Why Marketers are FUCKING Morons… and so am I

Have you ever wondered why your favorite television series gets canceled? Have you ever wondered why that magazine you really like stops showing up on the rack? Well, the truth of the matter is that it’s all the fault of the marketers and the content producers who don’t understand their responsibilities.

If you’re in marketing or content you’ve heard the term “metrics”. Metrics, by the industry definition, is data culled from various sources about a specific piece of content’s viewers. It can include, but is not limited to, number of viewers, how long they read or watched, what kind of poodle hair cut they like on their dog, how many members of the audience clicked on an ad and (or) called the 800 number. It’s all the ever-so-valuable information collected from organizations like Nielsen Media Research. My personal definition of the terms is as follows, “The feces that monkeys in business suits toss at each other while deciding how to waste the money of their clients.”

Let’s be real. All “free” content that’s made for profit is supported by advertisers who don’t give a damn about how much you like the characters in your favorite show. These advertisers are attempting to sell you soap. These advertisers are idiots. When I shop for soap I look for a nice fancy package that makes me feel hip. That’s it. I don’t EVER think about soap unless I’m in the shower or in the immediate area of the soap display at my local drug store.

A metric-obsessed advertising exec will stare at me slack-jawed when I tell them what little thought actually runs through my head when I choose to buy something. I’ll be straight up. I consider buying things out of morbid curiosity sometimes. I WANT to buy “Lots and Lots of Trains.” If I didn’t already have all the Zoobooks (including the Tiger Poster) from when they first tried to stuff them down my throat in 1986, I’d probably be interested in those too. The reason that metrics don’t work is because I’m not supposed to want to buy those products. I’m a childless, divorced, 27 year old man who lives alone. That’s not who they think wants to buy their product.

I once had a meeting with a guy named Bob. He’s a marketing guy from a large firm. He has a ponytail that makes other marketing idiots think he’s “hip” and alternately makes the target demographic (me) think he’s a tool. His grand idea is to spam my television with co-branded garbage! He’s developing a show that follows thirty-something wannabe female musical artists as they try to make it… all while using a Citibank visa card to do various music related crap. I’m not joking. He has a piece of software that analyzes the dirty little bastard son of metrics and demographics which was sired after a night of binge drinking and snorting cocaine up a PVC pipe. This abomination is called “psychographics” and it’s supposed to tell advertisers exactly what I, as a childless, divorced, 27 year old man who lives alone, want to watch in order to make me purchase their brand of toothpaste. It’s bunk.

The further fallacy of metrics is that those who analyze them often try to “toss out” views that they assume didn’t get paid enough notice. For example, I actually pay more attention to ads and products I hate then the ads I like. I love watching crappy products and making fun of them. If I watch the entire ad while laughing my ass off and ultimately visiting their website to blog about how foolish their enterprise is my “view” will get counted as a success. However, the busy middle-aged housewife who wants a glove to help her peel potatoes who happens to be in a rush and fast-forwarding her Tivo when she sees the ad will get the network a phone call bitching them out because that woman didn’t watch the whole ad or visit the site.

The only true metric is “saw the logo” or “didn’t see the logo”. That’s it. Everything else is totally up to the forces of the market and marketers need to learn to own up to the fact that sometimes they’re just selling a shit product.

I urge all content producers who have some shred of integrity to move their operations to a pay-per-view type of business model. You know damn well that you don’t care about how many never-dulling knives your sponsor sells. Don’t lie to yourself. Now, that said, as an audience member you have a responsibility to actually pay for what that content is worth to you! If you feel that you want to see a new episode of something like Jericho, for example, you could just pay for it. Let’s use some real numbers on Jericho’s ratings.

According to Nielson (the great Satan) Jericho was getting an average of 6.14 million viewers every week after its revival. Right off the bat I’m going to say that only 25% of those viewers care enough about the show to shed a tear when it goes. If that’s the case I know that Jericho could be done well *easily for $700k per episode. If the backers want a big pay day they can make $500k back on their episodes bringing it up to $1.2 million for every 44 minute piece of content. That’s under $1 from every viewer who wants to see Jericho. If you want a full season just pay a season pass of $30 and you get 24 beautifully produced episodes. At that price they can even give you 4 episodes free to get you involved in the plot and still come out ahead.

This is the model I want to see happen online and on new media devices like Slingbox.