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Last night, WFAA Channel 8 broadcast a story that had me talking to the TV and irritating my wife. The report, from Jason Whitely, was about Southwest’s new nonstop service from Love to Memphis. But it was mostly about how the airline promotes itself. Whitely and his camera(wo)man flew on the inaugural trip, which featured a short in-flight performance by the band the Black Cadillacs. The airline has done this before, with other bands. The WFAA report showed passengers holding up their phones, taking pics of the band, presumably tweeting and instagramming and facebooking the whole thing. Then came the expert, Steven Edwards of SMU’s Temerlin Advertising Institute: “It is the future of advertising,” he said. And from Whitely: “He said these in-flight performances are all about social media, hoping passengers snap pictures, shoot video, and share their experience.” Then back to Edwards: “Advertising is completely going this way, because when you hear about brands from the customer, it’s much more valuable than Southwest talking about themselves.”
There was just one thing missing from the report: Southwest wasn’t using only civilian passengers to advertise its nonstop service to Memphis. It was using WFAA. You know what’s more valuable than customers talking about brands? News media talking about brands. You can’t do a story about the future of advertising without acknowledging that you, the reporter, are helping Southwest promote itself. Whitley himself tweeted about the flight to his 14,000 followers.
Covering an in-flight concert is one thing. The arrangement is pretty plain. WFAA gets its light story about a band playing at 35,000 feet; Southwest gets the word out about its new nonstop flight. But it’s quite another thing to go meta and do a story about the future of advertising. Because then you are the story.
