It took me some time to start writing this article about what is going on in the Brazilian market when it comes to digital advertising. Everyday I have a new doubt about what's really happening. So, I decided to share my latest one: Is our market about digital or interactive advertising?
My digital story started with the Internet. There were no titles for those who worked on digital; it was all about the Internet. No matter what you had to do, it was Internet.
Here in brazil, there was the time when the client used to ask agencies to build their companies/products' 'homepage'. And it really used to be only a homepage, because a website had only one page. There was this 'make-a-cute-thing-to-my brand-on-the-internet' kind of mindset, and whoever had Photoshop and html bare skills could handle the job. Our advertising skills were worthless.
Then corporative websites came, huge projects usually lead by the IT department. Software houses took over and the best CMS won the pitch. In parallel, all the microsite frenzy was going on, full of Flash but seen as something that even a handy client's nephew could do. Digital was not an advertising territory at all.
Today a clue of what could be an answer to my doubts start to spring to mind. Reflecting about the amount of technology available, the whole '2.0 concept' (even the 3.0) involving the web and the consumer, I start to feel that it is not taking bands to the digital sphere anymore, they have already been there since we made the first e-card. The most important thing is the relevance brands will take by being interactive.
Do brands need to be opened to listen to what consumers and community have to say, and react to it in some way? Or, 'Do brands need to promote interaction in order to sell more products?' Someone in advertising certainly answered these questions 'yes'. And then the responsability of brands being interactive came to us, and digital became one of our tools to be interactive.
At this point we could go crazy asking ourselves what is the definition of interactive in advertising, considering that interaction came before digital after all. But what I believe is interesting here is the feeling of being released of all the technological confusion that digital brings within it. And be free to focus on exploring new formats and speeches to communicate something, which is what we really enjoy doing.
Meanwhile in Brazil, I see brand agency losing hegemony and agencies that used to call themselves digital are moving to be recognized as interactive, and the digital knowledge is seen as an aggregate value. Although Brazilians are facing some issues to deliver proper interactive advertising, here the more interactive the agency, the more respected and profitable it gets.
And again a new doubt pops up: what are we supposed to do with this information?
Written by Bartira Pontes, Digital Manager
Sao Paulo, Brazil
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