I came across this ad today and was compelled to write about it. Being a firm believer that digital advertising is one of the most underused and wasted forms this discipline takes I get quite excited (and animated) when I see an ad that tries to utilise the advantages that broadband internet has given digital marketers.

The ad in question, from Appletiser immediately stood out. I think partly I was surprised to see a banner ad from Appletiser, but perhaps I’m less used to seeing their marketing material as I’m, from what I can tell, not a member of their ideal target market (I guess because the ad was on MyDeco and featured items of women’s clothing).
Straight away I recognised the opportunity to interact with this ad. The first frame says “Your summer essentials 2009” and you are greeted with slowly falling green silhouettes of fashion items and bottles of pop.

I rolled over the banner, which was the first element that let it down as its position on the page was slightly strange, and it took a few attempts for it to expand. Once expanded, the silhouettes of the distinctive Appletiser bottle and other items cascaded from the heavens, and my first instinct was to ‘catch’ them with my cursor. My mouse cursor however was not remotely interested in assisting me with my challenge, and for the next five minutes I wrestled with it to capture the coveted items, including a handbag, some shoes and a dress, amidst a deluge of Appletiser bottles.

At last, success! And here was disappointed again. Whilst the animation and interactivity kept me entertained (and then exasperated!) there didn’t seem to be much reward for catching these items. Upon, catching them, the silhouettes zoomed into the foreground of the ad to display a colour image of the item in questions, in the example a golden silk handbag.  The message accompanying the image was “100% pure silk. You have to have it”. And of course you also have to have Appletiser as well, if not more importantly than the luxurious bag, shoes and dress.

I appreciate that I’m not necessarily the target audience so perhaps a (stereotypical) female user would be more inclined to like this ad, but I was not desperately sure why seeing a 100% cotton dress, 100% leather heels or 100% pure silk bag led me into really wanting Appletiser, other than the fact I have decoded the ad’s message? And sure, I get the message, that Appletiser is something I NEED and is essential as the other material items I (or the target audience should I say) wish for.

But capturing the silhouette of the handbag, clicking on it, and being rewarding with nothing more than the message ‘You have to have it’ just didn’t captivate me. I did try to catch all of the items (it took a very, very long time) and each time the fiddly mouse resulted in me accidentally allowing the banner to recede to its original size, thereby missing the final frame.

This is vital, as the final frame is where the ad (potentially) would have ‘come together’. The messages and products I had seen would have been succinctly tied in to the overall message that Appletiser is one of your essential items this Spring, and a call to action could have inspired to go ‘Yes, I NEED some Appletiser’.

Instead I left frustrated (and again I appreciate that I’m looking at this as a young man and a digital marketer). That said, I’m impressed with this ad for trying to capture user’s imagination, for encouraging user’s to notice it on the page and trying to use the power of digital to get more from their audience than they might from offline ad formats.

There is the basis for a great idea here (perhaps a little tweaking on how the interaction ties into the ‘point’ of the advert, the objectives) but mainly this ad is let down by execution. I hope I’m one of a minority that the ad doesn’t work for, but I fear that some extra testing would have been appropriate in this case and this will end being a missed opportunity.

This discussion leads me on to another question that has been following me around recently: is animation and interactivity enough to capture a user? In this example, the interaction, as far as I can tell, was a means to an end, to end users to see the ad, and to the brand and the message of the ad – but is this enough to make me go out and do something about it? Here, the interaction in no way made me feel like clicking to find out more.

The question really is, does interaction in online advertising need a firmer purpose than simply grabbing user’s attention?
Or, used correctly, is this actually its most useful reward?