below the belt ad on subway carLook around. It’s something New Yorkers, rarely do anymore. With the advent of mobile phones, we’re constantly gazing down at our devices trying to squeeze every last drop of productivity out of our day. You may not realize that your actions are driving an unintended shift: prices for above-the-waist out-of-home advertising have dropped dramatically in the past year or two because nobody is noticing them.
The other unintended side effect is that all sorts of new advertising are popping up to replace the inventory that’s less effective. This is the first time I’ve seen below-the-belt display advertising on the subway, but I know a few companies that are specifically capitalizing on this trend, notably AdRail, whose founder Gianni Cotteta pointed this trend out to me in the first place.
Emerging trends like this that remind us that advertising and marketing are constantly morphing to fit with what’s current today, and that we can’t get stuck on a tactic just because it used to work.
