I often wonder, if David Ogilvy were alive today, would he e-mail a PDF of an ad to a client for approval? As Ogilvy the agency loses its prestige, Ogilvy the man gets a new biography, called The King of Madison Avenue by Kenneth Roman. Honestly, I haven't read the book, and don't plan to unless I get a complimentary copy to review, as sometimes happens here on AdPulp. But here's a take on it from The Wall Street …
Wexley School for Girls, for Instance
This is a stellar illustration by Robin Eley running in Ad Age (it's also the only way to get Lee Clow in a suit). I wish I could say the same for the text that accompanies this work of art. The text is all about which agencies made the magazine's "A-list" for 2008. I know it's a trade magazine's job to serve their particular industry with self-congratulatory pieces, but this is such a narrow little view of the …
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Agencies In Strange Places: 17th in a Series
Fort Wayne, Indiana. Land of RV (recreational vehicles) manufacturing and basketball rivalries. Oh, there's also an ad agency in Fort Wayne. One with a blog, a Twitter account and a Web site where one can marker on the leaders faces. Pretty sweet. …
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The Boutique Is In Again
"Let's ditch these suits and kick it with those former Goodby guys in the old firehouse." Those may or may not have been the thoughts in the minds of Intel's CMO and CEO when they chose to work with Venables Bell & Partners in San Francisco on the technology company's core branding assignments. Here's a little of what's in Venables' head: The recession may accelerate the trend of large marketers looking for "more …
Question Reality
Jason Baer, writing on Marketing Profs Daily Fix, argues that there's a power struggle over social media and who will "control it"--the ad guys, PR, digital or the client. Baer believes there's "much at stake" and that ad agencies won't miss this ship, like they did with digital. I couldn't disagree more. For one, most "ad agencies" will miss the ship, since they don't see social media and content development as …
Shift Happens
Musicians Imogene Heap and Little Boots are active in social media. Their proficiency inspired Ian Tait to write about them, which in turn led Ed Cotton to ponder why brands and the agencies that assist them can't come up with something authentic to say. Somehow we've gotten into our heads that business should only talk when it has something to sell and beyond that there's nothing really that they can or want to talk …
Everyone Together Now: PULL!
I’ve spent most of my ad career serving large companies with equally large marketing budgets. These companies invest many millions of dollars pursuing all sorts of push marketing efforts. But that's not my concern at the moment. Recently, I've been realizing how much small businesses mean to me. My friends work in, and own, small businesses. And when these friends ask me about their web site or advertising, I …
Lines Are For Blurring
Brian Morrissey of Adweek looks closely at Panasonic's efforts to create buzz during the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas this week. Panasonic wanted to build cachet among Internet influencers for its array of tech products. As part of its "Living in High Definition" push, Panasonic new media consultancy Crayon recruited five bloggers to travel to CES on Panasonic's dime. Panasonic footed the bill for their …