The American Academy of Advertising

I had the opportunity to take part in my first ever ACADEMIC conference this past weekend. Yep..really! There hasn't been a big focus on the whole "scholarship" part of the academic world here at Champlain College in the past, but with a new president and an increased emphasis on professional development it is time for me to head out into a brave new world.

Of course, it helps when the conference is happening in your own back yard!

Yep, this year the Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Advertising was held at Burlington's Sheraton Hotel. This certainly did make the travel plans pretty straight forward. What a GREAT conference! Even though we are in the midst of a SNOWSTORM right now, the conference seemed to come off fairly well attended.

I learned some very interesting things this weekend from both an academic and practioner point of view -- I do enjoy when the two actually connect AND work together!

There was a session on product placement and its effectiveness in different media. From this presentation I learned that RAP music has the highest product placement, with Country second, Pop third, Rock forth and Alternative fifth. Within the RAP genre, product placement is about showing luxury items. According to the researcher, this signifies that the the Rapper has "arrived" and is a way to show status. Interestingly enough, the Country focus is more on utility and things that are needed to get the job (whatever it may be) done.

I also had a chance to learn that Cause-related Marketing has the potential to be more effective in India than in the United States, because in the US we are more skeptical.

Then there was the session on practicum learning -- the highlight of which was an example of the AdLab that is part of the Advertising program at Boston University. It was very interesting to hear how this University is providing students with real-world experience.

There was opportunities to network and meet others in the academic world and to share experiences as well.

Next year, they hold their meeting in San Mateo, CA. I'm thinking of going!