More Griping About Advertising: Bing Edition
Jason Torchinsky is a guest blogger on Boing Boing. Jason has a book out now, Ad Nauseam: A Survivor's Guide to American Consumer Culture. He lives in Los Angeles, where he is a tinkerer and artist and writes for the Onion News Network. He lives with his partner Sally, five animals, too many old cars, and a shed full of crap.
My previous rant about an advertising campaign had pretty mixed results, so let's try again. This time I want to talk about the television campaign for Microsoft's new search engine, Bing.
My problem with these ads is that they rely on one of the oldest, hoariest advertising tricks in the book: make up the disease, then sell the cure. This has been done for years; occasional bad breath became the dread disease "halitosis" in the 1930s, thanks to Listerene (which had previously been sold as, among other things, a dandruff tonic), for example. Now Microsoft is going to save us from "Search Overload Syndrome."
My previous rant about an advertising campaign had pretty mixed results, so let's try again. This time I want to talk about the television campaign for Microsoft's new search engine, Bing.
My problem with these ads is that they rely on one of the oldest, hoariest advertising tricks in the book: make up the disease, then sell the cure. This has been done for years; occasional bad breath became the dread disease "halitosis" in the 1930s, thanks to Listerene (which had previously been sold as, among other things, a dandruff tonic), for example. Now Microsoft is going to save us from "Search Overload Syndrome."
Now, I know they're not thinking I'm going to take this literally, that using (implied) Google is going to make me into some free-associating loon with no self-control, but that doesn't mean I have to like it. It feels like they're just trying a bit too hard to find something to gripe about. What are they suggesting? Google gives too much information? And all that information will destroy your brain?
They could have been onto something if Bing actually did anything remarkably different. I've been playing with it, trying to see if normal searches returned something profoundly more relevant, but so far I can't tell the difference. Now that I'm nice and terrified of getting Search Overload Syndrome (SOS), I'd be a fool not to be equally afraid of Bing. In fact, to be really safe, I should just start calling the reference desk at my local library and let that smug librarian risk her brain and social life with all that mind-destroying web searching.
I guess the real lesson here is that if you're going to make up a disease to scare people with, it should have at least some kind of plausibility, otherwise, who's going to be scared? It's like trying to sell a pill to keep people from getting Dutch Elm Disease; we're just not worried about it.
They could have been onto something if Bing actually did anything remarkably different. I've been playing with it, trying to see if normal searches returned something profoundly more relevant, but so far I can't tell the difference. Now that I'm nice and terrified of getting Search Overload Syndrome (SOS), I'd be a fool not to be equally afraid of Bing. In fact, to be really safe, I should just start calling the reference desk at my local library and let that smug librarian risk her brain and social life with all that mind-destroying web searching.
I guess the real lesson here is that if you're going to make up a disease to scare people with, it should have at least some kind of plausibility, otherwise, who's going to be scared? It's like trying to sell a pill to keep people from getting Dutch Elm Disease; we're just not worried about it.
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I clearly haven't been paying attention to the search engine wars lately. I saw that commercial and assumed that "bing" was a service where a human being would retrieve the answer to a query for you, thus helping you avoid having to pore through search engine results yourself.
Now that I know it's just another search engine that has nothing over Google I'm substantially less impressed with the ads.
These commercials are downright silly, but I like that. They make me smile.
That said, I really wonder what percentage of the audience gets the joke. I've read a lot about Microsoft's Bing marketing strategy, so I understand the point they're trying to make. But I suspect a huge number of people who see these ads just scratch their heads.
So long as I can get a prescription for medical marijuana for it, they can claim any diseases they want to.
I kind of like how they use the dumb idea of Search Overload Syndrome (lulz) to craft a lovely short film of nonsense and babble, which comments on our current techno-Babel culture. Formally it's compelling: I especially like the "things are falling apart" motif, especially at the airport, which to me is kind of subversive, modeling a breakdown of our techno-surveillance state. And the idea of a bewildering mass of data is resonant, even though falsely framed in the ad, to both a tech-savvy person and a clueless noob.
Also, the portrayal of people as chattering automatons is always fun and chilling, and gratifying to us who see human interactions a little bit in this way: a bunch of broken machines.... Again, completely fraudulent, but compelling.
Ads are little lyric films, mediating desire and consumption: asking them to make sense and be truthful, both in their claims about their product and their depiction of the word, is to misread them. Not a slice of life, a slice of cake.
And the cake is a lie, TDawwg. :-)
I completely agree, buy the whey.*
___
*SOMEONE'S selling it.
The people with Search Overload Syndrome remind me of the Hybrid from "Battlestar Galactica."
Jump!
I hate those ads. When I see them I think they're annoying and then associate that with Bing. Classic learning theory.
I don't think that's what they were going for.
Yes, Xopher, like the Joe Pantoliano character in The Matrix: "I know it's not steak, but I love the way it tastes!" A philosopher, he.
C'mon Jason, I don't remember the last time an ad campaign so poignantly identified and then crucified a problem and then the competition like this. Make up the disease? Friend . . . do you USE search engines AT ALL?
Even if not necessarily and outright solving the problem and reinventing the mousetrap, the Bing campaign hailed the product in the public eye by proxy, making its first impression so grabby and sticky with its intended audience that the literal truth doesn't really matter.
This ad campaign is pure genius, and, I see why you get mixed results.
So, appearently Search Overload Syndrome makes people burst out in random animal noices? Sounds like fun. Where can I get that?
I can understand the premise that blunt websearches bring up heaps of irrelevant answers that lead you away on tangents, even if I don´t neccesarily agree.
But this commercial doesn´t even nurture that premise, wich makes it doubly bad. Instead of reinforcing the point they want to make with comedy, the director starts to obscure the point with random slapstick - a classic sign that you don't trust your own script. You had me at "plasma", you lost me at "bwaackk".
How odd. It sounds more like the problem with WikiP rather than Google.
Griping about advertising is as old as the billboard-covered hills. If you don't like it, think it gets in the way, didn't get the joke, wonder if other people got the joke, or don't know why they're showing that erectile dysfunction during YOUR baseball game when you're clearly a stallion in bed, just relax.
Most ad-rage is from people calling out the exceptions, not really critiquing the rule. Chances are, you'll really love some ads, and really hate others. Just like you love some products/companies and dislike others--not all advertisements, just like not all products, are directed at YOU.
The best cure for ad-rage is a healthy dose of venting online, then a nice, rewarding SHOPPING trip--you can even do it from your own home!
Ask your doctor about SHOPPING. Because living with ad-rage is a chore, and you deserve a reward.
(Why yes, I do work in market research! You noticed!)
I think you're missing the point of the ad. This isn't "make up the disease, then sell the cure", the problem is already out there, they're just using humour to remind you that you have a problem (poor search results) and that they have a solution (the shiny new incredible Bing only from the sharp minds at Microsoft!!!).
I think it's an effective spot and enough to get people to try it. I find Google better, but I know how to use semi-advanced search criteria (like plus/minus signs) that most people watching TV do not. Whether it actually does solve the problem is irrelevant. It's an ad, and if products actually had to solve the problems they suggest, I don't think there would be many ads on TV (especially not beer ads).
This also needs to be read against its genre, the well-known "Crazy shit building up to an improbable climax" genre of ads. Cf. Nike's "Morning After" Y2K spoof, or the Whazzup 2008 ad. Context is everything!
I'm with #8 - I find these ads really annoying, associate them with Bing, and therefore will never use Bing (not on purpose, anyway).
Unfortunately Microsoft has made this ad moot.
If you find the ad annoying, which some do, they are turned off from the product - -1 for Microsoft. If you find the ad informative, you try the product (bing.com), and to see that it differs in no appreciable way from their major competitor, and in fact is LESS intuitive. Instantly the consumer is turned off from the brand permanently. (-1 for Microsoft).
Bing.com strikes me as a marketing effort that is exceeding the reality of the product. If it truly were what is being pitched, Bing's value-prop would be apparent on your first search - Like it was with your first taste of Google, for instance. Time has washed away the memory of my first google search, but I remember my immediate reaction - amazement and instant loyalty. THAT is what you need to win the search wars, not hyperbolic marketing wrapped around a mediocre me-too solution with imaginary differentiators.
I challenge you folks to find a search term that has markedly different results with Google vs. Bing.
For example, the lady in the ad was asking about back pain.
Google it then Bing it and you will see the results are identical (or close enough to identical).
(In other news, what's with these new anti-spam passwords? My one has the word "superstabbing" that's just freaky!)
Moderately amusing commercial, but Microsoft does have a point.
Companies are gaming the system on Google, and it's bringing us back to the bad-old-days of Yahoo!, Hotbot, Lycos, etc. searches where a search for "dog care" would bring you to hundreds of pages that were placeholders covered in ads that simply had the words "dog care dog breath dog teeth dog training dog catcher dog vet dog days dog dreaming" somewhere either hidden in the html, or blatantly at the bottom of the page.
Google doesn't seem to be doing anything about this, and the problem seems to be only getting worse. Some healthy competition will be good for both companies, and search engines in general.
The made-up disease angle is quite trite. The actual meat of the ad is very solid. It humorously portrays a common experience (odd results to a search query) in "real life". But the coda make it into a disease, which is oddly creepy. Are these people just going to keep spouting gibberish? The fine line between comedy and horror. Imagine if they just kept randomly free-associating, unable to even stop and draw breath...eek.
The other bit that gets me is the "decision engine" nonsense. An algorithm is not a decision. Microsoft is offering a filtered search engine. I'm a librarian, and the notion of Microsoft offering to help me make decisions in my search is not appealing.
Though Bill Gates is a great friend of libraries.
Poor search results? No. Poor searching? That's more like it. If Bing can take any half-formed noob-fart of a search query and make it return a decent result, then it'll have lived up to this claim. If it replaces one handle that you have to jiggle just right to get your chocolate with a slightly different handle, then it's pointless.
My day job used to involve quite a bit of research through search engines, and all the info you want is out there if you just use a sensible query. But it takes time and patience to learn how to coax the data out of them.
I wonder if search doesn't have some of the elements of a natural monopoly. A search engine needs to be big enough to generate and save metadata about THE ENTIRE INTERNET and those sort of costs are pretty backbreaking for an underdog in the market.
i love these ads. i wish everyday life really was like this, and people were creative enough and playful enough to free-associate like that. but alas, no.
Bing is now officially declared to be a "decision engine". Raise your hand if you're surprised that microsoft has made a tool who's stated purpose is to make your decisions for you?
Interesting point - bing users are more susceptable to advertising than google users: http://www.techcrunch.com/2009/07/24/are-bing-users-are-twice-as-likely-to-click-on-an-ad-than-google-users/
Just saying...
Keep in mind that advertising is absolutely brimming with dual meanings these days. Ads are designed so that different people will watch the same ad, and be influenced by it differently, but toward the same goal of selling a product.
I think you're all missing the real subtext, and I think Torchinksy's anti-suggestion ("Google is going to make me into some free-associating loon with no self-control") actually passes within pissing distance of that very subtext.
Here is what I see when I watch this ad: anti-intellectualism.
I mean, let's face it: there's a growing population out there who are comfortable with piracy, have entertained an "information wants to be free" argument or two, learn new things with Wikipedia every day, and choose Google as their search engine. Some of us have put down Apple (since they can't seem to stop spitting on us with DRM, proprietary kernels, resent for labor, anti-competitive lawsuits against Mac clone makers, and locked-up or bricked iPhones,) but the majority of us are basically suckers for their sleek contours and their sharp, smart image. Microsoft cannot possibly wrest this crowd from -- of all companies -- Google.
This ad is basically about calling us nerds.
We're getting a little bit too hip, and do not count it as a coincidence that Microsoft is slow-dancing with Yahoo around the same time they're trying to drive some kind of wedge between Googlers and everybody else.
I live in a boring, largely racist, and dense (wrt population, at least;) Pittsburgh suburb. iPhones and iPods are the only Apple products I've ever seen around. I've found engaging conversation to be... scarce. There is a store here where you can take your MSWindows computer to get the malware removed. If someone here uses a social networking site, it's not Facebook, it's MySpace. (FWIW, I don't use either.)
I'm absolutely positive that when Microsoft says their search sites lead to more click-throughs and conversions (a "conversion" meaning that a visitor spent money at your website) that what's really going on is that their users spend more and spend more impulsively. And what's more, I'm sure that the users they are talking about live here in my neighborhood.
I had a conversation recently during which an acquaintance and I started discussing the history of tobacco and cannabis, and the skank he'd been doing threw her hands in the air and exclaimed, "Ugh! Who cares?!"
That is the girl Microsoft is wooing with the secret message in their ads.
Google is nerdy, and their nerdy users are disrupting your lunch dates, consumer electronics shopping, travel plans, and even how you regard medical concerns, and they're doing this with details that seem (to some) dense, esoteric, and trivial.
They're advertising Bing as a more effective tool for getting stuff done online, and the subtext here is that you can do it without becoming inured in the exponentially exploding wealth of free information available out there. Imagine how you would feel if every time you tried to search for information on The Water Cycle (you know, transpiration, precipitation, etc.) you ended up reading about hydrogen bonds, photosynthesis, and polywater (definitely look up polywater on Wikipedia, it's pretty amusing.) That's a little overwhelming for some people. Some people just aren't that curious!
Of course, focus group testing helps ensure that the secret messages are delivered with surgical precision. If people knew what the ads were making them think, they might find it in bad taste.
There is *tons* of secret messaging in advertising these days. Have you ever seen an Enzyte spot?
Every time someone mentions "Bing", I can't help but to think of the Bing Bong Brothers video. (Warning: don't watch while eating or at work)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z4iiyRv_NrQ
YOU HAVE A PILL THAT PREVENTS DUTCH ELM DISEASE!?
How much does it cost? I'm suddenly deeply worried about this.
This Ad SUCKS!
let the products sell themselves, fuck advertising, commercial psychology, psychological methods to sell should be destroyed because of their own blind involvement in their own conditioned minds, the unit bonded together, morals, ideals, awareness, progress, let yourself be heard!
RIP D. Boon
Regarding Listerine, in the 1920s is was advertised as "so safe it may be used in any body cavity, which makes you wonder how people used it back then....
All sizzle and no steak!
Ah,the long slow death of Microsoft. I must admit I gloat a little in my mouth every time I see one of their ads.
Only somewhat tangentially, here's an interesting experiment called "Blindsearch". Enter in a search and it gives you three unlabeled columns of results, one from the Goog, one from the Cartel's new marketing campaign, and one from something called Yahoo!. You then vote for the best results, after which it is revealed that 4 out of 5 times you chose Google.
I liked the ad. I thought it was a good metaphore for just about every search I've executed...and I do searches all day.
@24
+1 for style.
Apparently Microsoft has successfully identified the problem that besets all the big names in the search business: AltaVista, Lycos and Yahoo!.
Perhaps now they will usher in a time where search results are ranked according to their relevance.
Oh, wait...
I'm (not really) looking forward to the ads in about 18 months for the new, improved Bing 2.0.
A better search engine approach would be to make it easy to express why you're asking, to guide the type of search results. Are you looking for opinions? Facts? Product reviews? Prices? Fiction?
Am I looking for a biography of Alexander Hamilton on line, a book about his life, or a guy I went to high school with named Alex Hamilton? If the search engine knew the purpose, the results would be much more contextual.
Problem: Microsoft needs money and Google, utilizing their ad revenue from their search engine is making money hand over fist. Microsoft finds itself at a serious disadvantage due to Google being so entrenched into the hearts and minds of the "searching" consumer.
Solution: Create a search engine that can "smart search" and position it as "smarter" than Google. Then garner attention of this new product through the use of an attention grabbing, break-through ad that exemplifies the benefit of using Bing. The ad isn't about a disease, don't take it so literally. The ad is about a new, alternative and "smart" search engine. You don't have to like either. Just be glad it's not like the Bill Gates / Jerry Seinfeld disaster.
I recognize the kid with the big blue eyes at the end, he's a comedian.
I hate those commercials. A friend of mine said they reminded her of me, because I'm always rattling off whatever inane bit of trivia has popped into my head.
One of my captcha words? "annoying" Ha!
any griping on boing boing about bing's advertising is... ironic.
this site and offworld and probably the other sites that i don't frequent as often are inundated with banner ads for bing.
also evony.
The purpose of ads is to continue to try to convince you that you are nothing more than a "consumer", and the only purpose to your pathetic life is to buy cheap Chinese made crap that you don't need, in order to keep the incredibly rich incredibly rich. When I hear a representative of a corporate entity say the word consumer, I remember it, and never purchase that entity's products, unless I already use the product and like it based on its merits. I choose a product based on its merits, not on its packaging or ads. In fact, I don't own a television, never watch it, haven't for six years. Love the brain functions that I have recovered since freeing myself from the idiot box. The only ads I am exposed to are on the netz, and I have better control over them (I can always resize my window to obscure them. If I see many ads for the same product, the chance that I will ever consider using that product decreases in reverse proportion to the frequency of the corporate entity's attempts to try and brainwash me. Corporations can, basically, suck it. I refuse to be marketed to.
captcha: foreign despise. hmm.