Why MacGyver is to blame for the lack of mobile ad formats
In this guest post Rob Hall argues new and better mobile ad units won’t appear while people are willing to make do and mend with the current ones.
Those of us who grew up watching MacGyver were in awe of this Vietnam vet/trained scientist/bomb disposal expert who could solve the most challenging problems with the help of only a Swiss army knife and what in retrospect was a pretty decent mullet.
What does his method boil down to? Resourcefulness. It’s a good skill to have.
But that would mean taking more than 4 hours to incept and design a banner. I’d love to do more creative placements. But I can’t offer them at the same price.
Yeah the lack of value attributed to the mobile creative process in general is another challenge for sure.
I think because the ad formats are all so relatively homogenous the value has been pushed down. Maybe by opening up new options we can excite clients and the flow on might be more realistic creative budgets for mobile. Here’s hoping.
Mobile is still creatively untapped. And we need to untap it, it’s the future. I also think it’s suffering a legacy of desktop digital. Options are limited, as is time. That’s why it ends being the final rung in a long list of ad channels. And you get scrap.
Nice article. Mobile is reaching a point where advertising is not matching the capabilities. Either we get busy trying, or get busy boring the heck out of consumers.