Another Favorite

In light of the lack of feedback for when Ads Go Bad part 1, I'll be postponing When Ads Go Bad Part 2. Instead, I'd like to share another of my favorite campaigns. I realize that it is a little old, but Coca-Cola's Vitamin Water ads have been awesome. My personal favorite is the 50 Cent ad, but I also loved the Shaq ad, and the Urlacher ad.

Companies Looking to be Infectious...

Companies have seen the success of OfficeMax in their use of viral marketing with "Elf Yourself" or CareerBuilder with their "Monk-E-Mail". In viral marketing you rely on your targets to view and pass on your content to their friends, who pass it on, until you have reached a large amount of consumers with your often interative content. Time Warner is atempting to get in the viral marketing game with their site "Fame Star". This site allows users to create themselves, and then chronicle their rise and subsequent fall from fame- True Hollywood Story style. The idea is to make Time Warner synonymous with entertainment and consumer empowerment, according to a recent AdWeek article.

Funniest Commercials

Although I can't say that I agree with all of them on the list. TBS has put together a list of what they believe are the funniest commercials of the year. If you're bored or just in need of a laugh, several of these are quite funny.

7-Election

7-Eleven is taking advantage of the election season by having their own election. They are selling their coffee in two cups, and letting their consumers choose which they will have. This 7-Election has been accurate in the last two presidential elections, with the George W. Bush coffee cup outselling the Al Gore cup by only one percentage point. As of right now Obama has a commanding lead in the 7-Election poll as McCain is only leading in New Hampshire and North Carolina. Still, as a marketing tactic, this is interesting to say the least. I'm not sure politics is necessarily a safe topic to be mixed with business, but if it generates some hype and possibly drives some sales, then it has probably served its purpose.

The Limited Limitations of PR

Public Relations, although a very different discipline from Advertising, is another topic that is very near to my heart. Although my last PR Professor tried her best to ruin PR for me for life, I have battled my disillusionment, and am now even more appreciative of what good PR can do for an organization. In today's economy, I am even more convinced that good PR can do a lot to diminish the impact of the many crises that companies are facing. PR has a seemingly endless list of the benefits that it can bring. Still, even the best PR can't help some of the more boneheaded of companies.



Days after asking for $85 billion from the government, AIG planned to host an executive retreat in Monarch Beach, CA. Are you kidding me? SNL's response to this gaffe was paricularly hilarius. Still, an important aspect of PR is crisis management. AIG, Wachovia, and other companies in such dire straits need their management team to realize that in order for their PR people to have something to work with, they need to buckle down make some changes to start performing financially. PR Week discusses the damage that has been done to these companies, and the actions that must be taken from a PR perspective to help rebuild their companies image.

'Tis the Season...

'Twas election season and all through the nation
Not a person was in agreement in any vocation.
The stocks were plummeting without a care,
In hopes that some candidate could soon repair...

Yes, that's right it's that time of year again, election season. Now, normally I wouldn't give time or energy to discuss politics in a forum such as this, but seeing as something like this only comes around once every four years, I figured I'd give it a go.

I don't know about you, but, as a marketer, I am infuriated by political ads. They are filled with half-truths, whole lies, and negative content that in the business world would be advertising suicide. Still, today's trends have opened up new advertising mediums that politicians are utilizing to try to get a leg up in this election.

Both candidates are using web marketing and newer marketing technologies to try to reach a new generation of voters. Obama has been doing a particularly good job of this according to the L.A. Times. He sent out a text message to 2.9 million people announcing his running mate Joe Biden. With his large advertising budget, he has also led much of the spending online especially on display ads. McCain, however, has invested very heavily in search engine ads such as Google Adwords. Another interesting trend is the use of social networking sites. Although Obama is the clear leader on Facebook, McCain holds the advantage on Linked In. Obama and McCain have adopted differing strategies for web advertising, and it will be interesting to see how it all plays out in November, and in future elections.

When Ads Go Bad...part one

The other day a co-worker and I were having a conversation about advertising. In advertising, it seems, that often the ads that are most memorable are the ones that push the boundaries of what's acceptable. This is probably why we have so many racy ads on TV and in print. Still, the stories of ads that go too far are many and often more than a little humorous. My co-worker pointed out that one ad that probably went too far was put out by Nike. The ad in question involved a chainsaw wielding murderer, a female, and some Nike running shoes. Although I didn't remember ever seeing it on air (probably because it was pulled right away), I've found it here. For all young marketers out there, it is probably a good general rule to just keep the chainsaws out of your advertising (unless you're selling chainsaws, and even then use common sense).

AOL also has a great article about some other "ads gone bad". Nike cracks this list as well with its hyperjump ads. Other notables include Go Daddy from Super Bowl shame, and Hardees which has a long history of using sex to sell burgers. Many of these ads have had very short runs, as consumer complaints forced the companies to pull the ads. Check these out, and if you can think of any other memorable ads that have gone bad, I'll feature them in When Ads Go Bad...part two.