July 23rd, 2008 by admin
I saw Alex Bogusky, co-chairman of Crispin Porter + Bogusky, speak last night at a San Diego Ad Club event.
You can read the whole sordid story, here, on my company’s blog, but I just couldn’t resist the opportunity to use this title.
For the whole story visit the blog at Nimbletoad.com
October 23rd, 2006 by admin
What I am about to write is predicated upon being able to back it up.
Where PR falls short and advertising excels in its ability to create reality. In PR your only power is to spin what is already present. In advertising and to a certain extent marketing you have the power to create your own reality and then to deliver upon it.
May 30th, 2006 by admin
These television commercials are hilarious. They were produced to conteract Al Gore’s new movie on Green Gasses. Their premise is that Green House Gasses are good for the environment and natural. My choose your own titles are a bit facitous but I have not seen this level of spin since cigarette ads were banned from TV.
Below is an article from the Enviance blog which links to these awesomely spun ads.
Clash of the Climate Change Titans
Big oil companies lash out at Al Gore
May 12th, 2006 by admin
Thinking about going forward with a new keyword campaign?
Before you do, take note of a few sobering statistics courtesy of a debate recently aired on CNBC.
Interested in learning more? Here are some sources:
The problem critics have with click fraud is that it since it accounts for such a large percentage of on-line ad revenue, there is little or no incentive for company’s like Google or Yahoo to put an end to it. Critics demand that a legal entity should force Yahoo and Google to regulate this matter. I disagree.
While I agree that Click Fraud should be looked at and not be allowed to run rampant, I do not see the dire need to force regulation. I believe in efficient market theory. Click fraud is analogous to the old Pay Per View banner ads of the late nineties. Pay per view Banner Ads used to be very expensive. Now they cost very little. Advertisers realized that a random banner ad generated very little ROI. The same will be true for search sensitive keywords. As soon as advertisers stop realizing a positive ROI on their keywords, they will pay less for them.
Right now the the average keyword search term cost $4.75. Is the price
too high? Maybe so, maybe not. Advertisizer’s revenue will determine
whether or not it is too high. Nobody is forcing advertsers to pay
$4.75. As soon Click Fraud begins to take a tangible bite out of revenue,
then the price of the search term will go down. On the other hand, if an advertiser is making a great deal of money on those keywords so as to offset the 12% fraud rate, then that advertiser will view the fraud as the price of doing business and continue to bid up the keyword.
The efficient market theory rules Google and Yahoo as well. As soon as Click Fraud takes a bite out of their revenue they will regulate it. Google stands to achieve a huge competitive advantage if they can prove that their keywords have a significantly less fraud rate than their competitors.
May 9th, 2006 by admin
The current marketing tool du jour is word of mouth advertising, or as Pete Blackshaw calls it Consumer Generated Media (CGM). Companies long for it, bloggers write about it, marketers talk about it, and a few lucky authors have even gotten rich writing about it. However, no one has discovered a fail-safe formula for creating a successful word of mouth campaign.
While far from fail-safe, Pete Blackshaw offers his 2 cents on how to boost your chances in an article he wrote for ClickZ. The article revolves around two CGM campaigns, a successful one by Pete’s Coffee and Tea and a disastrous one by GM. You can read the details here.
In the article , Pete identifies the ex-spot. He writes,
The
ex-spot is that critical moment of experience that makes feedback and
word of mouth slide off your tongue like kids on a waterslide. It is
always well-timed; piggybacks on the great things we love about
products, services, and brands; and is never — I repeat, never –
forced.
A big
reason so many marketers fail in word-of-mouth marketing programs is
they embark on programs well outside the ex-spot. They push messages
that are out of context with the actual customer or brand experience.
Pete suggests four factors that help a word of mouth campaign to be successful
- In store:
Plenty of great experiences are nurtured at either the retail location
or the point of purchase. Imagine the number of shoppers at Target who
would jump at the opportunity to advertise for the brand while actually
shopping.- At the feedback moment: It’s pretty clear consumer affairs is already an ex-spot for negative advertising, but there’s a huge, untapped opportunity to turn it into a more proactive advertising engine
for positive testimonials or incremental behavior. There’s clear
evidence the folks who give direct feedback also sing loudly on blogs
and message boards. Media planers rarely touch this zone, almost as if
consumers with megaphones have nothing to do with brand building.- On the Web site: Web sites are increasingly an
extension of brand experience, even in ostensibly low-involvement
categories like consumer packaged goods. Whether through feedback
forms, surveys, or well-placed programs, the ex-spot can be readily
teed up via Web sites.- In search: Certain keywords provide clarity as to
what’s on consumers’ minds or whether they’re actual users of the
products. These are also good times to tee up such opportunities to
create favorable CGM. What’s important is the brand use the
target-ability of search to get consumers quickly to the ex-spot.
The bottom line is that the stars have to be in alignment for CGM to work. Call it an ex-spot if you want, but for CGM to work the customer has to be in the correct state of mind for it to happen. Once again a common theme arises. The customer is the one in control.
March 27th, 2006 by admin
Plato made a powerful observation that explains why many marketing messages fall on deaf ears, or blind eyes.
"From the Walls of the Cave" is the title of my blog. I had hoped that this title would not only conjure up images of one of the first forms of advertising, namely, petroglyphs, but also that a few would recognize the reference to Plato’s Cave Analogy.
First a quick (very quick) refresher on Plato’s Cave Analogy. Imagine a group of people who have been shackled since birth and forced to only look at dark shadows on the walls of a cave. The shadows are the only reality these people know. Now imagine what would happen if these people were freed from their shackles. For the first time they would be able to turn around and look at the objects directly. However, these people eyes, being accustomed to the dark shadows, would be blinded by the bright light that cast the shadows. Although reality was now directly in front of them they would be blind because the light adjustment was too great for their eyes to take all at once.
This is the very problem many marketers make especially with new product launches. They forget to put themselves in the minds of the customer. Instead, their message makes too great of a leap and the viewer is blind to the message. Marketers need to take a customer centric approach and look through the eyes of the customer. They need to show the product in a light that the customer able to see.
In an established industry, customer’s eyes might be fairly well adjusted. However, in a new or revolutionary industries the marketing message needs to account for the time it takes a customer’s eye’s to adjust. Revolutionary companies are quick to get their message out, but rarely are these the companies that succeed with the general public. 
Take the PDA for example. The Apple Computer Company paved the way with the Newton and helped people’s eyes adjust to the vision of a PDA. However, it was the Palm Pilot that succeeded in cashing in on the opportunity. Palm waited to enter the game until the eyes had adjusted to the light.
Could Apple have succeeded with the Newton? I think so. Their recent success with the Ipod bears this out. When I first heard of the Ipod I had no idea what purpose a portable hard drive full of music would serve in my life. Within a year of the first Ipod release I was the proud owner of an Ipod. Apple’s marketing message was not only crafted in a way that allowed my eyes to adjust to the vision, it also made it impossible to look away.
By Drew Hendricks
February 15th, 2006 by admin
While I can appreciate the creativity of the Volkswagen commercials (as misguided as they might be), I have no respect for the total lack of creativity shown by Chevrolet.
The first commercial shows a group of guys who lose their friend when he falls into the ice. Rather than take him to the hospital and disrupt their fun, they decide to strap him to the car and continue their ski groupie life. I think the creative team watched the movie "Weekend at Bernies" and then pitched the commercial. Stealing the plot from a cheeky 1980’s comedy does not count as creativity. Every time I watch this commercial I cannot stop thinking about rotting flesh and the people that are too stupid to know or smell that he is dead. I guess that is Chevy’s target market.
The second one is for the Suburban. The suburban is shown in a field full of prairie dogs who are inspecting the car. I’ll ignore the fact that one little critter nearly drops to his death dangling from the hatchback and that another one almost gets its head severed by the closing seat. The fact that the truck is so heavy it falls into the earth is ridiculous. In a time when American cars have been criticized for being heavy fuel gobbling hogs, why would Chevy show the car that they tout as entirely different falling under its own weight? There are other ways to show that the car is large and perfect for a big family.
The third commercial is for the Tahoe. The cheesy honking horns didn’t bother me as much as they did my wife. The rest of the commercial shows the SUV imposed on various natural monuments. They call Chevrolet "America’s brand." I guess they are targeting those consumers who embrace imperialistic US tendencies. It makes sense, there is nothing that makes a natural wonder more amazing than a Chevy Tahoe placed right on top of it.
by
Drew Hendricks
February 14th, 2006 by admin
What the heck are these car people thinking? How much did they pay for these commercials?
The Volkswagen’s GTI commercials are at the top. The GTI is widely considered a "chick" car. I guess Volkswagen is trying to broaden the car’s perceived target market. I think they have alienated both their core market and their new prospective target market at the same time.
In the first commercial the viewer sees a wimpy little guy under the influence of an evil plastic head tell his girlfriend to stop her yakking so he can hear the engine. However, the driver is still a wimp and if the commercial ran longer I suspect we would see his girlfriend bitch slap him for talking back. After more thought I guess I was wrong. Volkswagen is not trying to target the macho crowd, but rather the wimpy crowd that is too afraid under normal circumstances to speak for themselves. I feel this will backfire. Why would a guy want to buy a car that makes him act like an asshole when he could just buy the little plastic head and achieve the same effect? Why would a woman buy a car that might make her significant other act like that?
The second GTI commercial is even worse. In this one the evil plastic head convinces an otherwise rational man to not only take his car out in the rainstorm of the century, but to drive like an 16 year old on crack. The end of the commercial shows this guy pealing out in the rain not for some noble cause like performing a heart transplant, but to pick up his take out order. Once again why would you buy a car to drive recklessly in when you could just buy the plastic head and crash any old car?
Tomorrow… Chevrolet…
by
Drew Hendricks
