Marketing Essentials 2012

Chapter 19: Advertising

eMarketing Feature

Online Interactive Advertising Online interactive advertising gets customers and potential customers involved with a product or a company brand through active participation. The interactive experience has customers returning to a company's Web site over and over again. In some cases advertisers have partners that complement their brand involved in the unique experiences and/or prizes. For example, Mazda^® partnered with "DriverVille," a virtual game where avatars race cars and win Driver Bucks that they can use to purchase virtual products for their cars. Mazda offers a mini-game within DriverVille, which is a digital version of Mazda Raceway.

Innovate and Create
Discuss the pros and cons of interactive advertising. Have students create an online interactive advertising campaign for a product or company of their choice. The aim of the interactive experience is to have customers involved for more than one day and to offer some type of reward for their participation. Suggest that students think of companies or social media platforms that complement their chosen product or company. The criteria for evaluating the students' interactive advertising campaigns should be: includes an interactive experience that is engaging so customers want to return; offers rewards; lasts for more than one day; is creative—has an interesting theme; and is realistic.