The Big Shout: Is it an ad? is it editorial? Does it matter?

One of the debates that rages in our marketing channel (well at least bubbles) on is that of who owns the right to produce branded content.

Of course the answer is anyone who can produce good content and get it in front of the right audience but there is an almighty land grab going on out in agency land at the moment.

Digital, media, creative, PR and Integrated all shout that they can produce the goods for their clients and they all have a valid reason for thinking so.

They all bring different activation skills to the finished product whether it be buying media around the content, selling in the content to editorial media, creating a great online destination for the content or coming up with a campaign that uses other disciplines to surround and exploit the central idea.

What I do find slightly annoying is this desire that everyone seems to have to put every piece of content into its own little box, to define every piece of content as either an ad or a PR activity or a piece or cheese etc.

Go back to content basics and it's clear that the consumer doesn't want ads, they want content. If a brand gets an advertising message in there then it will be accepted on the basis that it doesn't compromise the enjoyment of that content.

If the content is both engaging and relevant to the brand thats advertising then you've got it cracked. Not so easy

This example from National Geographic magazine is perfect. Of course they have so much editorial to work with to represent their brand but even so you don't often see media owners produce a film this clever, enlightening and compelling.

It's made all the more interesting through the end product it's promoting. It's not just a random feature, its a real appointment to read.

The film imparts knowledge that I can repeat to others and show my erudition and the graphic style while not ground breaking is easy on the eye and helps the piece to keep its pace which is important in a film that is entirely statistic based.

Is it an ad? Is it editorial? Is it branded content? Who cares? It's good!