Build Me One of them Dinosaurs!

I absolutely love this video taken at the Los Angeles Museum of Natural History. It so easily shows a reason why advertising budgets are crumbling or shifting, or whatever you'd like to call it. Setting aside what budget was earmarked for what part, just compare this animatronic dinosaur to running a spot about something closer to what you'd expect a natural history museum to be. Clearly the longer term affect to your bottom line business is provided by the dinosaur. And after you see the tons of videos being shared across the web, do you go to your ad agency and scream "Buy me some space on YouTube!" or do you go back to the animatronics company and say "Build me some more of them dinosaurs!"?

Extinct, my ASS! from The Original Joe Fisher on Vimeo.

And yes, I understand that those are two very different functions, but obviously dollars will continue to shift from messaging to things that tend to increase the intrinsic marketing value of the product or product experience. Tough for ad agencies to keep making money the way we do today, but sure sounds more fun to build a dinasour than to make an ad about a built dinasour, and for the customer, the reverse is true as well.

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Comments

[Scogs]

And thus, one more marketer is spreading the holistic agency model gospel. Seriously though, agencies like Anomaly are doing it right, taking on not only the advertising function, but marketing, research, etc. They're also investing real money and putting real skin in the game.

With the landscape as it is now (digital/traditional/mobile/omnipotent)it's crucial (and expensive) to have a consistent message across all the platforms. However, the thing most advertisers forget is that many times, sinking money in to the product is the BEST advertising; making a product remarkable is worth 10 SuperBowl ads.

Preach on brother!

[Josh Klein]

Hey, sorry that I'm not leaving a very thoughtful comment ... because I can't get my mind off of how absolutely badass that thing is :)

But seriously... I'm with you on the necessity of cross-channel (or is animatronic it's own channel?).

The problem is that large organizations are slow to adopt because they separate their ad budgets. The same amount of money suddenly needs to buy airtime AND be used for product development.

Somebody teach these MBAs a thing or two?

[Luc Debaisieux]

Hey Paul,
Agree with ya on the fact that AD agencies will have to adapt. I love all ideas linked to providing peoplle a new and unique experience.
The 'O so alive' dino is a fantastic example. This said, this one is even cheaper than animatronics. Good old man inside (check its feet). Definitely a lot cheaper than a 30sec. TVC production plus media space anyway!