1. Don't bet on a hunch
Big-budget media campaigns are like high-stakes gambling, according to Antony Mayfield, head of social media at iCrossing. "The marketing industry is addicted to the spectacular, the one big creative idea that drives an entire campaign," he explains. "It's like taking all your resources and betting them on 14."
The smarter alternative is to look at a campaign as a venture capitalist would. Just as a VC wouldn't put the entire fund into one investment, but seeds several and injects extra cash into those businesses that show promise as they develop, so marketing directors have the opportunity to monitor a number of low-stakes, media-light online experiments and ramp up those that work.
"The web is an attention market and you need to be really adaptive," says Mayfield. "More spend should go into backing up a campaign over its duration as you start to learn what is likely to be successful."
2. Use the web's free media infrastructure
The internet is already littered with communities, back-end infrastructure, networks and, in certain cases, underused development projects. A business-to-business campaign for IBM and Text100, conceived by online PR and content agency Content & Motion, recruited contacts through Twitter, Facebook, Flickr and the blog network for a series of events that took place in a Second Life model of the Forbidden City, built by IBM as a technology demo.
"Unless you can create a concrete case for building something, or creating a community or a platform, it is probably best to avoid it," says Roger Warner, founder of Content & Motion. "The fact is, those communities already exist, and it is far better to add something of value to what is already going on - within Facebook or Flickr or somewhere else - than to try to migrate people to some new thing you have built."
3. Blog your way to success
For the launch of its new iQ late last year, Toyota created 'This Is iQ', a blog platform at the manufacturer's website. It hosted original content and relevant aggregated material from elsewhere, effectively throwing the brand open to debate. "It was about network creation, which meant going and finding all the best stuff other people were doing and then making sure all the photos were in our Flickr group, all the videos were in our YouTube group and all the bookmarks were in our Delicious account," says Antony Mayfield at iCrossing, which created the campaign.
Spontaneously, the core of the initiative turned out to revolve around the 'hypermiling' craze, with enthusiasts seeking to maximise the car's fuel economy and report on their efforts. The New York Times, Wired and numerous blogs picked it up, noting the lack of stage management. "If you take that editorial approach and keep on the side of the user, you are more likely to get those authentic reactions," says Mayfield.
4. Invest in apps rather than ads
Apps and widgets deliver a cost-effective alternative to paid-for advertising, provided they are subtle, fun and not overtly pushy. The thing that unites Carling's iPint and Chanel's iPhone catalogue, two of the more successful iPhone apps, is that they offer genuine value to the user, as opposed to more novelty creations like the 'iFart flatulence simulator'. "If you look at how brands try to leverage apps, the ones that really work are those which have taken or created an exciting app and not tried to sell directly," says Steak's lead digital specialist, Chris Closset.
Striking gold with either apps or widgets is clearly no easy thing, but there is a marketplace here, and brands can get involved. As a rule, a branded app or widget should answer a number of basic questions. Does it genuinely meet the needs of its users? Does it deliver relevant content? Does it have a shelf life beyond a simple gimmick? And does it communicate your brand values?
Dozens of networks have emerged, making widget distribution easy and cheap. Companies including Clearspring not only enable brands to cheaply convert their widgets to be embedded on all major networks, but allow developers to partner with brands, both on new widgets and successful ones with room for a discreet sponsor. Snickers, Virgin Mobile, and a number of major film studios have done it; Sony's vampire flick 30 Days of Night, for example, bought the 'vampire' widget on Facebook (but you might need to save a bit of your media budget for that).
5. Don't shout, engage
Grey London's chief creative director, Jon Williams, recalls a trip to ATS one weekend to get his car tires changed. The staff were herberts, the job went wrong, and Williams tweeted angrily about it. On the Monday morning, entirely unexpectedly, the vigilant national sales manager of ATS contacted him, concerned to ensure that the problem had been put right.
"He said exactly the right things, and I went from being an active rejecter of that brand to a positive advocate by one simple use of social media," says Williams. "One of the quickest ways of getting a message out is by taking an ad, and I don't think that is ever going to die. There are always going to be places for bought media, but layered campaigns give a much deeper level of engagement."
6. Improve the online experience
So an increasing number of brands now prefer to invest in online content or social media in the hope of standing out. Keeping value in mind is also an important rule of thumb for brands determined to initiate some sort of viral phenomenon, either by offering a diversion from work, a piece of entertainment, or by encouraging users to upload their own content. "It is about understanding the very simple construct of a value exchange," says Williams. "Consumers' time is incredibly valuable, and for them to want to spend time with a brand, you have to give them something back that is of equal value, whether that is a game or something of a viral nature that enables them to look cool in front of their mates."
7. Be like Nike
Advertisers typically reserve around 20 per cent of their digital marketing budget for content and 80 per cent for media, but Nike can afford to adopt new online models. Nonetheless, when a major brand advertiser more than reverses the 80:20 rule in favour of content, something significant is happening.
In fact, last year Nike spent 95 per cent of its 'Cesc Fabregas' campaign budget on a UGC website, online TV content and all manner of widgets. More enjoyable, you have to admit, than a load of banner ads.
8. Reward creativity
Rory Sutherland, in his inaugural speech as president of the IPA, pointed out that agencies have managed to find themselves in a position where remuneration falls when media spend falls, but agency fees fail to rise when spend increases.
The more profound problem with that, said Sutherland, apart from inevitably declining revenues, is that "increasingly there is a danger that the stock market actually conflates the value of the agency sector with the value of the media sector". The notion that successful advertising is chained to paid media doesn't do anyone any good when the media sector is threatening to sink beneath the waterline.
Essentially the creative remains the same no matter what the media spend, therefore to link the two is illogical, argues Sutherland.
9. OK, don't scrap all your media budget
It doesn't take an old-media traditionalist to recognise that there is nothing like some paid-for exposure to light a fire under a campaign, even if it is a social, viral or app-driven one. US telecom provider Sprint's ongoing 'This Is Now' campaign is manifested online in a widget that offers a beguiling array of live counters, graphs and esoteric facts that detail the moment in which we are living (in terms of eggs being produced, babies being born, your own hair growth, and so on). The widget, created by Goodby, Silverstein & Partners, has been customised for takeovers of sites including AOL, ESPN.com and YouTube.
Even Google recently moved its online ad for Chrome onto TV, albeit only channels sold through its Google TV Ads system. Hasn't it heard of search or online video aggregation? Incidentally, the ad - produced by Google Japan - had racked up two million views on YouTube before it hit TV screens.