Bill O'Reilly and the Importance of Brand by Association

Advertisers are not stupid.  Bill O'Reilly's activities are not something they want to be associated with when they can negatively influence the consumer attraction to their brand -- especially when a scandal ensues. They recognize that it can sometimes be very inappropriate behavior. That's why mostly all of his advertisers have dropped out. That cost plenty. (I hear over $13 million was paid by Fox and Bill O'Reilly to silence women who resisted his advances.) The network is certainly in trouble. I don't know what will happen and, frankly, beyond encouraging advertisers to stay away from his show there's not much more to suggest. As we have learned from the Internet, there are sites that advertisers will avoid because of their pornographic nature or suggested sexual content that goes a bit too far.

Here's where we draw the red line. A lot of people in our industry are now talking about impression-based advertising as though it's the only important measure of advertising effectiveness. They choose to disregard content or specific programs that are often most compatible with their brand. They use programmatic buying to target the most relevant customer impressions and that is, of course, critical. But program content counts. It represents a certain quality of advertising through association. I also want to add that I think the personality or "host" of a show also represents the brand by association. You can even recall that sometimes the host will mention the brand itself on air.

I don't know what Bill O'Reilly did or didn't do. But when one of his advertisers says something like "we don't associate our advertising with the programs we advertise on" it makes me shiver. It's a minority opinion that borders on fringe thinking. That's not what most brands want.

Let's really think through the value of program content, and the respect of the host, because advertising can depend on the environment to enhance its message. Let's remember that.

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