BSkyB gets ASA reproach over unfair ads
The Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) recently issued a ban against airing of the BSkyB advertisement citing the unfair and misleading attacks on broadband companies BT and Virgin Media.
The internet speeds of service providers, along with concerned groups and individuals, raised their concern over the BSkyB campaign. The ad claims, “If you’re in a Sky network area, we don’t slow your broadband speed down at peak times – unlike Virgin Media and BT.”
The advertisement watchdog supported their decision to ban BSkyB, citing among others that only extremely heavy users would experience slower speeds during peak times, which is but an understandable connectivity and speed situations.
The ruling from ASA stated that the BSkyB campaign breached advertising guidelines on substantiation, truth and comparisons with competitors. It further issued a warning against the BSkyB to refrain from making similar unfair and misleading claims.
On the other hand, BSkyB retorted that all BT and Virgin Media subscribers could be likely affected by their fair use and traffic management policies. They argued broadband speeds of users exceeding “fair use” during peak hours would be experiencing what they claim. This particularly happens, said BSkyB when “heavy users” who are using on popular applications at busy periods with bigger bandwidths.
ASA explained that both BT and Virgin Media do not intend these slower peak-hours speed as implied by the BSkyB advertisement. The regulatory body stated that the public, particularly subscribers to the two internet service providers, would infer from the claim that their speeds are really affected and such slower connection is intended by the two providers.
Particularly to the consumers with low-bandwidth web browsing services, the BSkyB advertisement would make them think the services of both Virgin Media and BT are really slowing down their speed, even if such is not the case, ASA continued to explain.
To read more related information, click here: guardian.co.uk
Benefit financially from TalkTalk’s broadband advertisements
The attention – grabbing broadband ad campaign of TalkTalk continues to roll on. This time, they seem to have taken a cue from the Random Acts of Kindness movement as well as from Fagin of the novel Oliver Twist in equal measure.
In a new ad spot, the former pickpockets become emissaries of TalkTalk by surreptiously putting back money into the general public’s pockets. In addition to this cash, they are also given a slip with an explanation of the source of the money.
The whole point of this ad is that TalkTalk are actually giving people back the money that they have spent unnecessarily with the other broadband service providers.
You can watch this clip on YouTube now. However, if you fancy getting a tenner yourself from TalkTalk for yourself, then you would have to go now to Covent Garden, Oxford Circus, Trafalgar Square, Westminster, Leicester Square and The South Bank between now and August – end.
Ad scheme of 3 mobile broadband to set a precedent in broadband advertising
Today, 3 became the first ever broadband provider in the country to provide advertising on its software itself. Could this possibly be the tip of the iceberg for something even bigger?
The first company to have partnered 3 on this scheme is Yell.com. Their ads will be present on the dashboard. Users of 3 mobile broadband will be shown the advertisement of Yell.com as well as a search window every time that they go online using their dongle.
So how can we expect customers to respond if this becomes part of a wider – scale advertising on software?
It depends on a number of factors. When you consider the fact that Yell.com is a telephone directory, it is something that is quite useful to have as part of your browser and we can’t really imagine as to the reason that a person could possibly object to this. However, if broadband suppliers started getting adds from more divisive and obstrusive brands, such as Nestle or McDonalds, customers might not be very happy.
What do you think about this? Leave your opinion on this subject in the comments box below.
