tool, they optimized the “tagging” tool to create an online promotion and competition. The purpose was to engage Facebook users to tag specific items on each image. The incentive being the first person to tag would receive the item for free.
 * Campaign:** IKEA Facebook Campaign Strategy
 * Advertising Agency:** Forsman & Bodenfors

Using Facebook is an effective means of online advertising because everyone in his or her network will be instantly notified about (1) the contest, (2) the items, (3) IKEA. The average Facebook user is thirty-eight years old, hitting the adult demographic for people interested in IKEA (Pingdom, 2010). Since Facebook spreads news to friends, there are high chances that they too will be in the same age group.

This online campaign has created brand awareness as well as creating consumer demand. Since thousands of people are searching the photo album and tagging, the instant feed to their connecting network creates the buzz about IKEA, displayed on their profile page and newsfeeds. Through word of mouth, people are sharing links and associating with IKEA for the chance at free stuff. Forsman & Bodenfors agrees, “instead of people just looking at a banner with furniture, we got them to personally promote IKEA” (IKEA 2009). By integrating social media for this campaign, consumers are interactively engaging with the brand and accrediting their names to IKEA products. With the association to the products, there will only be one winner. But that doesn’t stop people from wanting the item, creating a higher demand.

The purpose of this campaign was to advertise the new store in Malmo, Sweden, but this online campaign has reached past that and created awareness for the brand. Using Facebook’s pre-existing tools to create hype and competition has created self-producing advertising for IKEA through feeds to thousands of networks.

"Apple ITouch: All Kinds of Fun | Ads of the World™." //Ads of the World™ | Creative Advertising Archive & Community//. Web. 08 Feb. 2011. .
 * Work Cited**

"Royal Pingdom » Study: Ages of Social Network Users." //Royal Pingdom//. Web. 08 Feb. 2011. .

"YouTube - IKEA - Facebook Showroom." //YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.// Web. 08 Feb. 2011. .

Stokes, Rob. //eMarketing: The Essential Guide to Online Marketing//. 2nd ed. South Africa: Quirk eMarketing (Pty) Ltd, 2008. Web. <[]>.