It is not surprising to find any brand these days staking a claim on Pandora. Since it has become a popular sight for music, everyone from liquor to restaurants to technology brands are getting involved in its advertising space. Some, as I have discussed before are not just effective, but engaging and are deserving of getting attention amidst rocking out to one's favorite songs. However, coming from such an innovative and smart company, Intel's latest advertisements on Pandora are less than intelligent (in terms of execution).
As someone who has to pay every month for going over my 40 hour allotment, I can confidently say that I am attuned to the advertisements that are running on the site. I do not keep my Pandora window open throughout the day and only when I occasionally want to skip an overplayed or depressing song do I actually see what is on the page. So, it makes sense that I am easily annoyed when I am interrupted by Dove telling me I can be "stubble free" or hear clips from the new drama Mercy on NBC that I now feel I can recite by heart. Since I am not looking at the page, I need to hear these annoying interruptions in order to have the brand message be clear - so why does Intel think that it is smart to run copy only ads on a site that is rarely seen?
Sure, when I hear the distinct "bum bum bum bummm" of the Intel tag I know that it is their brand. But other then that, I have no idea what has been said in these ads. I happened to catch one as I was giving a thumbs down to a never-should-have-been-produced song that I won't name, and it was great. I was surprised at how charming it was for its 15 seconds. The copy read something like "In 8 years your kids won't think what we are doing is weird" which is cheeky and witty for a technology company and is reflective of the lighter side of techies. Although had I never wanted to use that thumbs down I would have never seen it. There was no voice over, just good copy that risked the chance of never being seen. I wanted to believe that maybe there was a glitch that one time and that maybe the voice over was just missing. But when I saw a second ad, equally as clever and "fun" with missing sound, I knew it was deliberate.
You can argue that it is effective because regardless of how much I claim to never have my Pandora window open during the day, I saw these ads not once, but twice. If I am like most of you that I am guessing uses the service, you probably were unaware that their ads had anything good to say other than hearing a few seconds of elevator music followed by their recognizable tag. Seems to me that the effectiveness of this placement goes way down when it doesn't fit the form. This ad does not do Intel justice on their new approach towards advertising their company - you can even tell by their homepage above that they have a new attitude about the future and their developing technologies. If they are going to use media such as Pandora to highlight this, they need to cater to how consumers are using it or else their message is completely lost.
C'mon Intel. You're smarter than that...
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