I’m both a heavy user of Gmail and Gmail chat. Both are almost always on anytime I’m online. And in Gmail chat, you’re allowed a small space for a personalized message, such as “bored,” “busy,” “scratching head,” etc. It can be anything at all, of course. The little green dot in the image above means I’m available. I can also switch my status to unavailable (red dot) while also displaying a personalized message.

So here are three questions to pose:

1. Would I accept payment from a company to turn that personalized message into an advertisement of some kind?
2. Would a company ever pay me to advertise in that space?
3. Would such a campaign be at all effective?

I’m using “Monster.com,” my daytime employer, in the example above, to show how a link is conveniently generated. Why not include a link to a new movie or a new product, or a catch phrase for a marketing campaign — as long as it’s not one that will generate multiple bomb threats and parylze an entire city, that is.

Should you or your company want to test this concept out with me, I’ll be a willing guinea pig. Just drop me a line.

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