I've always argued that the great majority of agency personnel who add value to America's biggest brands are grossly underpaid. The thought is that the copywriter, art director or account person who consistently delivers million dollar ideas to the brand(s) in their care, rarely sees that fact alter their own compensation in proportional ways. Of course, none of that applies to this bunch. They're getting paid. [via …
Serving Customers In An Interconnected World
Brian Morrissey of Adweek is writing about Web 2.0 companies that are built on customer-centric models. He names Zappos, Etsy, Threadless, Craigslist and Yelp as leading examples and gives his piece depth by describing the lengths Zappos goes to engage with customers. But there's something else in the article that I'm attracted to. Google's home page may have nothing but a search box and links to Google's services -- …
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Ideas Are Infinite
Sally Hogshead writing in Ad Age says "there's no such thing as the idea." If you can break out of the mind-set that you have to create that one almighty concept, you can stay more open to client feedback, integrate other media platforms and forage outside of your comfort zone for creative thinking. This is good advice. Too many times I've watched in horror while creative staff impaled themselves on a sword for …
Content-Creator Buys Sunday Night Block
Media Rights Capitol, a content company backed by WPP, Goldman Sachs and AT&T has purchased the Sunday night slot from ailing CW network, which is jointly owned by CBS Corp. and Time Warner. The Wall Street Journal says, it's "unusual" to sell a stake in a block of prime-time programming to an outside entity. Prime-time viewership on major English-language broadcast networks is down 9.6%, to an average of 8.3 million …
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Idealism Is Not A Bad Word
I like the idea of a Humanitarian Lion, and I know many ad people want to do meaningful work, if only to wipe away the stench. What say you, would you, or the agency you work for, take part in something like this? Would your clients? …
Better Mobile Data Needed To Secure More Mobile Ad Dollars
Marketing via cellphones is forecast to be one of the next hot trends, but many advertisers are still hesitant to empty their pockets on mobile-ad campaigns. One reason: There isn't yet a reliable source of data that show what Web sites and features consumers are accessing on their mobile devices. Measurement firms such as Nielsen and M:Metrics, which have relied mainly on monthly consumer surveys to gather such …
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Kardashian’s Turn To Help The Burmese
Myanmar, the nation formerly known as Burma, is in the news this week, as its military regime has seized United Nations food shipments in the wake of the devastating typhoon that has killed thousands of the nation's citizens. Fanista--a community for entertainment enthusiasts--is running a 30-day campaign, Burma: It Cant Wait, with the hope of "raising a million voices of support" for Burma. Their campaign is one …
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MyData Goes AllSpace
MySpace said Thursday it will enable users to quickly share profile data with Web sites operated by Yahoo Inc., eBay Inc. and others. "There's this concept that social networks are walled gardens," said Amit Kapur, MySpace's chief operating officer. "We're taking those walls down." MySpace will roll out the new feature in the next several weeks. Among other things, MySpace users could have their default photo and …