By any measure, Apple's iPod commercials and advertising ventures have become hits and star-makers by giving traditional rock legends like U2 a Web 2.0 makeover. With its multifaceted deal, Apple retained exclusive rights to sell all songs from U2's album "How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb" on the iTunes Music Store and to market a special U2 iPod. For acts like Feist, Apple's iPod commercial featuring Feist's "1234" catapulted the Canadian chanteuse to the top of U.S. charts and garnered her a Grammy nomination.
No matter what Matt Creamer of Advertising Age suggested in the March 17 "Digital Issue," the fact that Apple makes this kind of effort -- while making its broadcast creative look like Flash -- implies that the creative "lives" in digital and ventures out into broadcast, not vice-versa.
Consistently, Apple's iPod campaigns use new music to pull consumers to its technology and its iTunes store. Apple's slick television spots, which focus on music and not their product, give added credibility to its brand while pulling viewers online to purchase the music they heard at iTunes. The key to Apple's multi-channel success is marketing the music first, the iPod brand second, with the added benefit of promoting iTunes.
Verizon, a Questus client, also has used music to create "pull marketing" to its brand and FiOS services. Working with major acts such as Fergie and Gwen Stefani, Verizon created successful online communities around each act's tours. Each interactive community featured online fan chat rooms, tour weblogs from the stars, UGC video elements, as well as phone and texting features that allowed concert goers to post live pictures from the concert event on the community site. By promoting the music, Verizon also introduced thousands of new consumers to its FiOS technology and broadband media offerings.
Both Apple and Verizon understand that great pull advertising means giving to your consumer community first, whether it is access to new music or greater access to their favorite acts -- getting consumers excited by understanding that their interests are really what the new agency model is all about.