why brands are the new entertainers

Back in the 1880s, the industrial revolution meant at least two things for Americans. They had cash and they had time. This in turn meant they wanted a little entertainment. And regular like. Vaudeville evolved from the old variety show format to meet this need for good wholesome entertainment. The kind you could afford, and take your family to.

These days we've got more cash, less time and we're more entertainment-addicted than ever. Brands, take your places please.

At last week's L21 conference I talked about why brands must become the new entertainers (alongside those other maestros of the time, audiences). The new vaudevillians if you like. And why marketers need to be both masters of conversation and mistresses of entertainment.

In the spirit of a good list, here are 5 reasons to support this:

1. We expect to be entertained. All the time. And in a way that's convenient, relevant and personal.

2. We don't forgive interruptions to our entertainment experiences in the way we once did simply because we don't have to. We can go elsewhere.

3. Our lives are becoming more defined by entertainment. This is reflected in the increasingly social and experiential nature of our entertainment consumption.

4. We're in the age of conversation and entertainment is at the heart of most conversations that happen online. Not to mention at the watercooler.

5. In the 'content cesspool' that is the internet, it's trusted brands and people that can help us both wade through the muck and amplify our entertainment experience.

This isn't an exhaustive list so feel free to add your own No. 6.

If I were Jane McGonigal, I would also talk about the way that brands can engineer happiness by creating an alternate branded reality that's better than our unbranded reality. But I'll leave that to the brilliant lady herself.

That's entertainment...or is it?

Entertainment is an impossibly broad term that means different things to different people. It might be anything from a film, a sudoko game or a social experience, and it can invoke any number of feelings in us like amusement, connection or pleasure. For me the commonality in the expression relates to how it makes us feel.

My definition is an experience you actively choose to engage with because of the feeling you derive.

This may be still too nebulous. It's hard to capture the meaning without being too broad or too narrow.

I'd love to hear some other thoughts or alternative expressions?

p.s take a look at Natalie Wood playing Gypsy Rose Lee, the original mistress of burlesque and a lady born to entertain

We're living in an entertainment culture

This piece in the New York Times highlights how much the place of advertising in culture has changed. It talks about the release of Nielsen delayed viewing figures for the big new season shows in the US. While popular shows like Greys Anatomy are doing pretty well, the numbers for shows targeting younger audiences make for interesting reading.

The article notes that for the 18-49 demographic, Heroes and The Office are delivering between 42% and 48% of their audience numbers respectively, via delayed viewing. For 90210 this figure is more like 53%.

That's means around HALF the audiences for these shows are recording their favourite programs, watching them later, and more than likely skipping through the ads.

We might be watching more TV but our viewing behaviour has changed dramatically. We're no longer willing to forgive the interruption of advertising when tools like PVRs mean we don't have to.

Brands need to work harder to understand the entertainment needs of their audiences. We live in an entertainment culture, and if audiences are the new entertainment executives, brands are queuing up to audition.