April 1, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

According to The Wall Street Journal, Woody Allen filed a lawsuit Monday seeking more than $10 million from clothier American Apparel Inc. over unauthorized billboard and online advertisements featuring the actor and director dressed as a rabbi.

image courtesy of Curbed

The lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, alleges the Los Angeles clothing maker and retailer, without his permission, put up billboards in New York and in Hollywood, Calif., in May 2007 that featured an image of Mr. Allen, who is Jewish, dressed as a rabbi from one of his films.

The images also were displayed in advertising on American Apparel's Web site and in sponsored advertisements on other Web sites, the complaint said.

The complaint said the unlawful use of Allen's image for commercial advertising was "especially egregious and damaging because Allen does not commercially endorse any products in the United States of America."

April 1, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Gas prices are out of hand and there's no ceiling in sight. We'll be looking at $4.00/gallon and up before GWB and his oil men buddies depart Washington next January.

The Washington Post has more...

"On April Fool's Day, the biggest joke of all is being played on American families by Big Oil," said Rep. Edward Markey, D-Mass., as his committee began hearing from the oil company executives.

"These companies are defending billions of federal subsidies ... while reaping over a hundred billion dollars in profits in just the last year alone," complained Markey, chairman of the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming.

Regulation? Taxes? NO WAY!

"Our earnings, though high in absolute terms, need to be viewed in the context of the scale and cyclical, long-term nature of our industry as well as the huge investment requirements," said J.S. Simon, Exxon Mobil's senior vice president. Last year the oil and gas industry earned 8.3 cents per dollar of sales, only a little higher than the Dow Jones Industrial Average for major industries, he argued in prepared testimony.

April 1, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Tribune Company, the largest employee-owned media company in the nation, today announced it has changed its name to ZellCoMediaEnterprises Inc. or ZCMEINC. Zell, who made a fortune in real estate before deciding he’d like to dabble in an industry completely unfamiliar to him, announced the change in his record-setting 437th email to exhausted employees this year.

"Hell, I put $315 million into this thing, and we’re on the hook for $13 billion -- the least I ought to get is my name on the company’s stationery," said Zell, who remains chairman and CEO of the newly named enterprise.

Picking up on the "news," The Wall Street Journal notes that Tribune's corporate Web site, www.tribune.com, has been temporarily replaced with a version including a running "DEBToMETER," a "TipJar" labeled "Hey buddy, help a paper out?" and a rotating sequence of dog photographs—a wink, perhaps, at a controversy Mr. Zell stoked by uttering an obscenity at a staffer who suggested that the push for profit would replace serious journalism with puppy photos.

April 1, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 7 Comments

I appreciate that Misha Cornes of Organic has stuck his neck out by declaring that he's "over Twitter."

Her reasoning is sound:

Most people are not that interesting.

There, I said it. Overall, the culture of self-promotion embedded in most social media applications bothers me. I know that listening to "life between blogs post and emails" is supposed to bring me closer to my Twitter friends, but I don't want to hear about their minutiae any more than I want to report on my own. The time you spend away from people is what allows you to be interesting to each other again.

Twitter takes bite-sized content about three bites too far.

Have you ever read the transcript of a Twitter conversation? It's like reading the notes that get passed back and forth in class. If blogs are bite-sized versions of newspaper-length articles, tweets are one-liners. And as Gertrude Stein quipped, "literature is not remarks". I like to get the benefit of people's reasoned opinions, not their spontaneous outbursts.

Twitter feels distancing even as it connects me to others.

I think the main positive benefit of Twitter - promoting weak social bonds between loosely connected groups- actually allows people to maintain their space and reduces real intimacy. In this great article about the parallels between behaviors like friending and more ancient forms of oral communication, cultural anthropologist Michael Wesch notes that there's a "fundamental distance" to social networks. "That distance makes it safe for people to connect through weak ties where they can have the appearance of a connection because it's safe."

With Twitter, each of us shouts into the void to the community at large, rather than taking the risk of speaking directly to one another. Tweets, if you can consider them personal communications at all, are a declaration of existence rather than an invitation to engage in a conversation.

If we are to buy into Wesch's "fundamental distance" theory of social networks and Cornes' three-part analysis, the game's up. I know I'm tempted to buy it. Where are you in this debate?

April 1, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Atlanta's Fletcher Martin has made a new spot to support Arby's "Doublers." It reminds me of Tide's talking stain spot, although that spot is more unexpected.

April 2, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Joyce King Thomas, the chief creative officer at McCann Erickson Worldwide's flagship agency in New York had humble beginnings in this business--an encouraging fact for those who didn't go from Portfolio Center straight to Wieden + Kennedy.

According to Career Journal:

First Post-College Job: I was offered two. One was working for Caterpillar as a brochure writer. I did not want to move to Peoria. The other was for a recruitment advertising agency in St. Louis called Worldwide Advertising, writing help-wanted ads. The job was fairly menial in some ways. I'd have to take dictation of a help-wanted ad on the phone and then rewrite it. I also wrote the brochures and whatever other materials human resources used for recruitment. I did that for nine months.

Career Path: When I arrived (at Wells in New York in 1982), I was at the bottom of the barrel. They'd been forced to hire me by someone really senior in Dallas who had moved to New York and was running the office. But he wasn't running the creative department, and I had to be accepted by the creative department. Someone did try to get rid of me, but I managed to not let that happen.

April 2, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Move over "Mad Men."

There's a new advertising agency-based TV show in town.

Variety and Gods of Advertising are both reporting that "Truth In Advertising," a show set in Chicago and written by former Leo Burnett employees, has been greenlighted by TNT.

Steffan Postaer says, "A few years ago, one of my best friends, John Coveny left Leo Burnett -not happily I might add- to join one of his best friends, Hunt Baldwin in pursuit of a career as screenwriter in Los Angeles.

By their own admission, they were running on vapors when the proverbial big break came."

TNT has ordered 13 episodes. Coveny and Baldwin are the head writers for the series and they are producing, as well.

April 2, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 1 Comments

Here's an interesting note from Adweek:

Hyundai Motor America last week assigned former national lead agency The Richards Group a "mini-campaign" for next fall through its Eastern regional dealers association, said Joel Ewanick, vp, marketing.

"I saw something we liked," said Ewanick, who declined to disclose spending on the campaign. "It suits our strategic and tactical needs at the moment."

A couple of facts for you:

- The Hyundai account was at Richards before it moved to Goodby.
- Ewanick worked at Richards as a Brand Planning Director before he was hired by Hyundai. He also worked at Porsche when Goodby was their agency.

C'mon guys. Get this crap worked out. You're killing the resale value of my Santa Fe if you can't move the brand forward.

April 2, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

Think you're having a rough time of it in the ad biz?

Well, you might feel better by peeking at AngryJournalist.com.

According to the awesome journalists at Breitbart.com:

The website was created by a former journalist who cut short his young career in the news business to work in political communications in Illinois. But he insists his decision to change paths was not driven by anger.

Kiyoshi Martinez, 23, who worked as Web editor for Chicago area community newspapers, said he was "disappointed" in his young journalism career about the direction of the industry.

In early February, the same month he quit journalism, Martinez launched his website after reading a study on burnout among newspaper journalists, which sparked his interest in knowing what was on reporters' minds.

April 2, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Our friend, Catharine P. Taylor, wants the virtual you to go clubbing and then report back in the morning.

Check that. Coca-Cola wants you to do so. Catharine P. Taylor wants to report on the action, or lack thereof.

image courtesy of Mashable

Here's what she's saying so far:

...if you believe that one thing social media marketing needs is great apps from major advertisers, it's as good a place as any to start. Admittedly, the Burn Alter Ego (application) promotes Burn, an energy drink that is only available in Europe, Brazil and Morocco, but anyone is allowed to play.

Here's how it works: once you've downloaded the application and set up your alter ego, it goes clubbing (which sounds rather attractive to me because I don't get out a lot) and promises to post to its own blog in the a.m. Mine went out for the first time last night, and apparently spent some quality time using the Xerox machine to make copies of body parts (none all that naughty, unless you count my avatar's bum). Those who download the app receive this warning: "If reading about drunken nights, nakedness, and crazy decisions make you uncomfortable, delete this application and go back to your knitting." Cool! Well, I don't knit, anyway.

You can set up your avatar to go out with friends who also have Burn Alter Egos or meet new friends while it's out, and the more it goes out, the more options it will have in terms of wardrobe, furniture for the flat, and so forth. I've set up mine to find new friends mostly because I barely know anyone who has loaded it so far, but wouldn't mind it if a few of us Social Media Insider avatars went out together in the next few weeks to see what our blogs would report to us in the morning.

Stafford Green, Head of Interactive Marketing for Coca-Cola Europe, says, "It's creating a lot of funny confusion at our offices. People overhear that I went out last night with Eva and we partied in Paris with some beautiful models. And we have pictures on Facebook to prove the event! But in fact, it was actually our Burn Avatars, Eva'izzle and Stafford'elicious."

April 2, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Entering the music business for the first time, The Clorox Company and its marketing communications partner, DDB Worldwide in San Francisco, recently released to the public "The Blue Sky Project: A Clorox Charity Collection."

"The Blue Sky Project," is now available for purchase on iTunes and 50+ other online retailers for $6.93.

Music from the CD includes original compositions from independent artists Iron & Wine, Amber Music, Singing Serpent and Andrew Rodriguez. The music was originally featured in Clorox commercials.

Half of the purchase price will benefit Music In Schools Today, a nonprofit organization that supports music programs in public schools.

Lisa Bennett, chief creative officer and managing partner at DDB San Francisco, said, “Music has played an integral role in much of the work we develop with Clorox, because of its emotional connection with an audience.”

Tarang Amin, vice president, Clorox Global Franchise, said, "Consumers were so passionate about the music they wanted to play it at weddings and dance recitals. This CD has truly been created out of consumer demand."

April 3, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 9 Comments

This is nuts. From Brand Republic:

Roger Makak (pictured), the creative ranked number one in Campaign Brief Asia’s recently released rankings, has been exposed as a work of fiction created by Saatchi & Saatchi Singapore.

Speaking to Media, Campaign Brief Asia publisher Kim Shaw said: "From our point of view we’re disappointed that this agency chose to use a false name for work done by someone else.”

According to Shaw, Makak is actually a nom de plume for the agency’s regional creative director Andy Greenaway, who said: “He does exist, but not in the form you might think. He goes bananas sometimes.” Greenaway added that more would be revealed in one week.

“I think they were trying to dupe the whole industry and then come out with some fantastic award concept at the end that would appeal to other ECDs,” said Shaw. “But, of course, because he ended up winning our rankings it’s come out very quickly that this guy doesn’t exist.”

Not sure who the guy pictured is, but wow. I wonder how many headhunters and award show-obsessed CD's saw this dude's name and said, "I've got to call this guy. With all those awards, he must be the next edgy rock star."

April 3, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Brace yourself, big marketers are getting hip to text-message lingo. In ads that begin in two weeks for a new line of Degree deodorant for teen girls, Unilever is highlighting "OMG! Moments." Print ads running in magazines such as Seventeen and CosmoGIRL show "High School Musical" star Ashley Tisdale at a glitzy affair discovering that she has toilet paper stuck to one of her shoes.

"We wanted to show the teens that we understand them and know how they communicate with their friends," says David Lang, president of WPP Group's MindShare Entertainment, which created the print, TV and online effort.

The Wall Street Journal also points to "Paris Hilton's My New BFF" -- and its Web site is www.parisbff.com from MTV as another example of text messaging language making its way into pop culture.

Creative executives say not all companies can pull off a text-message campaign. "You never want to come off as the Dad that is making Nelly references to his 12-year-old as a way to look cool," says Bill Rosen, chief creative officer of Arc, a Publicis agency.

April 3, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to Ad Age, Zune Arts was born more than two years ago as part of an alternative marketing effort by Microsoft that invited emerging artists to create online art around social themes to help launch the Zune digital music player.

But since then the website has morphed into an online haven for emerging artists and musicians. While still part of the Zune family of marketing initiatives and still touting the "sharing" themes, Zune Arts now has its own goals and audience in the indie arts community.

"The value of this service is that they help ensure people who like to discover things, discover your content where they want to," said Glenn Cole, co-founder and creative director of 72andSunny. "To me, the mental image of what they do is that they're like the guys who put the Easter Eggs out in the yard when they're seven years old, and they do it really well. They could just put it out on the tree stump in the middle of the yard -- and some clients want a giant egg out in the yard that no one can possibly miss -- but I think [for other clients] the hiding makes their content feel more special when you finally find it."

In a Wired feature from last December, advertising and design critic Warren Berger, said, "They're creating pieces of art, content with viral potential, instead of just a 30-second commercial. It's very smart, and a good way to go."

April 3, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 5 Comments

Adrian Ho at Zeus Jones is reflecting on leading firms like Google that "don't really use advertising agencies and instead rely upon innovative business ideas to communicate their benefits and values to their customers."

Ho also mentions Alex Bogusky's 2004 claim that "everything is an ad" and wonders how ad people are coping with that news.

Rather than creating "communications objects" that help to grow a client's business, agencies who champion the idea that "everything is an ad" should instead be helping to magnify and extend the communication and marketing effects of the client's own business objects. This is a pretty unpopular perspective in creative and production departments because it means that you start with the client's idea rather than starting with something created from scratch. Perhaps this is is why most agencies aren't advocating it.

I don't know that it's a "not created here" battle. I think 99.9% of us are busy working to sell the communications plans and executions we're paid by our clients to create. Jumping into this new pool where "innovative business ideas" are king, is a bit scary and many of us likely question whether we belong in this pool.

What do you think, is product development (to give one example) an area where ad people belong?

[via Brian Morrissey]

April 3, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 1 Comments

From Creativity:

Paul Arden, an eccentric, revered creative responsible for some of the U.K.'s most popular advertising during his 14 years as Saatchi & Saatchi's executive creative director, died Tuesday of a heart attack.

Mr. Arden, 67, left Saatchi in 1993 to start a film production company, Arden Sutherland Dodd, but continued to influence younger creatives with his first book, "It's Not How Good You Are, It's How Good You Want To Be," a best-seller published in 2003.

It's Not How Good You Are, It's How Good You Want To Be is a great little read. I highly recommend it, and its follow-up, Whatever You Think, Think The Opposite.

April 4, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 12 Comments

Wherever you are in Ad Land, have a drink for our fearless leader, David Burn. It's his birthday today.

David runs multiple blogs, a twitter feed, works at a cool ad agency, and goes to tons of live shows to keep up on the latest bands. He's either got more energy than anyone I know, or he lives 30-hour days.

Happy Birthday big man!

April 4, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints has always done a lot of traditional advertising. I remember seeing their commercials on TV when I was growing up. With renewed focus on the LDS church due in part to Mitt Romney's Presidential bid, the church is aiming to clear up misconceptions.

From Deseret Morning News:

The new print ad campaign features people who identify themselves and their quest to find God, describing a life challenge that sent them looking for meaning in the divine. "I felt so destroyed by my addiction to alcohol and drugs," writes Jovanny Vasquez, of Bronx, N.Y., in a two-page ad that appeared in U.S. News in the Las Vegas area in August.

Appearing alongside the image of a man dancing with a woman and two children, he continues, "I prayed with all my heart to find a solution to my life. I was at the point of losing my wife and family. The God I was looking for was a merciful God. I wanted to know how to be forgiven."

At the bottom of the page, the church's logo appears in large lettering, with the phrase TRUTH RESTORED underneath in smaller type, followed by mormon.org beneath them both.

The campaign, which has adopted a slightly different format for TV, radio, billboard and Internet advertising, has been running for about eight months in four different areas of the country that correspond to designated LDS mission areas: Las Vegas; Las Vegas West; Independence, Mo., including Kansas City and Wichita; and New York Utica, which includes Albany, Syracuse and Utica.

But it's not merely a matter of spreading the word. There's ROI here, too, as Scott Swofford, director of media for the LDS Missionary Department, says of early campaign testing:

He said eight months "is a pretty short time to decide whether the campaign is working," but the team will continue to analyze data on how it affected people who actually joined the church. "What we do know is that traffic to mormon.org increased from 200 to 300 percent from pretest levels. Of the referrals coming in, many of them are from that site, but we don't have specific numbers yet that say things have improved or changed.

"Whether the net result will be an increase in baptisms — we're still trying to figure out where that is."

April 4, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 3 Comments

Here's an Absolut ad running in Mexico:

The LA Times reports:

The billboard and press campaign, created by advertising agency Teran\TBWA and now running in Mexico, is a colorful map depicting what the Americas might look like in an "Absolut" -- i.e., perfect -- world.

The U.S.-Mexico border lies where it was before the Mexican-American war of 1848 when California, as we now know it, was Mexican territory and known as Alta California.

The campaign taps into the national pride of Mexicans, according to Favio Ucedo, creative director of leading Latino advertising agency Grupo Gallegos in the U.S.

Ucedo, who is from Argentina, said: “Mexicans talk about how the Americans stole their land, so this is their way of reclaiming it. It’s very relevant and the Mexicans will love the idea.”

Native Americans probably want to redraw the map even more, I suspect. And Lou Dobbs is now totally switching to Grey Goose.

April 5, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Ad Age is running an article on the former chief operating officer at WPP's Alliance, David Caruso. Caruso has started a new agency, Acme Content Co., dedicated to branded entertainment.

"I felt in a big agency [branded content] still wasn't being treated with the respect and thought leadership that the other disciplines were," he said. "It was still sort of a black sheep."

Part of the value of having an independent shop in branded entertainment, he added, will be helping marketers find ways to evaluate the effectiveness of programs, the timing and complexity of which don't always lend themselves to assessment by the marketing-mix models favored by more analytical clients.

"I've seen so many great ideas that weren't packaged fully and die, because eventually some tough questions are going to be asked," he said. "If you can crack the P&Gs and Unilevers of the world, the less analytical clients will come a lot easier."

The article goes on to say Caruso speaks P&G's language, and that P&G's favorite acronym is "FSCIs" (for free-standing coupon inserts). I'm confused by this. First, I've always called them FSIs, not FSCIs. The "coupon" is implied. Secondly, what do FSIs have to do with branded content? Not much.

April 7, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Can TV adjust itself to the realities of direct marketing? TV doesn't have much of a choice, experts say.

Advertisers continue to demand greater targeting and accountability as the growth in Internet advertising heats up competition for budgets.

Comcast and Starcom MediaVest now have some data to push things in that direction. Conducting a 16-month study, they found that households that had TV ads targeted to them were about a third less likely to change the channel than those that were shown traditional ads.

Sounds like a "duh" moment. But I'm sure it's important and all that.

[via The Wall Street Journal]

April 7, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

A few days ago I was wondering about P&G's FSIs and what, if anything, they had to do with content. In order to extend the dialogue on this topic, High Jive kindly clipped the following images from yesterday's paper and sent them AdPulp's way.

Here's what High Jive is saying about these content-infused FSIs:

P&G has been taking a “magalog” approach to their FSIs, attempting to make them feel like brochures. I know some people at Upshot in Chicago, one of the agencies where these things are produced. I have no idea if the public even reads or notices the “branded content,” as I suspect more people are only interested in clipping the coupons. Not even sure it’s right to call it “branded content.”

I'd call it "cause-related marketing" before I'd go to the "branded content" phraseology. Either way, it's more than a simple price pitch.

April 7, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to The New York Times, Charm!, a book written by a character on ABC's soap “All My Children” is doing well at retail, having sold 100,000 copies since its debut in February. The book also appeared on the New York Times best-seller list.

Naturally, a fragrance called Charm, which is a product of the cosmetics company in the novel as well as a plot point on the soap, will be on sale in Sears stores nationwide beginning April 14.

These are not the first instances of daytime drama brand extensions, according to Lynn Leahey, editorial director of Soap Opera Digest. Indeed, Kendall’s own mother, Erica Kane, who is played by Susan Lucci, produced the novel Having it All in 1997. It too was published in real life by Hyperion.

April 7, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

The Association of National Advertisers has once again asked 157 senior marketers what their top priorities are.

For the second year in a row, the number one response was integrated marketing communications.

Here's how CMOs and other senior marketers see their challenges:

1. Integrated marketing communications

2. Marketing accountability

3. Aligning marketing organization with innovation

4. Brand building

5. Media proliferation

6. Advertising creative that achieves business results

7. Consumer control over what and how they view advertising

8. Attracting and retaining top talent

9. Globalization of marketing efforts

10. Multicultural marketing

The creative professionals in our audience will, no doubt, be thrilled to see number six in that sub top-five slot.

April 7, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Research in Motion founder Mike Lazaridis spoke to BusinesWeek about innovation, management theory and other hot topics of the business day.

Here's a small part of what he has to say:

If you really want to build something sustainable and innovative you have to invest in R&D. If you build the right culture and invest in the right facilities and you encourage and motivate and inspire both young and seasoned people and put them all in the right environment—then it really performs for you. It's what I call sustainable innovation. And it's very different from the idea that you come up with something and then maximize value by reducing its costs. But building a sustainable innovation cycle requires an enormous investment in R&D. You have to understand all the technologies involved.

I see a lesson here for the ad biz. I often think of ads as communications products. But we don't do traditional R&D in Adlandia (not on our own "products"). Maybe that needs to change. Don't we want to advance our thinking as the markets we serve advance? Of course we do. But is there one person inside your agency working on this challenge? Is there two, ten or twenty?

It's been said that an agency can't all of a sudden become "creative"—that its ability in that area is coded in the shop's DNA. If you buy that, then there's either a culture that spurs innovation at the agency, or there isn't. What do you think? Can the agency biz learn from RIM and improve its product via R&D?

April 7, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Copywriter, blogger, cartoonist and marketing consultant, Hugh MacLeod, has a book deal.

His online manifesto, "How To Be Creative," has been picked up by Portfolio Books.

I am happy to report that I have just signed a book contract with Portfolio Books [a Penguin imprint] to develop it into a book. Portfolio, by the way, is the same imprint that publishes Seth Godin's books. We even have the same editor, and I'm told the book will have the same graphic designer that designed Seth's "Purple Cow".

Of course I'm excited and happy. Not only do I have a book deal, I have a book deal with a second-to-none, blue chip publisher. Big thanks and kudos to Seth for introducing me to them.

When Rex Hammock heard about the book deal, he said, "it was nice to learn that while it may kill you, blogging can also help you land a book deal."

Hugh is also considering making larger format art pieces and selling them from a gallery space in Alpine, TX, his recently adopted home.

No word yet on the size of Hugh's advance, but the PDF version of his manuscript has been downloaded over one million times, so I hope his publisher sent him a decent check.

Christian Lander, the writer of Stuff White People Like, recently landed a $300,000 advance. That kind of loot could go far in West Texas. It might even fund a storefront for cartoonish fine art by the author of a book on conjuring creativity.

April 8, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

American mobile marketing firms are looking to Asia and Europe for inspiration. They may have found it in QR codes, as mobile ticketing, payment, ID verification and other location-based uses are being invented for this technology.

But are the funny looking barcodes catching on in this country? The New York Times says no, not yet.

A company called Mobile Discovery, based in Reston, Va., is conducting the test at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland in conjunction with the university’s engineering school, whose students are helping to manage it. Students and other people affiliated with the university can download software to their cellphones and then can get campus bus arrival times, order magazine subscriptions, enter a sweepstakes sponsored by QVC and get text alerts from USA Today, among other applications.

But interest in the pilot project, which started Feb. 1 and will run at least through May 15, has been tepid, according to students on campus, in part because of the cellphone fees associated with it.

Catherine Vermeersch, a fifth-year engineering student, for one, does not share that vision. “Students don’t perceive it as practical,” she said. “Why would anyone actually pay for advertising?”

There's an easy answer to Vermeersch's question. It's not advertising people are paying for. Rather, it's information they want or need.

April 8, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

According to Adweek, Chrysler is introducing a new customer-centric corporate tagline: "If you can dream it, we can build it."

The campaign addresses topics, such as quality, fuel economy and safety. One print ad asks, "What exactly are the qualities of quality?" and features a lengthy essay on the topic that talks about "putting the customer back in charge." The new tagline appears at the end.

"[The campaign] is part of Chrysler's effort to listen to customers more than ever before," said Deborah Meyer, Chrysler's CMO. She said the carmaker's new customer advisory board has already garnered 5,600 online responses from people who are willing to tell Chrysler which designs and features they want to see in future cars.

April 8, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Sarah Lacy, the BusinessWeek writer who caused a melee at South By last month, turns her attention from Facebook to Yelp for the moment.

Yelp's real Web 2.0 bragging right is its business model. Unlike many companies in its peer group, Yelp provides a compelling advertising platform. People go there intending to make a transaction—say, find a Thai restaurant in New York or an accountant in San Francisco. And it's always easier to sell ads to someone when you know what they want. Even on a search engine like Google, people are only looking to transact part of the time. Often, they go to get information. And on a social network such as Facebook, people aren't looking to transact at all; they're just there to connect with friends.

I like how Lacy breaks that down. Web-based business models are all clamoring for ad dollars, but how many of them have asked the hard questions of themselves? Like, "Will our users click banner ads?"

April 8, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

There are a multitude of ways to resist modern corporate culture. One can turn the TV off, walk to work or live off the grid. If one is an artist, there are even more options.

Chris Held is an artist.

Today’s highly refined marketing machine appeals to our personal hopes, wants, needs, and dreams to effectively entice us to the point of purchase. Advertisers have found such success by making many of the same promises offered by religion. Love, happiness, acceptance, and comfort are now offered by corporate America and made available in a pill, wrapped in plastic, or with free shipping. Religious organizations have quickly taken cues from marketers and now spew their everlasting-life-guarantees over airwaves and across billboards.

In the installation, Overstock [jáce gáce, Portland OR, April 2008], Chris Held unites the messages of product marketing and religious practice by creating a monolithic shrine to the modern commodity.

The exhibit runs from Apr 4th - 25th, 2008.

image courtesy of PortlandArt.net

[via Rob Walker's Murketing]

April 8, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Steffan Postaer has been warming up on his blog, Gods of Advertising, for the past few months.

Today he put hot iron to flesh in a post about fear.

By definition the creative process is fearless. Scared people don’t make anything well except walls and weapons. Humphry Davy and Thomas Edison did not invent the light bulb to put out a fire. They were looking forward, which is what creators do. Invention is the by-product of an open mind.

Postaer goes on to say fear destroys once it makes its way inside the agency. Which is a reality I'm sure we all know well.

Let me think...What do people in the agency business fear most?

1) That they'll be canned
2) That they'll be embarrassed in a meeting
3) That their peers are making more money than they are
4) That they've sold their souls
5) That they'll need to continue to do so to keep the money coming in
6) That someone's going to find out they're a hack
7) That all the late hours and travel isn't good for the family
8) That it's all a waste of time and talent
9) That they coulda been a contendah

I'm sure there are more. The point is don't sweat it.

April 8, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 5 Comments

[via Ernie Schenck]

April 9, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The 30-second spot might be out of vogue at the moment, but that's not a concern when you work on a brand that's deep into lifestyle marketing. When you're on a brand like that, you can make an entire film. Without leaving the ad biz for Hollywood.

Fresh Creation points to one such film from Roxy, Quicksilver's womens line of surf gear.

Steve Hall at Adrants says, "who doesn't like to watch girls in bikinis surf, pose and frolic on the beach?"

Roxy's YouTube Channel also offers several other content nuggets, including an interview with surfer/musician Ry Cuming and coverage of The Happening at Bondi Beach in Sydney.

April 9, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Perez Hilton is taking over. His site drew 2.8 million unique visitors in February, according to comScore Inc., making it the ninth-most popular entertainment-news site in the U.S.

According to The Wall Street Journal, the ubiquitous purveyor of celebrity gossip on the Internet, is now expanding his empire to the airwaves.

Starting May 5, the blogger, whose real name is Mario Lavandeira, will have his own twice-daily miniradio show.

"Radio Perez," marks the debut offering from "C" Student Entertainment Corp., a radio and mobile-focused programming provider.

"We're going to prove that [the blogosphere] is a place where you can find talent," said Andy Schuon, former head of programming at MTV and one of the backers of this new venture.

Hilton's radio show is part of a strategy that includes more television appearances; the release this summer of a feature movie, "Another Gay Sequel: Gays Gone Wild," in which Mr. Lavandeira stars as himself; a coming book; and a possible development deal with Warner Bros. Records.

April 9, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Paul Ford is the author of Gary Benchley, Rock Star, a novel that was originally serialized on The Morning News, where he's a contributing writer. He is also an editor at Harper’s Magazine, an occasional commentator on NPR’s All Things Considered, and sole proprietor of Ftrain.com. He also writes Twitter posts of exactly six words each.

April 9, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Chicago artist Pamela Michelle Johnson likes to paint still lifes of food items on large canvases.

From her artist statement:

In the American Still-Life series, Johnson takes on another fixture of contemporary American life, and does so with no apologies. When confronted with a six-foot tall canvas of enormous and precariously balanced hamburgers, waffles, doughnuts, or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches the viewer is forced to recognize that the work is about more than alluring junk food. Johnson’s fascination with the phenomena of mass-produced foods comes from viewing those artifacts of our culture as indicative of the state of the culture as a whole. Her goal is to invoke reflection on embracing a culture of complete and instant gratification while ignoring the consequences of our indulgences.

I totally hear all that and can't quibble. But as a fan of Pop-Tarts, PB&Js, waffles and the rest, I also see her work as in a lighter context. In fact, if I was a brand manager on Pop-Tarts, I'd be tempted to misappropriate the meaning behind the work for my own purposes (or at least buy the original work and hang it in Kellogg's offices). I mean, Johnson makes the product look good. Does she not?

[via Bad Banana]

April 9, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 4 Comments

"Transit," a short film by Steph Green

The Responsibility Project from Liberty Mutual is a microsite that builds on the brand's "Resonsibility. What's Your Policy?" ad campaign.

Here's how the brand describes it:

It all began when we ran a TV commercial about people doing things for strangers. The response was truly overwhelming. Thousands of emails and letters from people all over the country thanking us.

We thought, if one TV spot from Liberty Mutual can get people thinking and talking about responsibility, imagine what could happen if we went a step further? So we created a series of short films, and this website, as an exploration of what it means to do the right thing.

[via 3 Minute Ad Age]

[UPDATE] Just noticed that Ernie Schenck of Hill Holliday has a producer credit on this short.

April 9, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 7 Comments

Scott Goodson, Founder, CEO and Chief Creative Officer of StrawberryFrog, is not content making ads. Far from it. For Goodson and his fellow amphibians, it's all about inspiring "Cultural Movements."

Cultural Movements is the StrawberryFrog way.

It is our process to come up with innovative strategies for our clients.

Cultural Movements is the StrawberryFrog competitive edge, our DNA. It sets the course for all the Frogs and our clients to follow. It's what we deliver. It how our case studies are written. It's our process to release innovation and liberate creativity. It lets us create a blueprint for change.

Cultural Movements is what we do at StrawberyFrog to maximize investments in marketing in light of all the changes happening around us, such as the fragmented media world, the radical decline of the 30 second TV spot, and the rise of the truly interactive class.

Sounds like fun. But it also sounds like a stretch. To me a cultural movement involves risk taking, collective effort on a massive scale, intelligence and guts. And it means you're moving the culture forward to a better place. I'm not sure a brand can move the culture forward.

Of course, I'm focusing on the word "Movement" here--Civil Rights Movement, Womens' Movement and the Labor Movement. Perhaps, Goodson is thinking of Cultural Movements differently. Maybe it's pop culture movements he's hoping to spur. It probably depends on the brand he's supporting.

April 9, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Matthew Milan, Director of Insight and Planning at Critical Mass, is sharing slides.

| View | Upload your own

On page eight of this deck, there's a nice quote from Ron Johnson of Apple. He says, "Design works if its authentic, inspired and has a clear point of view. It can't be a collection of input."

I love it when people refuse to compromise their vision. That is, I love it when their vision is grand and wise.

[via Jack Vinson]

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Louise Story of The New York Times takes the robe off Naked, the communications planning agency with offices in London and New York.

Here's a bit about how the firm is structured and the role they play in clients' lives:

Unlike many ad agencies, Naked does not create ads or purchase the space for them from media companies. Executives at Naked say that they are “media neutral,” meaning that they are indifferent to where the advertising dollars of their clients are spent; this, they say, distinguishes them from agencies that might tend to steer clients toward television, for example.

“We do not have any predisposition to recommend any channel,” said Paul Woolmington, a founding partner of Naked New York. “That is something that cannot be underestimated.”

Naked usually does not replace a company’s lineup of creative agencies and media buyers. Instead, Naked works like a consulting firm, advising how to use the regular agencies.

In other words, Naked disrupts the apple cart. I'm sure the "partner" agencies just love that.

Story's story also gets to the shop's attitude, if one can call it that. She says Naked's planners regularly tell clients "that their ad campaigns have been failing miserably." And Paul Woolmington, a founding partner of Naked New York, uses words like “transformation” and “movement” to describe Naked’s work. At Naked, staff are “brilliant misfits” who want to “liberate marketing,” he said.

The firm has even published a limited-edition book with a list of its principles, called “naked truths.” I'd like to read that book. This firm clearly has balls.

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

A trade group representing several large Internet companies sent a letter detailing "strong opposition" to a New York state bill that would limit the companies' ability to collect information for targeted advertising.

"[The bill] is unnecessary, most likely unconstitutional, and would have profound implications for the future of Internet advertising and the availability of free content on the Internet," wrote Jim Halpert, general counsel for the industry group, in a letter to Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, the Westchester County Democrat sponsoring the bill.

Mr. Brodsky dismissed the letter. "These guys want the unadulterated right to invade the privacy of the citizens of this state and we're not going to let them do that," he said. "This is why we have governments, not just corporations."

By "these guys" Brodsky means yahoo, Google, AOL, Comcast, eBay, Electronic Data Systems, Facebook, Monster Worldwide and Reed Elsevier NV.

[via The Wall Street Journal]

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation is in talks with Microsoft about joining in its contested bid for Yahoo, a move that could result in the union of Yahoo, Microsoft’s MSN and News Corporation’s MySpace. The New York Times calls the three-headed beast "a behemoth that would upend the Internet landscape."

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Online, it's all about community. Building community, embracing community, listening to the community.

According to USA TODAY, offline marketing is more about "the neighborhood."

Many Starbucks stores now boast that they have the best espresso "in the neighborhood." Applebee's has a new slogan: "It's a whole new neighborhood." Wal-Mart's smaller-scale suburban stores call themselves Wal-Mart Neighborhood Markets. Tesco's new grocery stores are dubbed Fresh & Easy Neighborhood Markets. Even Lowe's is onboard to be a neighborhood hardware store.

There goes the neighborhood?

Not exactly. The term "neighborhood" is beloved because it gives people a sense of place.

"Times of global stress cause people to retract and to want a sense of community," says Renee Fraser, a Los Angeles ad psychologist. "Belonging to a neighborhood really motivates people."

Sadly, the strip mall where these brands post up is far away from main street U.S.A. on so many levels.

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Are you hoping to see Obama and Clinton run together to beat back the Republican machine? If so, here's what such a move might look like.

The image is actually an ad for Hogeschool-Universiteit Brussel in Belgium, which claims to be a college and university in one. Clearly, they teach Advanced Photoshop there.

[via Copyranter]

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to Ernie Schenck, Hill Holliday is settling into its new offices at 53 State St, Boston, MA 02109, USA.

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Über stay at home mommy blogger, Heather Armstong, a.k.a. "Dooce," is often profiled in MSM.

Today, it's Career Journal's turn to mine for material.

Here's what I learned this time:

• Shani Higgins, Technorati's vice president of business development, estimates Dooce.com could yield as much as $40,000 a month in ad revenue from companies coveting her traffic, like BMW and Verizon.
• Heather sometimes suffers from severe writer's block and takes a notebook with her everywhere she goes in order to log possible ideas for her site.
• Heather prints out nasty emails, puts them in her driveway and drives over them with her car. "That's the attitude I have," she says, "and it's made my life a thousand percent better."

Heather is also a really gifted photog, but that's been established.

latest image from Dooce.com's daily offering

April 10, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

John Rash, Campbell-Mithun's senior vice president and director of media negotiations, will be taking on a new role starting next week. He will be joining the Minneapolis Star-Tribune's editorial board.

According to nonprofit journalism enterprise, MinnPost, Rash teaches classes at University of Minnesota, has a radio show on WCCO-AM and writes for Ad Age and the Star-Tribune.

MinnPost's David Brauer questions the move.

How can a former media broadcast negotiator who now does corporate media analysis steer clear of conflicts? We'll have to see — if we can, given that editorials aren't signed. The Strib should publish a list of Rash's past and present clients and negotiating partners, in the interest of transparency.

[via Romensko]

April 11, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

From Wired News:

Targeted ads might be a brass ring for the online marketers, but consumers just aren't buying it. According to a recent Harris Interactive survey, 59 percent of Americans take exception to Microsoft, Google, and Yahoo tracking their online activities for marketing purposes.

The nationwide survey was conducted with the help of Dr. Alan F. Westin, Professor of Public Law and Government Emeritus at Columbia. Westin argues that the distrust stems from consumers disbelief of the value proposition offered by marketers.

Once people find out how they're being tracked, they don't like it. But usually, they're not aware of how they're being tracked. And there just isn't much of an upside for consumers to all this tracking; the benefit is to marketers.

April 11, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Digital advertising veterans P.J. Pereira and Andrew O'Dell caused a stir in the industry earlier this year when they left their senior posts at AKQA. Wednesday, they announced plans to launch a new full-service agency, Pereira & O'Dell.

The two say their new San Francisco-based agency will offer clients both digital and traditional services, but won't sell them what they don't need, implying that both traditional and digital shops do just that.

In an interesting startup twist, the company has secured $30 million in funding -- plus, the founders say, the prospect of an additional $70 million -- from Brazilian investment fund ABC International. Agencies don't normally launch with that type of capital backing.

The Wall Street Journal explores this angle:

WSJ: P.J., you have some Brazilian investment connections that you're tapping to fund the company. Tell me about them.

Mr. Pereira: My first job in advertising was at Nizan Guanaes's agency DM9. We never stopped talking. He was my first boss in advertising. He was my first partner. Now he is my partner again.

April 11, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Louis Hau, Media Reporter for Forbes, explores an undervalued resource in the newspaper business--the proper monetization of which could be a big help to a struggling industry.

Here's one of the most perplexing aspects of the newspaper business: Readers love the sports section, but advertisers couldn't care less.

As the industry struggles to staunch the bloodletting in advertising revenue, the time has come for a second look. The chronically underperforming sports section stands out as an underexploited opportunity to generate dollars.

The picture isn't pretty at the moment. A quick survey of some major U.S. dailies finds sports an advertising wasteland, save for the occasional sneaker retailer or tire store. Thursday's New York Times had no advertising at all in its sports section. Okay, there were a couple microscopic car ads on page two. But still.

I'd love to hear from any media buyers in the audience on this topic. The Forbes piece speculates about an all male audience, and laziness on the papers' part. But I'm not sure about all that. Obviously sports is monetized to no end on TV and online. Why not in the dailies?

April 11, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Community? Check. Dialogue? Check. Expert advice? Check. Personalization and customization? Check.

In a move that combines the power of two well known consumer brands, and benefits from the latest interactive thinking, dove.msn.com, debuts today.

The new digital channel is the re-launch of Dove.com, providing what Unilever describes as "a unified worldwide digital presence designed to be a trusted source for information, education and inspiration."

The channel is an alliance with OgilvyInteractive and Microsoft's MSN.

"Our goal is to be become a global leader and a true digital media force by completely redefining the digital experience for women worldwide," said Kathy O'Brien, marketing director for Dove in North America.

The site will personalize each visitor's experience based on each individual's choices and combines technical innovation with intelligent design. The site will also feature an editorial board of experts, inspirational guest editors and specially selected "ambassadors" all of whom will drive conversation central to the real beauty debate.

[see CosmeticsDesign.com or the press release for more]

April 11, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

I snapped this pic this morning at my local Starbucks. I need to go back and study it, because now I realize that the smudged chalkboard look and feel is a neat way to say "LOCAL," even though a chain with thousands of stores can hardly claim to be a local institution. At any rate, I'm wondering if this POS really is chalked. Take a look next time you're at Starbucks and I'll do the same.

April 11, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Congrats to Bryan Judkins, ACD/Copywriter of Young & Laramore.

[via 10ad]

April 12, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to The Hollywood Reporter and Ad Age, "Gossip Girl," despite lackluster ratings, is still the flagship program of The CW and a program worth pimping (and I use that word intentionally).

"We wanted to create a provocative campaign that stands out from the competition and reminds viewers of some of the 'OMG' moments that have made Gossip Girl one of the most buzzed-about new shows on television," the CW said in a statement. "This sexy, sophisticated campaign speaks directly to our adult 18-34 viewers using expressions that are part of their lexicon."

The show, which returns to the air April 21, has not had an original episode air since Jan. 9, due to the writers strike.

"Gossip Girl" brought in $28.2 million in ad dollars 2007, according to TNS Media Intelligence, attracting such marketers as Procter & Gamble, L'Oreal, Target and Johnson & Johnson.

"Gossip Girl" is also home to a wide-ranging product-placement deal with Verizon Wireless that has the wealthy Manhattan teens at the center of the program by routinely using the company's products to talk to friends, send text messages, and even locate a seedy gambling den.

72andSunny in Los Angeles is the agency behind the work.

April 12, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Zappos currently stocks more than 3 million shoes, handbags, clothing items and accessories from over 1,100 brands.

[via Armano]

April 12, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Ana Marie Cox--Washington Editor of Time.com, founding editor of Wonkette and the author of the novel Dog Days--is on the loose again.

April 13, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to Adweek, Ford management has asked its 750,000-person network of employees, retirees and dealers to talk to friends and family about the quality and features of Ford vehicles.

The new marketing initiatve created by JWT/Wunderman, known as Drive One is also supported online, in print and on TV.

"The whole idea behind this campaign is not fancy ads. It's talking to the customer, who talks to a friend," said Jim Farley group vp, marketing and communications. "It's the only chance we have to break the apathy."

When Farley was recruited from Toyota and hired by Ford last October, he was determined to "get people to care about [Ford]." He said, "They just aren't engaged."

Well, that's certainly some straight talk form the executive suite. A good start, perhaps.

I like that the people asked to spread WOM are qualified to do so. We tend to think WOM as a customer-to-customer conversation, but it's bigger than that.

I can also see where this campaign has the potential to become annoying. Imagine an already over zealous Ford dealer talking car facts over an otherwise pleasant golf outing. That would be bothersome. But handled correctly this idea could go far. That is, it can go far if the 750,000 employees, retirees and dealers honestly feel good about the recommendations they make. They have to be true believers. And true believers aren't conjured up in a brainstorm, they're born from the product itself. Are Ford cars and trucks worth believing in? If the answer is yes, then maximizing WOM is a good plan.

April 13, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

A microbrewer, like a small scale wine producer, creates passion around its product and, by extension, its brand. By forgoing the mass market, the microbrand actually can have a meaningful dialogue with its base (something big brands desperately want right now).

Here's an example of the kind of "talk" that perfectly presents a brand's value proposition.

Rogue Nation Beer Manifesto

est. May 1996

I. We hold that beer is a superior beverage.

II. We hold that beer is worthy of passion.

III. We hold that beer enlivens spirits.

IV. We hold that beer is not an abstraction but a concrete reality which occured in the past, occurs in this living present and will occur in the future.

V. Beer is made from basic ingredients of water, malt, hops and yeast.

VI. Beer occurs as a result of a naturally occuring process which can be adapted and reproduced by anyone.

VII. Beer flavors occur as a result of radical discontinuity between the old existence of its ingredients and their new existence as beer.

VIII. Beer thus obtains widely varying degrees of complexity based on its ingredients and the brewing process.

IX. Some beer is produced and exchanged as a consumer good.

X. Some beer is produced but consumed in the home.

XI. Consumer tastes are widely varied.

XII. Those that produce beer for sale too often hold their profits in greater regard than their product.

XIII. Large scale brewers have ruined beer.

Maybe this was written over some cold ones after a shift at the brewery in Newport, Oregon. I highly doubt a copywriter got anywhere near it. Maybe for that reason, it rings true and makes me want to drink Rogue. Luckily, I have a 22 oz. Hazelnut Brown Nectar and a 22 0z. Chocolate Stout cooling in the 'fridge.

April 13, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Bill Green wants to hit something.

This is why:

So another brand--Century 21 this time--is jumping on the consumer generated content promotion bandwagon. Is that really reason enough to hit something? Before you answer, consider that the contest is void in several states, one's home has to be listed with Century 21 (duh!) and one's listing agent must appear in the video. Are you ready to hit something now?

The reality is there are few leaders in business or any enterprise. Leading brands are already waist deep in social media. For all the rest, they're just now waking up to the idea of a blog, a YouTube page or heaven forbid, a Twitter account. It's going to be hard for those of us in the Communications 2.0 game to take these Johnny come lately brands and their various "ideas" seriously. Yet, it's our job to do so.

April 13, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Eighty percent of the world's population has access to a mobile communications network, but only half the people have a mobile phone. That kind of opportunity--literally billions of potential customers--has big business on the move. Everyone from product designers to marketers to academics are working to advance the cause of global connectivity.

The fact of which explains why Sara Corbett, writing for The New York Times Magazine, brings a cool eye to her piece on Jan Chipchase and his quest to help people living in poverty emerge from those conditions. His tool of change? Naturally, the cellphone.

Chipchase works for the Finnish cellphone company Nokia as a “human-behavior researcher.” He’s also sometimes referred to as a “user anthropologist.” He gathers the sort of on-the-ground intelligence that is central to human-centered design.

One morning last fall, I arranged to meet Chipchase in a neighborhood in Accra where he and a few other Nokia people were doing research. At his suggestion, I took a taxi to the general area and then called him on his cellphone. Chipchase used his phone to pilot me through the unfamiliar chaos, allowing us to have what he calls a “just in time” moment.

There are a growing number of economists who maintain that cellphones can restructure developing countries in a similar way. Cellphones, after all, have an economizing effect. My “just in time” meeting with Chipchase required little in the way of advance planning and was more efficient than the oft-imperfect practice of designating a specific time and a place to rendezvous. He didn’t have to leave his work until he knew I was in the vicinity. Knowing that he wasn’t waiting for me, I didn’t fret about the extra 15 minutes my taxi driver sat blaring his horn in Accra’s unpredictable traffic. And now, on foot, if I moved in the wrong direction, it could be quickly corrected. Using mobile phones, we were able to coordinate incrementally.

To someone who has spent years using a mobile phone, these moments are common enough to feel banal, but for people living in a shantytown like Nima — and by extension in similar places across Africa and beyond — the possibilities afforded by a proliferation of cellphones are potentially revolutionary.

Speaking to the potential for meaningful change, cellphones as transaction devices is an area that's getting tons of attention from users and carriers alike. Here's an interesting scenario that shows how a cell connects people and can facilitate a monetary transaction between them at the same time.

April 13, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Once upon a time I helped to orchestrate a deal between Calistoga Mineral Water and American Rivers, where I worked on the development team. So, I know firsthand what it means to bring corporate dollars to an environmental group. The basic premise is tread carefully, so as not to upset the dues-paying grassroots members of the group.

According to sources, Sierra Club may have glossed over that key point when it struck a deal with Clorox, maker of Green Works, a "green" product line of household cleansers. The agreement includes a Sierra Club endorsement on Green Works' packaging.

Given that Sierra Club members and other environmentalists have been battling chlorine pollution for years, this fit seems unnatural at best. Sierra Club activists in Florida have been particularly outspoken about the matter and now find their "keep it clean" hands slapped by Sierra Club mucky mucks.

The Sierra Club's national board voted March 25 to remove the leaders of the Club's 35,000-member Florida chapter, and to suspend the Chapter for four years. It was the first time in the Club's 116-year history that such action has been taken against a state Chapter.

The leadership of the Florida Chapter had been highly critical of the national board's decision in mid-December 2007 to allow The Clorox Company to use the Sierra Club's name and logo to market a new line of non-chlorinated cleaning products called "Green Works." In return, Clorox Company will pay Sierra Club an undisclosed fee, based partly on product sales. The Clorox Company logo will appear on the products as well.

A 2004 report by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group Education Fund named The Clorox Company as one of the nation's most chemically dangerous.

Florida in the house!

The Guardian has more on the story.

April 14, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

China's recent crackdown on violent clashes in Tibet and its imprisonment of human-rights activists has spurred world-wide demonstrations and has turned its elaborate plans for a globe-girdling Olympic torch relay into a show of dissent.

According to The Wall Street Journal, despite the criticism, it appears that most sponsors have made the decision to refrain from criticizing Beijing rather than risk angering the Chinese government, gateway to the voracious consumers in the world's fastest-growing economy.

"These political issues are not related with the Games," says Phyllis Cheung, China marketing director of McDonald's. "It has not interrupted us."

Wishful thinking. Everything is related. But Chinese citizens and Americans do see things differently.

A recent survey by Los Angeles-based polling firm Kelton Research showed that one in four Americans surveyed are considering not watching the Summer Olympics due to concerns over China's human-rights violations and poor environmental record. A recent Zogby poll also found 70% of likely American voters believe the IOC was wrong to award the Games to China, because of its poor human-rights record.

By contrast, 72% of Chinese people polled by Ogilvy Group and Millward Brown said they are proud of China's role as Olympics host, and media buying agency GroupM estimates that 90% of television viewers in China will be tuned to the Olympics at any given time during the Games.

[IN RELATED NEWS] The New York Times is featuring an article on how the Beijing games are spurring pro-Tibet pr.

For all its business success and military power, China is still something of a naïf when it comes to Western-style public relations. In many ways, China is facing the same challenge that companies like Philip Morris and Wal-Mart have in recent years as protesters and union activists have grown increasingly sophisticated in delivering their message.

April 14, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Advertising Age Editor Jonah Bloom recently led a roundtable discussion with some prominent marketing bloggers.

Contributors included Power 150 founder Todd Andrlik of Toddand; Paul McEnany of Hee Haw Marketing; Anna Farmery of The Engaging Brand; David Armano of Logic & Emotion; Matt Dickman of Technomarketer; Daryl Ohrt of Brand Flakes for Breakfast; Ann Handley of Mp Daily Fix; Mark Goren of Transmission Marketing; Rohit Bhargava of Influential Marketing Blog; Lewis Green of Biz Solutions Plus; Servant of Chaos' Gavin Heaton; Sean Howard of Crap Hammer and Geoff Livingston of Livingston Buzz.

Here are a few moments worth lingering on:

SEAN HOWARD: The conversation that needs to be had with big brands is this: They are looking at how media is changing, they are talking about fragmentation, about spend, about all these things. That's not the game. The game is that behaviors are changing. So the discussion we generally get into is to focus on understanding the shift in behavior. Once we start to understand the shift in behavior, then we can start talking about things like context and relevance, which is really what we're talking about.

LEWIS GREEN: The Fortune 500 is never going to lead anything. The Fortune 500 [are] going to be the last adapters. I work with what I would call midsize companies ($100 million companies). It's uphill with their marketing people, but they are willing to listen because their margins are thinner, and some are public and some aren't.

MATT DICKMAN: The other conversation inside the agencies that I'm seeing now is there's so much confusion. Really, because the PR shops, Fleishman, Ogilvy and all those guys are doing the digital stuff, but the client may have a digital agency, and then they have an ad agency that also has a digital group, and there's all this confusion on who has control of that space. And it's worse for the client, the marketer. Trying to educate them on how to deal with that situation to get the most out of their money -- it's very confusing.

April 14, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Bob Greenberg, CEO of R/GA told Adweek why his agency is opening an office in San Francisco.

"We opened in San Francisco not based on business but based on talent," he said. "Talent is the biggest issue facing agencies today. It's the biggest open creative and technology talent pool other than New York."

"It's not so much the agencies but the Yahoo!s and Googles," he said. "All the technology companies have many potential hires for us."

R/GA is looking at office space in San Francisco that could house as many as 80 employees. By the end of 2008, the shop expects to employ roughly 25-30 workers in San Francisco.

One of them will be Mauro Cavalletti, who is returning to R/GA as executive creative director after three years at Organic and most recently AKQA, where he was group creative director.

April 14, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Paul Isakson, Senior Strategic Planner at space150, wants ad peeps to start thinking like designers, not like ad peeps.

As an industry, we have to stop thinking about things like traditional advertising people. We need to start thinking about things like designers, engineers, architects and the like. We need to think about the action we want people to take and what will be required to make that action happen. We can't just think about what we want to tell people. Odds are, telling someone to do something won't be effective alone, if at all. Today's congested media landscape requires a lot more than a campaign built on 30-second TV ads with a heavy media buy to create any real change. It's in creating total experiences that we will see success.

Hmmm...sounds like a great argument for inviting experiential agencies to the decision-making table.

Here are some more thoughts from a designer working closely with The Martin Agency:

April 14, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

BlogHer released the BlogHer/Compass Partners 2008 Social Media Benchmark Study today, which reveals new insights into the power of the blogosphere and the significant role it plays in the lives of U.S. women.

Women are so passionate about blogging that large percentages of women said they would give something up to keep the blogs they read and/or write:

• 55% would give up alcohol
• 49% would give up their PDAs
• 42% would give up their i-Pod
• 43% would give up reading the newspaper
• 20% would give up chocolate (some things are sacred)

“Several recent surveys indicate that our trust in institutions is declining. We are losing trust in the government, politicians, the media and many corporations. But as it turns out, we trust each other,” said Elisa Camahort Page, BlogHer co-founder and COO.

April 15, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

It's taxes due day in America and the perfect time to look at consumer spending and the retail segment of our economy.

From today's New York Times:

The consumer spending slump and tightening credit markets are unleashing a widening wave of bankruptcies in American retailing, prompting thousands of store closings that are expected to remake suburban malls and downtown shopping districts across the country.

Since last fall, eight mostly midsize chains — as diverse as the furniture store Levitz and the electronics seller Sharper Image — have filed for bankruptcy protection as they staggered under mounting debt and declining sales.

Even retailers that can avoid bankruptcy are shutting down stores to preserve cash through what could be a long economic downturn. Over the next year, Foot Locker said it would close 140 stores, Ann Taylor will start to shutter 117, and the jeweler Zales will close 100.

Speaking to the consumer spending question in today's Washington Post, marketing consultant and friend of AdPulp, Marc Babej, said, "The common denominator in what people will look for is how to get the most bang for their buck. That means trying to get better value and more pleasure out of each dollar you spend."

Better value and more pleasure. I like that. That ought to be S.O.P., no matter what the economy is doing.

April 15, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

"This instrument can teach, it can illuminate; yes, and it can even inspire. But it can do so only to the extent that humans are determined to use it to those ends. Otherwise, it is just lights and wires in a box." -Edward R. Murrow in 1958

Members of the National Association of Broadcasters are in Las Vegas for their annual get together. Like any such meeting of minds, it's a time for some networking, learning and fun.

According to Variety, the keynote speech--delivered yesterday by actor, director and producer, Tim Robbins--checked a couple of those boxes.

In a keynote speech laced with wry irony and winking sarcasm, Tim Robbins managed to slap back at his right-wing critics, recount an entertaining history of radio and TV and urge broadcasters to "appeal to our better natures," saying news directors and producers have a responsibility to "the health of the nation."

The fun started to get uncomfortable when Robbins referred to both the Reagan and Clinton administrations having eased limitations on media ownership -- all to the "benefit" of communities, which then no longer had to listen to diverse, complex opinions "or alternative rock." NAB has supported relaxing ownership rules.

Robbins peaked with what he called a three-pronged proposal that broadcasters should adopt in order to eliminate "confusing, complex issues" such as diversity of thought and opinion.

"First, erase all diversity," he said. "You only need two opinions. Second, stay focused on sex scandals. We don't want any kind of reporting outside the soundbite. I don't know about you, but show me a drunk starlet getting out of a car with no panties on, and I think the world is a better place. Third, more distraction. The economy sucks? Chaos in Iraq? It is a moral responsibility to distract."

Variety's reporter notes that "two-thirds of the packed ballroom rose to a standing ovation" to thank Robbins for his clarity and bravery on matters important to them.

Broadcasting & Cable has more, including audio from the event.

April 15, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Paul Isakson is a planner working in Minneapolis. His tweet is in response to Joseph Jaffe's talk last night at the Fine Line.

For the record, Steve Hall sees social media and conversational marketing as "two entirely different things."

April 15, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

Spike Jones is on the box.

Ninety-two percent of word of mouth happens offline (so says Keller Fay Group). 92%! And that’s not going to change.

Working from that factual place, Spike's premise is a brand has to have an offline, real world dimension to any community building efforts it undertakes.

Why is it the more I am connected online, the more alone I feel? Because I an missing the one thing that online can help facilitate, but never replace: the magic of a face-to-face encounter. Not webcam to webcam. But looking someone in the eye, shaking their hand and experiencing the presence of other people who share the same interests. And that, my friends, is the difference between yet another online social community and a successful, sustainable movement.

Shout it from the mountaintop, brother!

To me, this fundamental truth is one more reason to blast interactive out of its silo.

Interactive--where these so-called online communities are curated--needs to be everyone's job. No, everyone needn't run out and learn PHP, ASP and Ruby on Rails. But all agency and client personnel need to fully grasp what the web can and can't do for a brand.

April 17, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Element 79 is on the ropes after seeing its biggest accounts--PepsiCo's Gatorade and Tropicana--walk out the door.

PepsiCo has been dissatisfied with Element 79's recent creative work, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company is shifting its Gatorade business to a sister Omnicom agency, TBWA/Chiat/Day, and ad responsibilities for Tropicana also are being moved within the ad-holding company, to Arnell Group.

But creative is not the sole problem for these brands. Despite being the market leader in the sports-drink category, with a roughly 80% share, Gatorade's growth has slowed, thanks in part to the growing popularity of water and fortified waters. Meanwhile, sales of Tropicana juices and juice drinks have sagged as PepsiCo raised prices to offset rising costs.

April 18, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Ad Age is running two articles about blogs stepping out of their pajamas and into neatly tailored suits.

One piece is about John Battelle's Federated Media announcing a $50 million minority investment from Oak Investment Partners. Federated Media aggregates and packages popular blog content for marketers. The company is thought to be worth as much as $200 million.

The other article looks at music blogs being sold and in other cases making deals with mainstream media companies.

Gawker Media kicked off the round of deals this week by selling off Idolator, its music blog, to Buzznet, a social-networking site that recently added the popular music site Stereogum to its network. Now two independent-music magazines, Fader and Paste, are looking to the music blogosphere to add some reach to their online-ad buys.

Paste Magazine is looking to aggregate for advertisers via its new Paste Nation network. The new partnership brings 11 music and movie blogs to the Paste online network (including PopMatters, Spout and Virb), totaling 4.3 million unique visitors and over 28 million page views per month. Not only is it a scale play for Paste, it's a targeting opportunity for non-endemic advertisers seeking to seeking to align their brands to different music- and movie-based activities.

I know MSM is busy blogging and playing the social media game now, but I like the recognition here that a new PopMatters can't be easily created. Thus, working in concert with established online destinations--and popular music blogs are all of that--is a good move for a print book like Paste.

On a related note, I write a music blog, albeit one far down the long tail.

April 18, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Random Culture is pointing to interactive agencies with reels. The following reel is from Reflex Group.

Interactive or no, I like an agency willing to share on YouTube. Who wants to ask to see a reel anymore? Googling for it is the natural state of things today.

April 19, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Jackie Huba is a word of mouth marketing specialist and one half of Church of the Customer.

Here's the Fast Company article she references.

Andrew Chen, a blogger and former advertising executive who worked with MySpace, calls a viral loop the "most advanced direct-marketing strategy being developed in the world right now."

It's an interesting piece, but it can be boiled down to this: create something good, something people really want, need, or enjoy. If you do, people will adopt it and share it—the act of which can make you filthy rich.

[UPDATE] Marc Canter has some rough commentary on Ning and Fast Company's puff piece.

I create software to better the world - to provide mechanisms to connect people together. Ning sees social networking as the latest fad - and they exploit that notion to better themselves. Now the Libertarians and Republicans out there are now saying: “what’s wrong with that? Isn’t that what it’s all about - money?” I can just visualize Jason Calacanis rubbing his grubby hands together saying “money - money - money” And since this is a free country Ning certainly has the right to do whatever they want - sort of like how the Gun lobby and Military industrial complex has the right to build arms that kill people. Only this time- the weapons are social networks.

Canter also claims that Ning "copied" his ideas.

April 19, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The newspaper business is hurting. But an answer to their pain could be right under their editors' noses.

Look at this passage from Forbes:

More than 15 years into the Web revolution, many papers remain hampered by insufficient communication between the editors and writers generating content and those on the business side charged with selling it to advertisers.

"From the genesis of an idea, both sides have to be at the table,'' says John Kelly, vice president of advertising for The Palm Beach Post in Palm Beach, Fla. "We all have to realize that we're on the same team. We haven't developed that trust."

With good reason, many editors would argue. Newsrooms have long cultivated a strict "church-state" division between themselves and their papers' advertising departments, fearing a loss of independence and integrity--and with it the trust of readers.

I admit I like the quaint nature of editorial independence, but I think its time for a new concept to take root. As a copywriter it's so easy to see that one is working to sell "the story," whatever story it may be. Journalists, of course, do not think like that. If they wanted to sell, they would have gone into real estate, stock and bonds or advertising.

April 21, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to The New York Times marketers are looking increasingly to ad networks, which sell display advertising across groups of Web sites. Some networks offer targeted advertising; others, called vertical ad networks, include sites that focus on one subject, like travel or sports.

Imran Khan, an Internet analyst at JPMorgan Chase, estimates the top 20 ad networks earned $2 billion in 2007, or 14 percent of the $21.1 billion display market.

The reasons ad networks are thriving are price and improved technology. Ad networks charge much lower cost per thousand ads served (known as CPMs), as low as $4 on an ad network with some targeting, compared with $40 and up for some ads on premium sites like MSN or Yahoo.

April 21, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 1 Comments

JWT Intelligence offers reports on a variety of topics important to marketers. Their latest trendletter, Nichification, not to be confused with Californication, is on sale now for $250.

Here's a bit on the concept:

Selling to the masses has been a cornerstone of capitalism since Sears sent out its first catalogue and Wannamaker opened his first department store. But the world today is a patchwork of societies that are far more diverse and commercially self-indulgent than they were in the heyday of the mass market. People are less interested in conformity and more interested in self-expression. Consumers have gone from wanting to blend in to wanting to stand out.

Ann Mack, director of trendspotting at JWT says, “Consumers can find what they want with the click of a mouse—and woe to the marketer that has miscategorized them.”

“Smart marketers are leveraging the phenomenon of too much choice by playing to niches,” says Mack. “In an era where most people are shorter on time and patience than on money, niche marketing can help consumers drill down faster through the layers of choice and find the product that really hits the spot.”

April 21, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

MySpace is introducing a tool that allows advertisers to directly manage their branded profiles on the nation's most popular social site.

According to Ad Age, this is a vast change from the tightly controlled, often laborious process brands previously had to endure to have a presence on the social network. It's also a reaction, MySpace said, to advertisers' desire to use the community more as a standing customer-relationship tool rather than a three-months-and-split campaign tool.

It "streamlines efficiency and creative control," said Ian Schafer, CEO of Deep Focus, which has tested the product. But more important, he said, it moves beyond what historically has been the role of a MySpace profile -- as a promotional tool -- to the idea of MySpace as an opportunity for a dialogue.

April 21, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Can you get rich working in advertising? The answer is yes, if you start a company and someday sell it for millions. Of course, there is another answer—ascend to the top of a big time holding company and make millions each and every year.

According to Media Daily News, Michael J. Roth, Interpublic's chairman of the board and CEO, received $1.1 million in base salary for 2007, only about a 3% raise from 2006. The company reported his total compensation--including stock awards, options and incentives--at $8.9 million, about a 16% increase over 2006. But an Associated Press calculation from the filing determined that Roth actually took in $11.1 million during the year--a 28% increase from 2006.

John J. Dooner Jr.--chairman and CEO of McCann WorldGroup, which includes Universal McCann--had a higher base salary than Roth at $1.3 million, also about a 3% raise from 2006. His total compensation, according to the filing, was $5.9 million--about 9% over 2006.

April 21, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

Captured today on Victory Drive in Savannah, GA

Do me a favor, when you see this kind of craziness, snap a pic and send it in. The insanity must be documented!

April 21, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

[via Nylon TV]

April 21, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

| View | Upload your own

[via Social Hallucinations]

April 22, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

I love the copy in this new spot from DIRECTV.

Here's the cable exec's babble:

Problem: People everywhere are hooking up their new flatscreens to DIRECTV and they are blown away by the picture and all the amazing HD channels.

Solution: We go viral. We get on the net and we blog it out. Ta da! We are up 800% among suburban tweens. Who just saved Q3?

This campaign is directed by satirist Christopher Guest.

Speaking at Berklee College of Music in January, Guest said, "I direct TV commercials so I can afford to make my movies. These are the movies I want to make," said Guest. "They're my cut, not the studio's cut."

April 22, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to The New York Times, gasoline prices surpassed $3.50 a gallon nationwide for the first time and oil jumped to a record high on Monday.

Given the intense price pressure on consumers, it's interesting to note this article in Ad Age about consumers buying gas on brand preference, not price.

Karen Wildman, brand and communications manager of the Shell brand at Shell Oil Co., said the industry hasn't done a good job in the past five to 10 years of educating Americans about their fuel products.

She said the $35 million she spent last year for the gas brand's "Passionate Experts" campaign was a good investment and is spending the same amount this year to continue the effort.

Ms. Wildman said Shell's quarterly research shows that consumers' perception of the brand's gasoline has improved dramatically since the campaign began running, though she declined to provide specifics. She credits improvement partly to the simple message that Shell gasoline can "stop gunky buildup" in engines.

Personally, I don't purchase gas from Exxon/Mobil, nor Shell.

April 22, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

The Barbarian Group launched a new self-promo site. It's good.

Rick Webb, Co-Founder and COO, explains:

Taking six months to make a website is pretty ridiculous, but we were doing several things during that time. building a whole publishing platform. This site has a full, rails-based custom, multi-level blogging platform. Each employee has a blog, and then posts are bubbled-up to the Barbarian Blog, and the most important information is elevated to the Barbarian Homepage. We’ve also introduced a whole topical-taxonomy thing, aggregating content around various topics to give many different windows into our content. Finally, the site is fully integrated into our sales, production and staging systems. Finally, finally, after six years, no more entering the same data into multiple databases. We are now running on a fully-integrated, custom-built project management platform.

Webb also says he almost cried when he saw Modernita's new minimalist "site," but that approach would not have worked for Barbarian. "We’re more than an idea shop, more than a branding shop, we actually have to execute some pretty serious stuff, so our website needs to be representative of that."

[via Ken Wheaton]

April 22, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Hugh Macleod is writing a book about creativity in Alpine, Texas.

Facebook is a pain in the ass (or whichever body part it comes into contact with).

April 22, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 4 Comments

Adrian Ho of Zeus Jones is a planner, a.k.a. one who thinks deep thoughts, and increasingly shares them via the interwebs.

As postmodernism tore apart the traditional hierarchies and relationships I had been brought up with, I felt a strong need to create new ones. To tie things back together into a new story, to help make sense of the world again.

I think this sense of feeling adrift was quite widespread. One of the books that I felt captured this phenomenon very accurately was The Protean Self. I haven't read it for a long time, but the main thesis was that one reason for the resiliency of humans is our ability to become very fluid and adapt to "dislocations" by re-creating ourselves rather than by trying to recreate our world.

Rather than attempting to weave together a new story or structure to explain the world, I think we have all become more adaptable, more fluid and less concerned with structure and hierarchy. This is one of the defining characteristics of Generation Y and it has led to the mashup culture that we all experience today.

Marketing has created more meaningless structures than most disciplines in its attempt to disguise what is essentially a creative discipline as a "scientific" one. To me progress starts by tearing these apart and allowing the relationships between the various concepts we use to be more fluid and more dynamic.

I'm trying to think what this means in a practical sense. Does it mean copywriters are now free to write plans and planners are free to write copy? I suppose. There must be thousands of applications for this new and improved fluidity.

April 22, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

“My words are my pearls!” -Steffan Postaer

It's refreshing to see a well known Executive Creative Director speak freely about the creative process and how fraught with humanity it is.

Coming up in the creative ranks at Leo Burnett my partner(s) and I had to compete with any number of teams looking for the same outcome: the agency’s recommendation. And then it was the client’s turn to debate and decide. This process was and is a brutal tournament. The odds are almost always against you. Even the best of us lose more than we win.

It’s a humbling journey necessarily fraught with politics.

Maybe the creative director has somehow seen his work rise to the top…again…at the expense of your work…again. It’s called cherry picking.

Maybe the client is predisposed to buying junk work and the agency, craving revenue, is obliged to give it to them. The cheesy “B” team is more than happy to provide. The copywriter has his eye on a new bass boat. The art director wants her kids in the British school. They know pleasing the client equals pleasing bonuses. Your brilliant work is left to rot behind the dead plant in your office.

My favorite culprit: the brilliant presenter who gets the nod even though her work is undeserving. Your campaign is superior but Kimmy is a better dancer. I’ve been on both sides of this one.

I'm not sure why creating ads is "necessarily fraught with politics."

One thing I say on the job a lot is "Let's not make this difficult."

At its purest, making ads is hard but it never needs to be difficult. That is, it's hard to find the perfect expression of a brand's best attributes. But it's difficult to put up with all the internal and client-side bullshit. The more you can quiet the noise, the better you can concentrate and consistently deliver your best work. As a creative director, I feel like it's my job to quiet the bullshit (to the best of my ability) for the benefit of my team.

April 22, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 3 Comments

Have y'all seen this?

These spots are running a lot right now.

If you had $300 million to do an ad campaign for environmental awareness, would you put these two in a commercial? Or Newt Gingrich and Nancy Pelosi?

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Olay for You, an online product- recommendation program that's attracted more than a million visitors since January, is getting some play in Ad Age. I'll give it some more here because I like to see online initiatives with offline legs.

Wal-Mart Stores has begun testing an in-store version of Olay for You via kiosks in stores, marking the latest of several efforts in which offline retailers are looking to tap the convenience and functionality of online tools, such as search and recommendation engines, to improve the often-annoying offline shopping experience.

Because of expectations created by web shopping, consumers increasingly expect offline stores to have the goods they want and make them easy to find, Carter Cast, a former CEO of Walmart.com said. "So the ante is raised in the physical world."

While P&G has tried in-store kiosks before with Clairol and Millstone coffee, Olay For You's combination of a highly graphic, iterative interview process and a soothing female voice may come closest to actually simulating a customer-service rep.

While I like to see online initiatives with offline legs, I don't know about these kiosks at retail. They don't seem to offer the kind of brand experience that truly comes to life in this space (inhabited by real humans). If I haul my ass all the way to the store, I don't want to get on a computer, I want a real, knowledgeable person to work with me and guide me to a purchase.

If the ante is raised in the physical world, as Cast suggests, then raise the customer service bar at retail and find other ways to allow customers to experience the brand. For Oil of Olay that might mean in-store celebrity appearances, in-store seminars or a promotion that ties to the online presence in some way.

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Robert Birge, CMO of IMG, talks to Adweek.

[via Adverganza]

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Well run oil, financial services, technology, retail, health care, communications and consumer packaged goods companies are making money.

Here's Fortune's list of most profitable companies:

• Exxon/Mobil
• GE
• Chevron
• J.P. Morgan Chase
• Bank of America
• Microsoft
• Berkshire Hathaway
• Wal-Mart
• AT&T
• ConocoPhillips
• Goldman Sachs
• Johnson & Johnson
• IBM
• Procter & Gamble
• Altria Group
• Pfizer
• Wells Fargo
• Cisco Sytems
• Hewlett-Packard
• Intel

If you work on any of these accounts (or another, just like them), I hope you too are making a healthy profit.

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Undercurrent is a social interactive think tank. They help brands and agencies understand and engage with a new generation of consumers that were born digital.

It's also where Julia Roy works.

Did I mention it's where Julia Roy works?

Steve Hall did.

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Would you trust this "joker" with your brand?

According to Creativity, many big time brands do just that.

By the way, Andrew Bancroft, a copywriter at Goodby Silverstein & Partners, is a former member of of the San Francisco-based sketch comedy group, Killing My Lobster.

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Creativity recently hosted a roundtable with a bunch of creative luminaries from the ad biz.

Jan Jacobs, co-founder, Johannes Leonardo, had this to say:

Leo and I started the company because we feel it's the most exciting time in advertising. The doyennes of advertising, the Bernbachs, the Cronins, were valued for bringing true business value to their clients. I think through the years, testing methodologies, research and all these formulaic structures have eroded our influence and have taken people away from this business that really should be in it. And I think all the current uncertainty has brought that value and respect and responsibility back to us. As a young company entering this marketplace, our role is to be brave and responsible, take clients into this world without fear. Because that's what they pay us for. Everyone is out of their comfort zones, we are and the clients are. It doesn't matter what discipline you are in, it's a wonderful place to be.

FYI: "Doyen" is a person considered to be knowledgeable or uniquely skilled as a result of long experience in some field of endeavor.

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Wired Editor Chris Anderson spoke to Jon Friedman from MarketWatch. His words have meaning for anyone directly involved with managing a brand today.

"The mission of this magazine is the same as it was in 1993 when it was founded," he told me. "We're NOT about technology -- we're about how technology is changing the world."

He explained that Wired has two objectives for all of its stories: "Amaze us, and tell us something we've never seen before, in a way we've never seen before."

Anderson bluntly shot down Wired's reputation as the smartest magazine on the coffee table. "Being smart? That's not in our mission," he said. "Blowing minds is."

In other words, stop selling me and start amazing me.

April 23, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 4 Comments

And see if you can spot what's peculiar about this logo for the UK Office of Government And Commerce.

April 23, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

It's important to do cause-related marketing right. The best way to do it is to find a natural tie to the brand. Häagen-Dazs, with the help of Goodby Silverstein & Partners, has achieved this with their new Help The Honey Bees campaign.

For an overview of the environmental problem, see this 2007 New York Times article.

April 24, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Los Angeles Times is on top of breaking news in QSR land.

The owner of Arby's said today it is buying Wendy's International Inc. in an all-stock deal worth $2.34 billion that comes after the burger chain's board rejected at least two earlier offers by the company.

Triarc Companies Inc., which is owned by billionaire investor Nelson Peltz, will pay about $26.78 per share for the company, which has about 87 million shares outstanding. The price is a premium of 6% from the company's closing price of $25.32 Wednesday.

Pam Thomas Farber, 53, daughter of Wendy's founder Dave Thomas, said the family was devastated by the news.

Farber said the family had a supported an alternate bid led by Wendy's franchisee David Karam, president of Cedar Enterprises Inc.

April 24, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

According to Greenpeace, Unilever is speeding up climate change by buying palm oil from companies busy destroying Indonesia's rainforests to make way for palm oil plantations.

Unilever uses palm oil to make Dove soap and other products.

April 24, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Journalists Marc Glaser and William Bastone discuss Barstone's site, The Smoking Gun and topics related, on NPR's MediaShift site.

The Smoking Gun started 11 years ago as a side project for Village Voice organized-crime reporter William Bastone. It has since been sold to Time Warner, but its core mission and staff size hasn’t changed; it’s still three folks running the show, hunting down incriminating documents and digging up dirt.

One of the reasons I'm pointing to this interview is Bastone's call for original reporting.

There are a lot of people commenting on stuff and riffing on things and blogging, but actually reporters breaking stories on the Net — there are a lot fewer than I would expect.

I get a kick out of the Gawkers and Defamers of the world, but how much of that is a news story, they broke a news story. It really isn’t. It’s a high profile site, but can you identify a story that they broke? If you had asked me 10 years ago, I would have thought there would be a huge scrum for [breaking news online], and it may get to that point, but I don’t really see it.

This is something I think about regularly. I'd love to move to an original reporting format on AdPulp. The thing that prevents it (for now), is the fact that I already have an all consuming day job.

April 24, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to ReadWriteWeb, MySpace officially opened its Application Gallery to all users this morning after launching it in public beta last March. Since March, over 1,000 applications have been approved and added to the gallery and there have been over 2.1 million application installs across the site.

April 24, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 12 Comments

April 24, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

We get press releases everyday telling me about people I don't know moving into jobs you could care less about. Such is the nature of running a site like this.

Here's a decided twist on things from Etsy:

[via Scott Goodson]

April 28, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 12 Comments

Ad Age looks into the glaring Fort Lauderdale sun and sees Zimmerman Advertising, a bright spot in South Florida's agency lineup.

Zimmerman Advertising launched in 1984 in a 400-square-foot space in a strip mall with used office furniture. Its expertise was pretty much limited to car-dealer ads. Mr. Zimmerman slowly grew his business, taking on bigger clients and acquiring area firms. Two decades later, Zimmerman is a beast of an agency under the Omnicom Group umbrella, with 22 offices; more than 1,000 employees; a burgeoning roster that includes Nissan, Six Flags, Crocs and Friendly's; and projected billings of $2.5 billion in 2008.

AdAge ties this company's success to its flamboyant founder, Jordan Zimmerman.

Jordan Zimmerman, 52 years old, tan and barrel-chested, is about to bench press 225 pounds. This is the self-imposed, militarylike ethic with which he starts each day just before 4, when his alarm clock goes off and he hurries to one of two gyms in Boca Raton. The onetime competitive bodybuilder, who was "Mr. Florida," eats the same breakfast every day: oatmeal with fruit, scrambled egg whites and a juice made of leafy green kale and seaweed.

When he pulls into the offices of the ad agency he founded at around 7:30, he is usually the first to arrive.

"If I told someone 20 years ago that I was going to build a company like this in South Florida, they would have said I was crazy," Mr. Zimmerman told a bleary-eyed reporter while grunting his way through a rigorous workout. "But you have to be a bit off in order to succeed in this business."

And succeed he has...

This cowboy-boot-wearing registered Republican is known to friends as "JZ," and while you wouldn't confuse him with the rapper, he is every inch the mogul -- he owns a stake in the NHL's Florida Panthers -- and he knows a bit about the good life. He collects Bentleys and Ferraris and flies only by private jet. He summers in the Hamptons and rubs elbows with the likes of Don King. He has even hosted President Bush at his waterfront home in a Boca Raton gated community. And he has a personal chef named Dudley, who wears a uniform with the letter Z emblazoned on it.

One of the keys to Zimmerman's success--other than the drive of its founder--is the agency's reliance on metrics. "JZ" dreamed up something called "Brandtailing" while in business school. His method purports to build brands for the long haul while driving purchase today.

[UPDATE] Adweek's 25th annual Agency Report Cards segment gives Zimmerman a "B-". Which might not be great, but it's better than Wieden's "C+".

April 28, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Eric Karjaluoto of Ideas on Ideas interviewed Kevin "Lovemarks" Roberts, a.k.a. Saatchi Kevin, Worldwide CEO of Saatchi.

I like his answer to the following question, even though I don't believe Roberts is a soothsayer.

Eric: With the rapid changes occurring in today’s media space, do you believe there will be room for traditional agencies in ten years time?

Kevin: No. “Traditional” anything will be under threat. Progressive ideas-driven, consumer-focused digital communication agencies will thrive.

April 28, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Steve Rubel says what some have been saying for awhile now--there's a growing need for storytellers. He actually says, "digital storytellers," but I don't see the need to make that distinction. The story will be told digitally. We know that.

Harvard Business Review last month noted that most executives cannot articulate the objective, scope, and advantage of their business in a simple statement. "If they can’t, neither can anyone else," HBR posits. That's not good.

Remember, much of the developed world is coping with The Attention Crash. If a company can't tell pithy, authentic stories in the right places at the right time to the right people, someone else will. For more on this, I highly recommend the book Made to Stick.

As Jason Calacanis notes, there is a big market for people who know how to create or cultivate compelling content that pulls in people. To that end my employer is starting up Edelman Studios - a virtual content house that will identify online talent and pair them with brands. Many in the Hollywood community, ex-journalists and advertising/PR creatives will orient their careers in such a direction. Don't be left behind. There's plenty of need here.

I reoriented my career in this direction after reading the groundbreaking book, Digital Aboriginal in 2003. Of course, copywriters are already there from a skill set perspective. It's just about understanding clever ads aren't going to move many consumers, but well told stories will. The digital environment is a good place for these stories, but by no means is it the only place for them to live.

April 28, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

John Dodds speaking about Twitter Spam, alternatively known as Twam or Spitter, says companies need to be receptive to direct messaging on Twitter, but not use the service to blast their pitches shotgun style.

When we market our company's products/services, we have to remember that part of the job is to to be the individual's advocate. It's all too easy to serve the company's needs and forget about the customer.

Naturally, this pearl of wisdom is much bigger than the media in question. If we don't care about the customer we're trying to reach and have "a relationship" with, then there's no hope for our clients' messages.

April 28, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

According to Ad Age, Word-of-mouth marketing in the U.K. will face radical restrictions starting May 26, when it will become a criminal offense for brands to seed positive messages online without making the origin of the message clear.

The rules make it an offense to blog, use brand ambassadors or seed viral ads while "falsely representing oneself as a consumer." They also apply to bloggers who fail to disclose they have accepted money to write about a product.

April 28, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

When I filled up my Pathfinder yesterday, I realized that $3.54/gallon means a $70 tank--double what it cost me a short time ago. Naturally, this type of inflation has dire consequences for the economy.

For the first time since 1980, consumers are driving less. Last year, the amount of miles driven declined 0.4%. The previous two years had been flat. Prior to that, the amount of miles had grown 3-5% each year.

Brandweek explores some of the behavioral changes taking place as Americans keep it in "park."

91% of consumers claim they have changed their shopping behavior due to various rising prices in the U.S. economy.

One of the categories getting hit the hardest is restaurants. Last year, customer traffic was up only 0.7%. More than half of financially challenged consumers surveyed said they are stocking up, preparing more meals at home and using leftovers.

The article also says Coca-Cola and PepsiCo will feel the pinch as transportation and raw materials costs rise. "It's squeezing everybody's margins," said Gary Hemphill, managing director at Beverage Marketing, New York. "Beverages are price sensitive, there is only so much you can pass onto the consumer."

Brandweek believes strong branding is more important than ever, as it's that much harder to motivate purchase. I believe they are correct, but if gas prices continue to rise at this rate, it's not going to matter much. People simply won't have the disposable income it takes to make non-essential purchases.

[UPDATE] Now that I've had the chance to read the front page of Sunday's New York Times, I see this topic is on the media's mind. The Times says middle- and working-class consumers are starting to switch from name brands to cheaper alternatives.

In Ohio, Holly Levitsky is replacing the Lucky Charms cereal in her kitchen with Millville Marshmallows and Stars, a less expensive store brand. In New Hampshire, George Goulet is no longer booking hotel rooms at the Hilton, favoring the lower-cost Hampton Inn. And in Michigan, Jennifer Olden is buying Gain laundry detergent instead of the full-price Tide.

April 29, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 8 Comments

I'm happy to see my friends at Brains On Fire get some positive press for their Fiskars work.

Josh Bernoff, VP-principal analyst at Forrester Research and co-author of Groundswell, writing in Ad Age outlines the idea.

Although Fiskars products are central to the scrapbooking experience, in 2006 the company found its own image was lackluster. In focus groups, respondents told the company that if Fiskars was a color, it would be beige; if it were a food, it would be saltines.

How could the company align itself with the enthusiasm of its own customers? An ad campaign would cost too much and wouldn't make long-lasting difference. So Suzanne Fanning, Fiskars' head of corporate communications, teamed with a brand consultancy called Brains on Fire to create the Fiskateers.

Fiskateers is an exclusive community of crafters. You have to be invited to get in. Once there, you can connect with one of the lead Fiskateers, four crafting enthusiasts identified by Fiskars in a national search. When you join up, you get a box that includes crafting supplies plus unique two-tone scissors available only to members. But, most important, you get to connect and draw ideas and support from fellow crafters.

Fiskateers is a social application, but it's not a campaign -- it's an ongoing effort. In just over a year, Fiskars has grown the community to include more than 4,000 members, 20 times its original goal.

I was thinking of asking Spike Jones to answer some questions about this campaign, but then I thought, "You ask him!" He's going to see this post and I'm sure he will be happy to engage via comments. I'll get us rolling.

Q. Spike, does Brains On Fire have a scrapbook? Is that what a blog is to some degree?

April 29, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Luis Sinco/LA Times

The above image, taken on November 9, 2004 has since appeared in more than 150 publications worldwide. It's also earned the subject, Blake Miller, the moniker "Marlboro Man."

According to Rolling Stone:

Overnight, the photo made Miller an unwitting icon, a symbol of the indomitable spirit of U.S. troops, the heroism and virility of the American fighter. The New York Post ran the shot — later nominated for a Pulitzer Prize — under a simple headline: SMOKIN'.

It's a sad story from there and has little to do with marketing, but my thought is this. How lucky did Philip Morris get with this free "ad"? What if Miller was a roll your own kind of guy?

April 29, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Facebook this, Facebook that. Blah, blah, blah...It's a story one can't escape from. And it's one that often overlooks a glaring fact—Facebook is nowhere near as popular, nor as profitable as MySpace.

According to Fortune, "Rupe" bought MySpace in 2005 when it had $23 million in revenues; he recently told analysts that in the fiscal year beginning in July, it will take in $800 million, with a profit margin greater than 20%.

Facebook, on the other hand, had estimated revenues of $150 million, primarily from advertising, in 2007, but it is reportedly burning through more cash than it is generating.

Okay, so MySpace rakes in the page views and ad revenue. Why? What's so special about the anti-darling? For one, MySpace is less about technology and more about pop culture. It's clearly the more effective site for the entertainment industry and the millions of people who like to discover new music.

Design snobs complain about the visual noise on MySpace, and how Facebook's clean white lines are easier on the eye, but Steve Pearman of MySpace says, "We're focused on helping people express themselves and do the connection and discovery game. If you want pink blinking text on a black background, who am I to say it's wrong?"

April 30, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

I have not purchased gas from Exxon since the Valdez oil spill. Yes, I'm a grudge holder.

According to the The Wall Street Journal, forces inside the oil giant are working to move the tanker in the right direction (not than anything Exxon does will ever win me back).

A majority of 300 adult members of the wealthy Rockefeller family, influential shareholders of Exxon, voted to support four shareholder resolutions at the company's annual meeting in late May. The proposals include urging the company to create an independent chairman post, cut greenhouse-gas emissions and examine whether Exxon should take a more active role in developing sustainable energy technologies.

While most of these issues have been raised before by shareholder activists, the addition of voices from the Rockefeller family, who are well known for supporting environmental causes, adds considerable weight to the calls for change. Several members of the family will be holding a news conference Wednesday to discuss their concerns about Exxon's direction.

April 30, 2008 by Dan Goldgeier | Permalink | 0 Comments

Here's a little contrarian piece on Portfolio.com (the web site of Conde Nast's Portfolio magazine):

Sure, the U.S. could be in a recession. Consumer confidence is declining. Food and gas are so expensive it’s more cost-effective to stay home and diet.

But the advertising business (of all things!) is actually benefiting from the painful spectacle of the traditional media landscape fragmenting into shards. The internet is continuing to oust broadcast TV, print, and radio from their once-secure position as the automatic repository for ad dollars, and the complex environment that’s been rattling the advertising and media industries could actually function as an economic buoy during these hard times.

Here’s how it works. Advertisers and the companies that service them now need a multitude of ways to drill their messages into the public consciousness. That desperation plays right into the hands of the giant holding companies that now own everything from traditional ad agencies to media planning and buying businesses to PR firms to promotions specialists to digital advertising agencies with expertise in hot, new areas like search-engine optimization.

So what's going on at your agency? Are clients cutting spending? Are they just moving it around? Do you feel the effects of the recession where you work?

April 30, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

Stuart Elliott is in Dana Point for the 4As Conference.

He heard some top people at TBWA distance themselves from all the wallowing about change.

“Stop whining,” Lee Clow told the estimated 380 attendees. The new realities “shouldn’t be scary,” he said, because they offer “a huge opportunity for us” to become far more useful to marketer clients as they seek more effective ways to sell products.

“If you want to participate, you’ve got to start hiring young people,” Mr. Clow said, “and don’t tell them what to do — ask them what to do.”

“We should just stop talking about what was,” Tom Carroll, president and chief executive at TBWA Worldwide, said.

“It’s like driving in the fog,” said Mr. Carroll, who is also the chairman of the association, known as the Four A’s. “You’re not sure what’s ahead of you, but you have to keep driving.”

“All industries recalibrate themselves,” Mr. Carroll said, illustrating his point with a rhetorical question, “How’d you like to be in the CD business?”

Speaking of the CD biz, did you hear Coldplay is pulling a Radiohead?

April 30, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 0 Comments

Nick Denton, Publisher of Gawker Media is worth a lot of money. He didn't get that way from making dumb moves. Even so, he raised a few eyebrows with his recent announcement that he would part with Wonkette, GridSkipper and Idolatar.

Here's his reasoning:

Everybody says that the internet is special; that advertising is still moving away from print and TV; and Gawker sites are still growing in traffic by about 90% a year, way faster than the web as a whole. But it would be naive to think that we can merely power through an advertising recession. We need to concentrate our energies, and the time of Chris Batty's sales group, on the sites with the greatest potential for audience and advertising.

The dozen sites that remain represent some 97% or our 228m pageviews per month, and an even higher proportion of our growth and advertising revenue.

Idolatar was purchased by Buzznet, a music-focused web and social network.

Gridskipper is being taken over by Curbed, the network founded by Lockhart Steele, in which Gawker Media is a shareholder.

Wonkette is being spun off to its managing editor, Ken Layne.

April 30, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 3 Comments

IHAVEANIDEA went all out to promote its Portfolio Night 6. They convinced DDB/Toronto to make this video, which required Bob Scarpelli to remain incredibly still throughout the production--a trying matter for any Worldwide Chief Creative Officer.

April 30, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 9 Comments

Regarding Hugh MacLeod's latest doodle, Rob at Six Sentences only takes three words to say, "Delicious. Awful. Accurate." What say you?

April 30, 2008 by david burn | Permalink | 2 Comments

The ever-generous Tom Asacker sent me a serious looking hard bound book, The Ad Men and Women: A Biographical Dictionary of Advertising, edited by Edd Applegate.

I finally cracked the tome and read the chapter on Howard Luck Gossage, written by academic Kim B. Rotzoll.

Here is a passage I particularly like (from page 160):

They (advertising practitioners) regard the audience incorrectly—as individuals gathered by the media to read or watch something else, the non-advertising content. Thus, advertisers never think of the assembled as their audience and, hence, feel no particular obligation to them—as, for example, does the actor. Given this erroneous premise, Gossage asserted, all sorts of sins are permissible—mind-dulling repetition, vapid messages, every conceivable abuse of taste."

I'm thinking Gossage would have liked the internet—it's a place where advertisers can run their own content.