I just saw some new TV commercials for Dos Equis beer in which someone known as The Most Interesting Man in the World gives us quick tips on bar and drinking-related topics such as “When To Use Pick-Up Lines”: “The time to use them is never. You can figure out the place on your own.” The commercial closes with the tagline, “Stay Thirsty, My Friends.”

You know what? He is a pretty damn interesting guy. To be honest, I don’t know what it was about him, but the dude intrigued me. So I went to his website. And that was cool too. Plenty of fun things to play around with as I learned about this fine gentleman.

In that particular instance, I didn’t need a :30 second commercial to get me interested. And frankly, if you always need all of 30 seconds to convey your message to consumers, you’re in trouble anyway. Especially in the age of devices that skip right past commercials.

Here’s what I’m getting at: Perhaps tactics like 15-second commercials (instead of 30 or 60-second commercials) are a good example of how advertisers can have their cake and eat it too in these harsh economic times if the goal is a wide reach across, say, a national level. It’s a matter of trimming, adapting and creative media planning that may help keep TV in the media mix when it’s completely appropriate for the given audience. Whole methods of media don’t always have to be chopped in their entirety out of the budget.

See, while some say the 30 second commercial is “dead,” I look at the :15 commercial as a complementary tool. You may need that 30-second TV spot to introduce your message, but from there, a series of 15-second quick hits can help register your brand message and help integrate with other types of media you’re using in your mix, such as your website.

Maybe it’s trendy to say traditional methods of media advertising are dead, but I don’t agree with that across-the-board thinking. TV can work. Radio can work. Print can work. But you have to be intelligent about how you use those methods in terms of knowing whether or not it’s appropriate for your target. And if it is, then it’s about a host of other factors such as what channels/publications, what times, how frequent, etc.

Agencies and advertisers so often refer to “creativity” in terms of writing and design. And that’s true. If your message isn’t creative, I don’t care if you’re lasering your logo on the freakin’ moon. But media planning creativity accounts for a lot too. If you only think about traditional media in increments of 30 seconds, well, you’re not thinking hard enough. Less — such as 15 seconds less — can often be more.

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