Netflix and Spotify Ask: Can Data Mining Make for Cute Ads?

Somewhat also interesting that it looks like the negative feedback started up before the companies commented on how they came up with the lines.

I remember a decade-oldish fast food TV commercial I remember that was something along the lines of "dear person who ordered a double cheeseburger and then felt regret after your buddy ordered a triple: it was only a dollar more", and it was obviously a fictional yet relatable ad. Funny how much things have changed since then, as companies have done such a poor job building anything like consumer trust around data - what was once obviously cheeky and cute (if faked) now comes off as rude and malicious and sneaky but real. And from the article and discussion here, it seems like the less you know about how the ad creation process works/has historically worked, the more likely you are to cry foul on first blush.

I've never had a Netflix account and I've already started building my .flac library back up and will be cancelling my spotify subscription. The convenience of these services is not worth their disrespect to me as a customer.

I doubt that we will ever break the grip of the advertisement-driven web, but maybe someday a corporation will make an advertisement tone-deaf enough to spark a revolution on how the internet is funded. I'm not affiliated with, nor do I have any stake in this concept, but I think micro-payment funded content, like yours.org, is an interesting alternative. But I doubt many people will adopt yours.org, myself included, until the content is on part with that of ad-funded media.

These "cute" ads require reading and thinking time, and I question people even stop to absorb and process. Granted, here we are, looking at these ads in a digital medium. Clearly, the KPI is probably "sharability" and ultimately brand awareness. Would it have been more efficient to just release these digitally only? As someone who has lead advertising both on the brand side as well as media agency side and is now trying to fix a lot of hot trash snake oil, I really wonder what the measure success is here beyond "let's do something funny and get people to write about us". Can these brands/agencies answer one simple question backed by data: Was it worth it?

I will side on the simple answer and say. Advertising companies like Google and Facebook collect tremendous amounts of creepy data and are blatantly incompetent in utilizing it

That said I wanted to know the end-goal of those ads?

If it's going to make me convert or sign up - that does not look like it's going to happen (no CTA, no real driver etc.)

If the idea is to be on people's mind (informational) - I can see it being hip/fellow-kids' like (considering it's coming from a multi-million dollar corporate entity) - I don't see how it'll last longer than a few weeks at best (considering the amount they probably spent on it).

That said, I can see how it stands out from the crowd (creepy factor not outstanding).

However, in the article Spotify claims that they sought permission before using playlist names on their advertising, so I can't really be upset about it.

Using someone else's art as a surveillance marketing tool? Wow that's gross even by the music industry's low standards. Congrats, you've really made it!