Capturing the millennial vote with video

Jonathan Bowers, February 8th 2008, 3:28PM

In the film Wag The Dog, Robert De Niro is a spin-doctor drafted in by the US Government in a time of crisis. The President has been accused of sexual misdemeanours with a firefly girl and it's about to hit the news just weeks before Election Day. De Niro needs a diversion and he turns to Dustin Hoffman's Hollywood producer to create him a war - something that will unite the American people behind their leader. The information is delivered to the people via TV and newspaper. In the end, the President is re-elected and the manufactured war actually turns into a real concern.

It is a clever film and a great watch - but ten years later, it would never work. Why? Because the internet would easily have exploded the myth Hoffman created. And millions and millions of people today are influenced by the information they access online. The television is still of course a massively important conduit but the internet like never before has the capability to create a majority. Few understand this better than the US Presidential candidates who are well aware that there is an online battle to be won.

In this battle Barack Obama appears to have the upper hand - as well as a little help from his friends. The Viral Video Chart reveals that a new video posted just 6 days ago has already been viewed by over 5 million visitors. It has been linked to by more than 2000 sources and commented on across all social media platforms by many more. The video is the 'Yes We Can' Obama Song by Will.I.Am.

As The Campaign Spot (National Review Online's blog) points out and as De Niro knew a decade before, Hollywood can provide a very powerful message. It is no wonder that 18-30 year olds (the millennial voters) are turning out in record numbers. It is also no surprise that Barack Obama is winning the majority of this vote on nearly every occasion.

Tags: pr, video
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Microsoft opens up the search market?

Jonathan Bowers, February 6th 2008, 3:56PM

It has been almost a week since Microsoft put a deal on the table for Yahoo! to consider. While we don't seem to be hearing much yet from Jerry Yang and his board of directors the rest of the industry has plenty to say - especially Google.

Google is vocal but not quite uniform in its response. One minute, MD for UK Sales Mark Howe is welcoming the competition and the next, senior vice president David Drummond is appealing to competition commissions that a merger will give rise to unfair dominance.

Naturally, the online marketing community is welcoming a long overdue challenge to Google's advertising strength but there's more to this bid underlying Google's concern than many realise. Focus has been placed on the online applications side of a deal but Microsoft has for a while now been developing its demographic ad/search capabilities and has only one rival in this area - Yahoo!.

It is difficult to get hold of accurate figures, but Wikipedia cites Windows Live Hotmail as having 260million accounts in existence which means a hugely valuable database of user information activated when users browse after login. In recent statistics, comScore places Yahoo as the web mail leader with 255m accounts so while something is a little awry it is clear is that Microsoft - with the addition of Yahoo's user data would indeed be a very formidable force in the digital advertising market.

With Google's sign up email (gmail) tiny in comparison, the ability to target ads to the right demographic is one of Google's weaknesses within the market. And with the search leader's DoubleClick acquisition moving forward Microsoft needs to do something to avoid being left behind entirely. The Yahoo! bid brings it back in the eyes of all involved as a force to be reckoned with.

I for one am very excited about how this will develop over the coming weeks and months.

Tags: advertising, google, microsoft, search, yahoo!
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