What Are My Choices?

This morning, while chomping away on leftover pasta, I checked the headlines at the Grey Lady, The New York Times. The Times strategically places video ads to the right of a story. I typically ignore the ads. Most of them, such as the movie trailers, require eyes and ears. But there's a passive quality about them.

This morning, one video actually caught my attention. In the ad, a young girl stood blinking, and then held up a sign asking, "What are my choices?" A question is engaging. Wasn't it Socrates who answered questions with a question? As soon as chalk marks started to draw images around the girl, I knew that this was a Microsoft ad—one from the "Your Potential. Our Passion" series.

I have mixed feelings about the ad campaign, at least on TV. While the ads are endearing, they're slow moving for my taste. But on the Web, asking a question, I responded.

Good marketing is about familiarity, about reaching out to people with something they can relate to. Relationship is all about commonality, a common base between two entities. Good marketing is very much about forming a relationship, with a potential customer and a company or one of its products.

The Microsoft "What are my choices" ad uses a girl and a question about her, about her future as a hook. It's a good one.