Moments & Advertising Strategies

At the center of connecting with a target audience, is understanding the mindset or “Moment” they’re in when they view a brand’s ad.

Understanding the importance of Moments will increase the performance of ad campaigns and reduce wasted budget. Today, Rakuten Advertising launches its latest report Connecting in the Moment: A guide to key media “Moments” and how advertisers can use them.

Why Moments Matter In Advertising Strategies?

Imagine that you’re settled on the couch in front of a romantic movie, glass of wine in one hand and popcorn in the other. You’re enjoying a quiet night at home after a long week at work, in a moment of calm relaxation. The break arrives and an ad for beach holidays captures your mood perfectly. The ad for the mud-removing floor wash less so, even though you have a kitchen. You’re not in the mood to think about cleaning.

For the advertiser, both of these cost the same – but one was effective, the other a waste of budget. As a ‘data point’, the individual on the couch is the same, but the context makes all the difference. As such, while demographic is an essential factor in planning an advertising strategy, it shouldn’t always be the dictator of it.

Advertisers need to understand where their audience is throughout the day, understand them as a person and consider the context they’re in when they want their message to resonate.

Weaving these moments into an advertising strategy involves elevating them to a concept – the Moment – which encapsulates the role they play. In understanding Moments, budgets become vastly more effective, and the resonance increases significantly. They’re ignored at peril.

Moments Matter

We’re all different people at different times of the day, and our emotional (or rational) state reflects this. This can be kicking back with a coffee, taking a walk, or staring out of the window wondering what to buy your partner for their birthday.

However, each of these can also involve media consumption: watching the rolling news with that coffee; video calling a friend during that walk; and browsing online for that birthday treat. They all, therefore, become Moments, none of which are actually momentary.

A Moment doesn’t have to be fleeting. It’s how long and how deeply we are involved in an act over a period of time.

The Opportunity in Advertising Strategy

Advertisers need to be part of these Moments alongside the audience, because brand loyalty is increasingly driven by a shared set of values. Brands must demonstrate how much they align with their audience’s lives – be they professional or personal.

The Rakuten Advertising portfolio offers touchpoints across a variety of platforms through which to establish this strategic connection:

• As the global home to Asian content Rakuten Viki boasts one of the most engaged audiences worldwide. Its viewers become part of the experience through contributing to what they’re watching. Advertisers can harness this through knowing the content being watched; travel brands will flourish within travel documentaries and lifestyle brands will thrive among the latest Asian dramas and movies.
• For business users and consumers Rakuten Viber takes messaging to a new level. Brands can become part of the user experience without being intrusive, engaging at scale through subtle placements that ensure advertising does not become an intrusion – it simply sits as part of the benefits and experience that users expect.
• Rakuten TV brings original content, rolling news, and video streaming to the biggest screen in the house, giving brands a plethora of Moments to connect within while audiences are highly engaged.
• Rakuten France demonstrates that the moment of a transaction is merely the end point of a longer Moment browsing for gifts, treats, and indulgences (at an emotional level), as well as household appliances at the rational.

Connecting with the audience in the context of the Moment multiplies the impact of the message. It brings emotional understanding to what would otherwise simply rely on broad demographics – a depersonalized and detached approach to recognizing individuals as people.

Connect in their Moment

Ignoring the Moment the audience is in is at best ineffective and most likely annoying. This is an easy way to fall out of alignment and leave the wrong type of impression, if any at all. It’s wasted advertising spend.

Rakuten Advertising understands the different Moments the users of its media platforms experience. Whether it’s messaging friends on Rakuten Viber, catching up on a show on Rakuten Viki, adding items to a virtual shopping basket on Rakuten France, or watching a film on Rakuten TV, navigating this landscape can be more effective and impactful.

To find out more about how Rakuten Advertising can help brands discover the right Moment, download the report Connecting in the Moment: A guide to key media “Moments” and how advertisers can use them. Never be in the wrong Moment again.