iMedia Connection: The Water Cooler Dilemma

If everybodyís talking about something they saw on the Telly around the prototypical water cooler (or perhaps these days across the street in the nearest Starbucks), then chances are theyíll be exposed to the commercials that accompanied the attention-grabbing content. And in those special cases, they might even be chatting about the commercials themselves. Millerís catfight scene would qualify in this category, as would the famous Budweiser Wassup? commercials, which certainly have the water cooler effect to thank for becoming ingrained into the very fabric of our pop-culture.

Now here comes the fly in the ointment. What will happen to the water cooler effect as Network continues to lose audience to Cable, amid a frenzy of media fragmentation?

The question that he goes on to pose is whether the internet can step in to fill this void? Personally I think that the answer to that is yes, at least to a degree. In fact I'm currently speaking to a number of ad agencies about precisely that, demonstrating to them how they can get extra value out their ad campaigns by using the internet as an ad extension/buzz medium.

To illustrate see this recent campaign for Diesel, that I worked on with viral/buzz marketing specialists DMC, where the internet was used to kick start a wider cinema, print and TV campaign.