Caffeinated posts from a copywriter/adgrunt. I write about advertising, design, astronomy, cooking, and pretty much anything else that strikes my fancy, including random bits of reference info for work purposes. You may also know me as 'that other gal' who helps run Adland. | make contact | RSS Feed | ATOM

Monday, January 31, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Gratuitousness in advertising ]

+ Tess Alps ponders upon "Sex sells - when it's allowed to, that is".

So sex certainly sells media products, and it can work for others, where permitted. Advertising, quite rightly, is not allowed the same latitude as editorial, because it arrives unsolicited and unannounced. However, advertising needs to keep up with shifts in consumer attitudes, or it risks looking quaint and irrelevant.
[...snip...]
However, as soon as there is a suggestion of women enjoying any sort of sexual pleasure, some outdoor contractors will refuse the ad. One Harvey Nichols execution, featuring underwear-clad women riding joyously on giant lipsticks, was turned down because "objections were raised to the phallic imagery". Well, at least they got it.

As this is written from the UK, Alps also notes that the ASA "does not permit gratuitous sexual imagery". Which is not a bad policy. Besides the fact that gratuitous is less shocking these days. It might ruffle the feathers of certain audiences but for the most part, the ads aren't targeting those groups and probably don't really care too much about how they feel. Especially when it comes to going after younger consumers- if their parents are offended by it, then it will probably (although not always) be considered "cool" by the kids. If the parents like it, it can be an automatic turn off for those kids who are in a phase of rejecting what their parents and elders find fitting.

Beyond all that, gratuitous sexual images are just that -gratuitous. If they aren't helping the brand or communicate the message in the advert, then there really is no point in using it. What does beer have to do with half naked women? Nothing. What do jeans have to do with half dressed women? Nothing. But they create chatter. Recently it seems like fewer ads are using sex for the sake of using sex, although there are still plenty of brainless concepts out there that rely on the use of naked bodies or innuendo to move product. And with that we've also seen some more equal gender use of sex to sell as well, with brands like Mike's Hard Lime.

Advertising blogs have picked up this pointless use of sexual imagery like when the story is about Birkenstock and Tony Little the image is of him with some women from Hooters (yes he did appear in a Hooters spot, but when the main story is about Birkenstock, it seems like it was just a way for them to stick in a picture of women from Hooters.) Or this post about McDonals and Heidi Klum, rather than opting for a McDonald's logo or picture of the Big Mac as they do with many other of their posts, they picked a picture of Heidi in a bikini. Are they following on the heels of other blogs which use sexy babe images to get people to their sites? Possibly. For a site like adfreak, it's a fuzzy line - as their blog is a part of adweek- and therefore an extension of a brand that many ad folk see as one of the ultimate in advertising journalism. Plus, they have more to offer like inside knowledge, close contact with all sorts of adpeople (in the US), lots of funny scoops and NYC-centric adgossip about who's where and with what major brands and the sort, instead relying on cheap use of girlie images that mimic sites probably visited more by horny teenage boys and men in their mid-life crisis. So what does it mean when they start throwing in unnecessary sexual images? It's bad enough that as an industry we use these pointless images to communicate when it isn't necessary, but for our industry news publications to do so, it is pushing the limits even further.

I'm far from a prude, but overusing this kind of imagery is old and tired. And it seems that when a creative team can't come up with a good concept, these hacks rely on using sexy images and innuendo to try to "make" an idea. In August of last year, we were told that sex no longer sells after a study was done, because youth markets are no longer shocked or intrigued by the use of such images. So from that perspective, taking that route has become less effective. There is always the hope that this tactic will get someone upset and then get the media talking about it, in the tradition of FCUK. But many are tired of hearing about FCUK and this method only works for so long before even the most prudish of people realize that it's nothing more than a stunt for free PR.

So my point of this rant is this: If what you're selling has nothing to do with sex, stick to a concept that works for the brand, rather than just trying to put some sexy image in where it doesn't belong. And even if the brand easily can be paired with sexy images or some kind of innuendo, remember that if all your competitors are doing it as well, you're not going to stand out from the rest of them if you follow the same tactics.

[ :: adgruntie :: Branding shifts and PP ]

+ What happens when a company’s business shifts and the brand needs to shift with it? This article takes an interesting look at how big brands go about shifting consumer's perceptions as they evolve with the times by expanding their product or services.

“It’s very hard to change a brand quickly because people don’t change their perceptions that quickly,” Matt Ross, senior partner at the advertising firm Ogilvy & Mather said. “As much as companies would like to have complete control over the way their brand is perceived, the customer has a lot to do with it, too.”

+ If there was an Oscar for best product placement, these would be the nominees according to Stuart Elliott of The New York Times.

AFLAC: The familiar duck that promotes the supplemental health insurance sold by Aflac made its film debut in "Lemony Snicket's a Series of Unfortunate Events," appearing briefly in a scene playing, well, itself. In the scene, the duck, inside a boat during a storm, is squarely in the path of an unfortunate event involving a flaming stove.

CLOROX: The Clorox bleach brand sold by the Clorox is prominent in an early scene of "Million Dollar Baby" featuring two acting nominees, Clint Eastwood and Morgan Freeman. A Clorox bottle is visible among the products on Freeman's cart as he cleans the gym where Eastwood trains boxers. "Why do you buy that expensive stuff?" Eastwood asks Freeman. "Bleach is bleach." Freeman replies, "I like the way it smells."
.
HAI KARATE: In "The Incredibles," Hai Karate, a mass-market men's fragrance introduced by Pfizer in 1966, makes the kind of comeback that consumed Norma Desmond in "Sunset Boulevard." A bottle of Hai Karate is visible as a character named Lucius (with the voice of Samuel Jackson) prepares to resume his secret identity as the superhero Frozone.

KLEENEX: The Kleenex tissue brand sold by Kimberly-Clark turns up in many scenes near the end of "The Aviator," set in the 1940s, when Howard Hughes, played by Leonardo DiCaprio, began displaying symptoms of the obsessive-compulsive disorder that would eventually consume him.

SANFORD: Speaking of vintage, "Sideways," set in the wine country of Santa Barbara County, California, is a veritable brandfest, with the Sanford line sold by Terlato Wine Group playing perhaps the most prominent part.

[ :: adgruntie :: Ad blips ]

+ Over at AdLand, Dab points out 101 Hungarian commercials and Harry Egipt Estonian TV-Commercials from the 1980s.

+ Settlement reached - Lee and Dan have to say that they're sorry. Dang, looks like the soap opera is coming to a close. ;)

+ How do you improve your agency's creativity? TBWA hopes to improve the creativity of its staff worldwide by putting them through a programme which forces the participants to exchange and absorb the ideas of foreign cultures.

The plan to introduce the programme was initiated by Thor Santisiri, chairman and executive creative director of TBWA Thailand, said Jonh Merrifield, regional creative director of TBWA Japan.

Local staff of the agency have attended a workshop with Mr Merrifield in Bangkok to learn about the Japanese approach to creativity in order to broaden their horizons.

The same approach would then be adopted with other TBWA offices on a one-on-one basis or in groups in terms of offices, he added.

"This is to share passion [among staff in different countries] and bring insight into how things work in other countries.'' Mr Merrifield said that the future of the world will be built on cross-pollination as mixed marriages between different ethnic groups increases.

Definitely interesting and a good idea when you have a large international network to help explore the cultural differences. I suppose that the only possible issue would be if some of the techniques might lead to ideas that don't translate as well to the consumers in the different area. But the idea of broadening how we come up with the ideas and how to look at the creative solutions from a different angle is something that every creative needs to keep in mind as a general rule, not only for the sake of "cross-pollination".

+ Evil media empire, Clear Channel is working with UNICEF (and in conjunction with Campaign) to raise awareness of the impact of HIV/AIDS on the children and young people in the world. They are asking ad agencies and creatives around the world to produce a global outdoor ad campaign for UNICEF.
Clear Channel will give $5000 to the winning entrant, $5000 to the winner’s agency to develop the concept to final artwork, and a donation of $5000 to UNICEF. Judges include Sir Roger Moore-UNICEF Goodwill Ambassador, Lord Puttnam-UNICEF UK Chairman, Robert Campbell-Executive Creative Director at McCann-Erickson UK, Peter Sevel-Creative Director, UNICEF and Claire Beale- Editor at Campaign. The winning creative will run in August 2005 and appear on Clear Channel billboard and street furniture panels, across more than 50 countries spread over five continents.

More info can be found at www.posterchallenge.com.

Before you get all worked up about this though, in the entry details, you'll find this:
Each creative entry requires a MINIMUM donation to UNICEF of $150 (£80).

Not to say that a donation to UNICEF is a bad thing, but if you're going to be producing work for them at a fraction of what their agency would charge already, why do you need to give a donation to submit your entry?

+ The copyright battle over the Dr. Martens Logo has come to an end after 17 years.Apparently Ross Evans was brought in as a freelance designer for an ad agency hired by R Griggs Group Ltd. looking to combine their "Dr. Martens and "Air Walk" logos. Evans then sold the copyright to Raben, an Australian footwear company.

Mike Lynd, partner at Marks & Clerk, the UK’s largest patent and trade mark attorneys, commented:

“This is a victory for brand owners who quite rightly ought to be able to expect to own the rights to any trade marks which they commission. Evans is merely the latest in a long line of creators of trade mark logos who have sought to retain rights in their creations to the detriment of their patrons.  Although this case once again makes it clear that the law is on the side of the brand owner, it points up the need to avoid such long and costly disputes over the copyright ownership by the parties making sure that they come to an agreement at the outset of the relationship.  If the client expects to own the copyright this should be explicitly agreed with the supplier via a written assignment of the legal title, backed up by a trade mark registration.  Freelance designers of logos should certainly not assume that they own the copyright simply because they are the creators.

“Ross Evans was mistaken in thinking that because he had the ‘legal ownership’ of the copyright, he could sell the rights.  In actual fact, the ‘equitable ownership’ – which in this case was held to belong to the company that commissioned the work – overrides the legal ownership. The legal copyright was held in trust by Evans for Griggs, who thus can require assignment of that legal copyright to them, so that Griggs can now enforce that copyright worldwide.

The whole thing could have been prevented if Evans had to sign an agreement at the beginning. Probably this is why, along with non-disclosure agreements, many agencies cover their behinds.
Saturday, January 29, 2005
[ :: design :: Design Mags On The Redesign Rampage ]

+ Yesterday I picked up HOW and Print. Funny thing is both magazines have done a redesign and both launched them at the same time. I think HOW did a better job. Print feels more cluttered and almost too busy. HOW also has a piece on how the redesign happened.

Over at Kit.blog there's a post on Print's redesign. And I have to say I do agree with what he says. There's a feeling of trying too hard on the new logo/masthead to be "trendy". And it feels false.

Print's redesign was done by Abbott Miller, a partner in Pentagram's New York office, and his lead designer John Kudos.

HOW's redesign was done by DJ Stout, a partner in Pentagram's Austin, Texas office, and senior designer Erin Mayes.

Looks like Pentagram's Texas designers beat out the ones in NYC. ;)

[ :: adgruntie :: What's wrong with the news & NYFestivals ]

+ Seems the media are jumping on the already stale tattoo advertising, eBay forehead & other body part advertising. Considering this was first real "news" back in 2001, perhaps the media might want to pay more attention.

Not only that, but, it seems the media is also having problems discerning fact from fiction. Seems like it all started with The Times writing a story, which they failed to get confirmed. And many others have picked up the "news" story from them, obviously without doing any fact checking either.

Why no fact checking? Who knows. It seems noone even bothered to really check out the site, because as Dabitch pointed out, on the site causing all the "news" there is a disclaimer: "MAAD fact #1 - Be alert: the internet is not always what it seems to be." Seems like the news media have forgotten that fact.

101-280 points out another clue to the clueless media:

And I think this is "another clue" here at the foot of the front page:
If you are currently in a MAAD state of outrage and would like to let us know, please bear in mind that there is a strong satirical element to this site.

Over at Ernie Schneck's blog (under his orignial post on the subject- he later apologizes for not fact checking - which none of the "news" outlets have yet done) - you'll find a comment by Painter Mo who states:

This is Painter Mo, paint-roller artist of Birmingham and founder of MAAD.

The site was an old joke from back in 2000, the Times ran a story about it without checking with me first. I would have thought it was fairly obvious the site wasn't serious, it had poetry about painting over Sophie Dahl, ridiculously detailed instructions on how to paint over a billboard, a statement that ASA are "pants", ludicrously melodramatic news stories about heroic and nimble poster improvers escaping capture from the police and "geniuses" attacking paritcularly inaccessible posters.

Not only have the media picked up on this story but so have bloggers- probably blindly believing what they read and what was being fed to them as "news."

So what's the lesson learned here? Check your sources! And don't believe everything you read on the 'net.

Find more here:
Old Forehead/eBay auctions/stunts:
@ advertising on forehead hype reaches fever pitch (posted 1/10/05)
@ Now THAT's using your noggin' (posted 8/23/01)
Pregnant Belly Ads:
@ advertisments or pregverts? (posted 9/10/03)

+ The winners of the New York Festivals 48th annual international TV, Cinema & Radio Advertising Awards were announced on Wednesday. Here are the Grand Award Winners:
Television Advertising for Best Commercial: J Walter Thompson of Capital Federal, Argentina - Aerolineas Argetinas, 'Shadow'
Best Campaign: TAXI of Toronto, Canada - Canadian Film Centre's Worldwide Short Film Festival, 'Love Scene/Good Cop, Bad Cop/Establishing a Character'
Best Cinema Commercial: DDB Berlin, Germany - 'Volkswagen Golf DSG, 'Kids On Steps'
Best Public Service Advertising: Caravan Pictures in Rozelle, Australia - Australian Red Cross, 'We Gave Blood'
Best Creative or Production Achievement in Television Advertising: Gorgeous Enterprises in London, United Kingdom, Sony Playstation 2 spot, 'Mountain'.
Best Radio Advertising: McHale Barone, NY, National Thoroughbred Racing Association's campaign, 'Amusement Par/Golf/Road Trip'.

Thursday, January 27, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: New VW ad, using WHOIS & Pepsi SB spot ]

+ VW's new Golf GTI advert by BMP DDB, features Gene Kelly rapping and breakdancing to a club-mix of Singin' in the Rain. It begins airing tonight and "was the result of months of negotiations with the star's family, the movie rights' owners and record label EMI. It remasters the scene using masks, wigs and a digital techniques to impose Kelly's face on the dancers." Shame on MediaGuardian making the ad only avaliable to view in crappy Real Player. Don't they know that most ad folk are on Macs and Macs and Real Player don't like each other very much. Grr.

The spot - 'Gene' was directed by Jake and Ryoko at Stink and was posted by the team at MPC.

+ This morning I discovered Bloggerheads had posted some of my comments on the VW Viral thing. I'd like to return the favor with something great that he posted on his blog.

Oh, and the last names of Lee and Dan that seem so elusive? It took me about 2 minutes to track this down:Lee Lockwood and Dan Brooks

FFS, Lockwood is easily revealed by a simple WHOIS lookup. What are they teaching journalists these days?

Fantastic! What are they teaching journalists? Apparently not much. Sort of amusing though, because doing a WHOIS lookup is a basic way of getting information and doing your research. Apparently none of the folks at VW have thought of this either, so the journalists reporting on the story shouldn't feel so horrible. ;)

In somewhat related news, AdLand's superslueth Dab reports CP&B site spoof has nothing to do with CP&B after talking with a CP&B rep as well as phoning the NY phone number listed in the WHOIS for theneep.com. Apparenlty none of the other journalists who reported on this story bothered to do so. But *please* don't call the number- it seems that someone used a fake number and some poor fella is getting calls about something he has no idea about.

+ Media Bulletin reports on one of the Diet Pepsi ads for the Super Bowl.

Rapper P Diddy is set to star in the latest Diet Pepsi ad alongside former supermodel Cindy Crawford and 'Desperate Housewives' actress Eva Longoria.
The 30-second spot, the first created by DDB New York since winning the account from BBDO last year, features the rapper on his way to an awards ceremony when his car breaks down.
Diddy has to hitch a ride to the awards in a Pepsi truck and as he pulls up to the red carpet a host of celebrities, including Crawford and Longoria, marvel at his "cool" method of transport.
The ad is due to premiere during the US Super Bowl on February 6, traditionally the time when Pepsi debuts a significant new campaign.

This will be the second time Crawford has been brought back to pitch for Diet Pepsi.Yet another sign that this year's Super Bowl will be the year of the celebs, instead of the animals, for a change. ;)
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Another Snowy Day another Post ]

+ Irn-Bru streaker ad gets them into hot water with ASA. The issue that the ASA had with the ad was that it ran during what some considered a kids programme, so now they are only allowed to air the post after 9pm. Funny, didn't Nike do a streaker ad that took place on a football pitch as well? Badlander? Maybe.
Either way, check out AdLand for Streakers on the Run in Ads for the full scoop and a walk down memory lane of streakers in adverts.

+ Looks like VW is still promising to sue the VW polo suicide ad creators. Strange that VW can't find them. Especially if they created the ad to show to their ad agency- someone, somewhere must have a business card they left behind.

+ Are you an AdLand fan? Then you should go vote for it in fistful of euros' European weblog awards, The Satin Pajama awards.

+ Vandalizing pages is FUN! Graffiti on the web. (Hat tip Dab)

+ AIGA launches an impressive online archive with four years' worth of award-winning work, including the 50 Books/50 Covers competition. The archive will eventually include all selections dating back to 1980, so keep checking in for updates. Sweet. (hat tip to Tracy).

+ Apparently, these guys want to be like CPB. (Found via Brand New.)
Monday, January 24, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Celebrity Endorsers ]

+ Are celebs really an advertisers best friend? The LA Times takes a look at the pros and cons of celebrity's in ads.

Celebrity endorsements are as old as advertising itself. In the late 1800s, Queen Victoria's laundress was used to endorse Glenfield Patent Starch, Mark Twain's mug appeared on a bag of flour and two brands of cigars, and Sarah Bernhardt's face sold Carter's Liver Bitters. In the late 1940s, people took note when Ronald Reagan and Lucille Ball posed in Chesterfield's magazine ads under their "quotes" endorsing the cigarettes.

[...snip...]

Whatever the context of the celebrity endorsement, choosing a personality means an advertiser must scrutinize values and beliefs as closely as career trajectories. "What do they actually stand for?" asks Dan Burrier, chief creative officer and managing director of the L.A. office of the advertising firm Ogilvy and Mather. "What is their real self or their screen self or their on-the-court self? And where is that going to be in six months? But most of all, does it ring true? Is this a forced fit? Or is this somebody that's going to spiritually align with the brand? Would they actually use it? Is it actually part of their life?"

[...snip...]

"With product placement or home improvement shows or the use of celebrities in voice-overs for animated movies, the whole notion of marketing and branding and the reflection of fame is so well known by kids and adults that it's no longer a matter of 'You could be beautiful like this if you buy the product,' " says Ogilvy and Mather's Burrier. "People are so far beyond that, so sophisticated, and turn off so quickly to anything that smacks of pandering to a lower intelligence."

Celebrities most likely to inspire buying from a Jericho Communications survey from 2004 of 4,236 shoppers in seven malls nationwide:
Jon Stewart, Oprah Winfrey, Bill Clinton, Sean "P.Diddy" Combs, Martha Stewart (yes folks, that's even after she ended up in jail)

Celebrities least likely to inspire buying:
Donald Trump (Visa better stop running their Check Card ads with him), Dick Cheney (ha), Tyrell Owens, Teresa Heinz Kerry (maybe that was Kerry's downfall- next time keep her on the sidelines), Ashlee Simpson (she's even least likely to inspire buying of her albums too!)

Looks like this year's Super Bowl will have some star studded ads as well. From the information I've found so far we should be seeing Burt Reynolds, Dennis Rodman, Mike Ditka (although for some reason he always seems to pop up in ads), MC Hammer (I thought he last was supposed to be referred to as "Hammer" but maybe he went back to the "MC"), and Brad Pitt.
Thursday, January 20, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Saunders, Dove and the Beer Ad War ]

+ MediaGuardian reports that Barclaycard spokesperson, Jennifer Aniston, is being replaced with Jennifer Saunders, of French and Saunders and AbFab fame.

+ Came across an interesting article yesterday in the Telegraph, written by Dominic Mills is editorial director of Campaign and Marketing magazines, about the Dove campaign. He makes a couple worthwhile points. But he does seem to have a bee in his bonnet too.

As the population becomes more ad-literate and technology like Sky+ enables us to screen out marketing messages, so advertisers resort to making the pitch more covert, whether that involves aligning oneself with good causes; disguising the message as editorial content; or co-opting a broader political or social agenda, as in this case.

Marketing people will argue that this is perfectly legitimate, except that no one should be in any doubt that both agency, Ogilvy and Mather, and the Dove marketing team won't be judged on their success in changing public perceptions of beauty but on how many tubs of firming cream and bottles of shampoo they shift.

To this end, like all good marketeers, Dove wants to know as much about its customers as it possibly can. The campaign website is an efficient way of gathering thousands of names and details of the women who vote on it at low cost. Will Dove maximise that information? Of course, especially for those lured by the offer of cut-price promotional offers and so on.

That may be a cynical view, but it might be easier to stomach if you knew that Lever Faberge, Unilever's toiletries arm, also owns Lynx, whose male toiletries advertising shows geeky men in successful pursuit of stunningly attractive women - a campaign diametrically opposed to Dove's.

Could you imagine a Dove woman in a Lynx ad? Hypocrisy might be too strong a word, but despite what Lever Faberge might have you believe, market pragmatism, not principle, is the driving force here.

Well, no duh. Of course Dove is going to be trying to sell their product. That's what they do.

What I do find interesting is that I had no idea that Lynx was also a part of Unilever. As mentioned in a previous post, Lynx brand owner's former chairman Niall Fitzgerald admits that the success of the marketing campaign for Lynx deodorant is based on appealing to men's desire to attract women. The difference in direction between the messages being sent out by both brands under the same parent company is drastic to say the least. But the target markets are different too. So in that vein, it makes sense.

But would even attempting to take a feel similar to the Dove ads even work for Lynx? Doubtful. It's not a part of the brand essense or brand heritage as some would say.

+ Speaking of "lad ads", I find this rather amusing. Seems that the Associated Press has put out a story on the Miller/Bud war that's been going on, which was picked up by about 36 different media outlets, according to Google News. What's so amusing about that you might ask? We've been covering the whole thing over at AdLand for quite a while.
See related links for all the poop and ads:
@ Battle of the Brews (12/23/04)
@ Taste and Flavor vs. Freshness (9/28/04)
@ Bud, Miller are at it again (9/21/04)
@ Catfight between Miller and AB (5/29/04)
Wednesday, January 19, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Hump Day Ad News ]

+ Lastminute.com ad complaints upheld by ASA. Complaints received were for two posters, "one showed the legs and bottom of a woman wearing bikini shorts and used the strapline "go where the sun does shine", while the other showed a close-up of a woman's breasts in a white bikini, with the line "forget sandcastles, play in the dunes". Sexist and demeaning to women were just some of the reasons complainees found the ads offensive. "In its ruling, the ASA said that it was upholding the complaints not because it agreed the campaign would cause serious or widespread offence, but because it was "concerned by the advertiser's lack of response and apparent disregard for the code"."

+ Major League Baseball will be having open casting calls for real fans to appear in their next installment of the "I live for this" ad campaign. There will be six new spots for the 2005 season. The "six teams that participated in the 2004 postseason, including the Red Sox, Cardinals, Astros, Yankees, Angels and Dodgers. The representative fans from each team will be selected from open casting calls scheduled in each market between January 22 and February 2."
If you're interested check the link for dates, times and locations. The MLB site as well as individual team sites will have more information on the casting calls as well. Finalists will be flown to Miami, Florida to shoot the ads in mid February.

+ Probably the most controversial ad of the moment is the viral ad for VW Polo. Check out the link to AdLand where you'll find all the poop on the story. Over at MediaBulletin they state "the campaign is the work of a duo known for their spoof advertising, called Lee and Dan. "

They have worked on a string of legitimate ads including Ford SportKa, BP and Casio G-Shock, among others.
Dan, from Lee and Dan, said: "The ad got out accidentally and has spread like wildfire. It wasn't meant for public consumption.
"We think the spot reflects what people see in the news everyday, and in this instance the car is the hero that protects innocent people from someone with very bad intentions. We're sorry if the ad has caused any offence."

The ad is awfully polished to be just some joke that they created. Plus, if it wasn't meant for public consumption, then who was supposed to be consuming it? Hmm? You'd think people might have learned something from the Ford SportKa Cat ad. But apparently not.

+ Some what related- BBC Magazine lists 10 things that make people foward emails and viral ads.

+ Lewis Lazare reviews Snapple's latest campaign by Cliff Freeman & Partners/ New York.

[ :: quarks and quazars :: Cassini-Huygens, Mr. O, and Auroras ]

+ Stumbled upon LiveScience today. Interesting sister site to Space.com.

+ Huygens probe landed in Titan's mud.
Want more? Check these links out:
@ All about Cassini-Hugyens at Space.com.
@ Cassini-Hugyens NASA site.
@ ESA's Cassini-Hugens.

+ Possible Breakthrough Study of Material from Beyond Our Galaxy

For decades, astronomers have sought to pin down a source for ultra high-energy cosmic rays. The distant sources must be among the more powerful events in the universe, perhaps the creation of black holes or the mergers of galaxies.

It appears the first source has been located, a finding that would be considered a major breakthrough in the field.

If proved out, it represents the first time scientists are able to study a known object from beyond our galaxy by examining actual material (stuff like what you and everything else is made of) instead of electromagnetic radiation (radio waves, visible light, X-rays and so on).

Cosmic rays are not actually rays, like light. They are instead subatomic particles, thought to be mostly protons, on of the fundamental units of matter. The highest-energy versions of them race across the universe at more than 99.9 percent of light-speed, packing in their tiny bodies more punch than a golf ball hit by a pro, explained physicist Glennys Farrar of New York University.

The particles are difficult to study, because most break up in Earth's atmosphere. Only a handful ever reach the planet.

+ Mr.O - The Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter- Scehduled to launch August 8th from Cape Canaveral, it will be the largest spacecraft to orbit Mars.

Zurek said MRO is booked with early work at the start of a five-and-a-half year agenda.

For one, MRO will scope out a landing site for NASA’s Phoenix lander. That mission is to land in the northern polar region of Mars in May 2008. Once on the surface, the stationary lander is to use its robotic arm to expose the upper few feet of surface material in a search for ice.

One of the first things on MRO’s priority list is to scan possible Phoenix lander sites for any hazards. MRO radar and sounder readings will also be taken, with the data assembled surely to be helpful in picking the right Phoenix landing spot. "They want to make sure it’s safe and we’re going to help certify that site for them," Zurek told SPACE.com.

Similarly, locating the Mars Science Laboratory’s touchdown zone in October 2010 is another priority, Zurek noted, with MRO able to find the best place on Mars for the greatest scientific return from that highly capable rover.

+ Aurora around the world is putting on quite a show with a coronal mass ejection headed for Earth. Strong geomagnetic storms and high aurora sightings are possible when it arrives on January 19th for both Northern and Southern Auroras. POES Auroral Activity has more. And Aurora Viewing Tips- just past midway down on the page you'll find clickable maps to find your latitude, longitude, magnetic latitude and Kp.Find out the Kp for your location. Then check out this estimated planetary Kp index chart, updated every 3 hours, to see if you will be able to view aurora.
Other handy sites:
@ Hourly STD DMSP/POLAR Auroral Activity Report
@ Auroral Activity Observation Network
@ SpaceWeatherCenter
@ Aurora Sentry
@ CANOPUS- Real Time Auroral Oval
@ Night Sky Live

Tuesday, January 18, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Embracing Real Beauty ]

+ Embracing Real Beautyover at AdLand is worth a read if you're interested finding out about Dove's Campaign for Real Beauty. You'll get to see some ads and find out probably more than you wanted to know. Plus, I wrote it, so its gotta be good! *wink* Enjoy!
Monday, January 17, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Marmite, Heineken, PVRs, and Outsourcing ]

+ Tribal DDB has launched a new Marmite web site to support the new TV campaign.

Tribal DDB designed Marmite.com around the 8-year old, ‘love/hate’ campaign developed by DDB London: the site’s landing page offers consumers the choice of entering either the ‘love marmite’ site or the ‘hate marmite’ site. [snip] The two sites offer specifically themed content around the ‘love’ or ‘hate’ idea: while the ‘love’ site offers different ways to enjoy Marmite, the ‘hate’ site provides joke recipes and cartoon graphics of people being sick.

+ Brad Pitt will be in a Heineken ad airing during the Super Bowl.

He is the latest A-lister to take the once-taboo job of U.S. TV pitchman, teaming with "Fight Club" director David Fincher to shoot a spot for brewmeister Heineken.

The ad, which will air Super Bowl Sunday, shows Pitt buying a six-pack of Heineken and being chased through the streets by paparazzi - who are really after the beer.

Heineken confirmed that it had a Fincher-directed spot ready to go in major markets on Super Bowl Sunday. The company wouldn't confirm that Pitt was involved, but ad sources said the "Ocean's Twelve" actor already filmed the spot.

+ As was mentioned in the comments, Media Bulletin reports "Personal video recorders are costing the UK advertising industry over £30m a year, according to a new report, reviewing US and UK TV viewing trends by audience connection company, The Big Picture."

Simon Andrews, founding partner of The Big Picture and a former Delaney Lund Knox Warren executive, said: "Viewers are fed up with being mugged by advertising everywhere they look."
He said that brands needed to provide content that was chosen by consumers.
"Be that [content] ad-funded programmes, mobile applications and content and broadband content that people seek out and spend serious time with. You don't get the big numbers you do with old-fashioned mass marketing but you replace quantity with quality," he said.

Ding ding ding! It's not about finding other alternatives, it's about boosting up the content of advertising. It's going to take smart creative to break through this hurdle.

One of the things to remember, is that even without the PVRs, people still use a amazing thing called a remote control to avoid seeing commercials. I know I've mentioned this before. Ad-avoidance is not new. It's just easier.

+ New ad agency embraces outsourcing. How vile. It's bad enough as it is, we don't need to be taking jobs away from people in the ad biz in the US. There's no way this can be good for the economy, no matter how much money it will suppsoedly save companies.

There are sites out there that already have created this as an issue for advertising, which was not that long ago just a tech and consumer relations (help lines, etc) problem. There is a fine line between how they describe their use of talent from around the world, and just having offices in countries where the currency equivalence to US dollars is so drastic that it, in my opinion, is taking advantage of the people in those countries. Beyond the fact that it is also taking jobs away from workers in the US.

This also brings into account the difference in cultures and the reasons why many ad agencies have branches in each country to tailor a campaign to what makes sense for the cultures there. The overall message is the same for the most part, but what works in say, India, might not work in the US. Even McDonald's and Dove are keen to this fact- not usually airing the same ads in different countries because of cultural differences and sensibilities.

I'd also like to point out that on their web site they do not use the words "outsourcing" but find nice fluffy words to talk around it. But their press release firmly uses that word.

Knowing what brands are going to be joining forces with this ad agency will definitely help me to sort out which brands I purchase in the future- yes, I will not buy them, and I'll tell everyone else not to buy them either. Which includes their first client - Swiss boutique watchmaker, Alfred Hammel as well as companies that helped them to test their model, including MetLife, Johnson & Johnson and DIRECTV. Sorry folks, you just lost another consumer.

[ :: adgruntie :: Super Bowl advertisiers ]

+ Adage's list of Who's Buying What at the Super Bowl is out today. The chart contains 27 advertisers, when the ad should air, what we might see, and the agency/agencies responsible for the creative.
Sunday, January 16, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Brand Beliefs, Banned ad and Jingles ]

+ The "brand belief" campaign trend. That's what the Media Guardian calls it. Brands that have embraced this technique, according to them, include Nike, Apple, Johnny Walker and now Dove. The idea is that instead of focusing on the science of the product or benefits of the product, they touch upon an attitude towards life, a brand belief.
For Dove, I think it's a great thing. It's a brand that has been around long enough that most people know the "1/4 moisturizers" bit. And their taking a stance on the position of perception of beauty is really very groundbreaking in the beauty category. No air-brushed models, no overly lit hair shots.
I know I have ranted on and on about this campaign, but I really do think it is probably one of the best ideas in a long time. And it just seems so logical.

+ Don't make fun of Churchill. Internet service provider in the UK, madasafish, had one of their TV adverts banned by the watchdog Broadcast Advertising Clearance Centre for making fun of Sir Winston Churchill.

Chief Executive, David Laurie described the ban, reported in today’s Mail on Sunday and Sunday Telegraph, as absurd and an affront to the British sense of humour.

The banned 30-second ad features Harry Enfield playing his loud-mouthed TV character Frank Doberman and shouting “Oi, Winston, No“ at a bemused Churchill. Doberman rounds off by calling Churchill “You porky Prime Minister“.

Other adverts feature Captain Cook and Einstein, although they received no complaints. Check out the banned ad and others at madasafish's website (QT & Media Player).

+ Australian ad folk claim the jingle is far from dead.

Matthew Melhuish, chief executive of BMF Advertising. While he acknowledges that the heyday of the jingle has passed and that today's sophisticated world of marketing demands more than just a simple riff, there are very tangible benefits to those marketers with an eye on the long term.

"When you buy that song it might be terrific for that period of time but you are never going to own it. Some of the more recent ads that used U2 or the Beatles were ones that we probably enjoyed a lot but I can't recall what they were advertising. A jingle will be forever linked to your brand. When someone is whistling a jingle, that brand will come to mind. Whereas when you are singing U2's Vertigo [used in an Apple iPod ad], there's more chance that you would be thinking about the singer rather than the car," hesays.

Copywriter Alan Morris: "The day you start reading a print ad under the shower instead of singing a song is the day I'll stop writing jingles."

Saturday, January 15, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Newsy bits ]

+ Jay Schulberg, creator of ad campaigns for Milk (mustache campaign) and AMEX ("Don't leave home without it") died on Wednesday at 65. He was a creative head at Ogilvy & Mather in NY before he became chief creative officer at Bozell Worldwide.

+ Levi's do their own take on Shakespeare's "A Midsummer Night's Dream". The campaign spend is reported at £21 million.

And it is hoping the £21m campaign centred on the bard's A Midsummer Night's Dream, will reverse a seven-year sales decline in the 501 brand.

The new campaign features a romantic encounter between Bottom and Titania, queen of the fairies, transferred from Shakespearian woodland to a gritty downtown Los Angeles setting.
[snip]
In the latest advert Bottom is played by model turned actor Joshua Alba, while the role of the waitress as Titania is played by Donna Summer's daughter, Amanda Sudano.

Sounds a bit like it was taken from the revamped version of Romeo and Juliet done a few years back. The ad will be dubed into Italian, German, Spanish, French and subtitles will be added in Scandinavian countries.

+ TBWA\London has developed the latest campaign for Lockets, in which the cough sweet brand promotes itself as the 'sponsor of Winter'.

The Masterfoods brand has moved away from typical marketing promotions, which generally focus on product benefits, instead nominating itself as the "Proud Sponsors of the British Winter".
The campaign consists of one full-length and three shorter TV commercials, featuring a series of people - and a robin - coping with the hazards of a typically harsh Winter and showing that by soothing coughs and colds, Lockets "allow you to get on with life".
In the longer version, the ad opens on a robin sneezing so hard that he is thrown off the branch that he is perched on. It continues by portraying a variety of familiar horrors that the British winter has to offer, such as people fighting against the elements with their umbrellas, a jogger falling over on his way down an icy street, swimmers jump into a freezing Serpentine and a girl stuck in a snow drift rescued by her friends.
The ad closes on a typical British bobby, who eats a Locket to alleviate his cough and cold and is then promptly hit with a snowball.

+ How the Oscar Mayer wiener jingle was created back in 1963 by Richard Trentlage for J. Walter Thompson in Chicago.

+ Creative Generalist pal posts on Pantone's Colorstrology Color of the Year for 2005 - Violet Tulip -- or Pantone 16-3823 aka HTML 9b90c8. That last bit is in the html color.

+ Over at Brand New there's a post about the latest VW/NBC Universal product placement deal for $200 million. Seems to me someone is afraid that advertising and the rest of their marketing strategies aren't going to be enough in this TiVo world we live in. What's somewhat amusing about that is the percentage of people who have TiVo-like devices are probably a very small percentage of the population and more importantly, of target markets. At least for now. I think there's a lot of worrying about this sort of thing before it's necessary.

+ Ernie Schenck points to this article from the NYTimes about the Super Bowl. There's a good list of advertisers there. Also there's an interesting quote from David Lubars:

"When you try to do something that stands out in a game full of advertisers trying to stand out, you have to walk a line," said David Lubars, chairman and chief creative officer at BBDO North America in New York. "And some people walked over it last year."

BBDO North America, part of the BBDO Worldwide division of the Omnicom Group, is creating campaigns for several sponsors of Super Bowl XXXIX next month, including FedEx and Visa. "I don't think anybody goes in saying, 'Let's do spots in bad taste that will offend everyone,' " Mr. Lubars said, adding: "Last year, people thought their spots would be funny like they were in past years. But they just didn't work out."

Yes to the first part. Bud did. Lay's did. And I'm sure there are others but they were forgettable. But that second part. Oh, the second part. I'm not sure that there is an intentional desire to offend people. More likely it's a lack of understanding the whole of the audience that is viewing the spots. Besides the testosterone oozing, frat boys, the Super Bowl attracts a more varied audience than just the target market for your product. Usually that's part of the allure of using the Super Bowl as a launching pad for branding campaigns. But at the same time, if you are going to be having a more diverse group watching the spots, you can't be so niched in the content/creative/etc as you would if you were airing a spot on ESPN or some other channel that was more male orientated.
This is the danger zone for Super Bowl advertisers. The other side of the coin though, is, do they really care if they offend some people, if they aren't the target they are trying to reach in the first place? Probably not. Like Lubars said, it's a fine line.
Thursday, January 13, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Well, alrighty then. ]

+ Clay pointed me to Dr. Gary's Jivedecoder, the world's first ad agency translator. Check it out.

+ A lack of creativity seems to be engulfing most advertising.

Does creativity sell? What an utterly ridiculous question. It blows my mind that there are still people who even ask it.
Of course creativity doesn't sell. Bland, boring advertising with strategically relevant messages...now that sells.
Consumers are just sitting at home, bored as hell, just waiting for your advertising to tell them something fascinating about your product. They love learning stuff about products. It's way more interesting than anything else that's on TV. Way more interesting than playstation or rented videos, more interesting than magazines and books, or anything else that could possibly be happening in their lives.
If research was done on this subject, I'm pretty sure that 95% of all respondents would express a craving for product information more than any other life experience.
So there's really no need to make advertising entertaining in any way; that would just detract from the incredible product benefits you have to communicate. And because people are basically cerebral, rational beings, the unique selling features of your product will sell it all by itself. There's no need to appeal to anyone on any emotive level. Consumers are just pliant, sponge-like vessels with nothing else to do but soak up your advertising message, and then react exactly as you'd want them to react - by rushing out and buying your brand. What role could creativity possibly play in selling a person anything?

Beautiful sarcasm! Although I would bet that there are some out there that might think this is really true. Which is extremely scary. There's more to the article. Read the rest, it's very good.

+ Debra Scheufler is suing Estee Lauder and several other companies, charging them with advertising false claims of their products' "anti-aging" properties.

Scheufler denies that she was overly gullible or vain.

"As a female, society encourages us to always look our best," she said. "Once we hit 21, the skin starts to show the effects of aging, and I wanted to do everything I could to look my best."

According to La Mer's advertising, the cream makes skin "softer, firmer [and] virtually creaseless. Aging lines and pores are noticeably less visible."

"I'm not a doctor or a chemist, and neither are most of the women purchasing these products," she added. "At what level are we supposed to research these things before we buy them?"

Scheufler said La Mer made her skin "rougher" and clogged her pores - a disappointing result for a cream costing over $100 per ounce.

Just more proof that Dove's campaign is on the right track. God forbid a woman looked slightly older or even had, *gasp*, a couple wrinkles! *wink*

+ Animal-rights group PETA's suit against a "state milk board for its "Happy Cows'' advertising campaign was put out to pasture Tuesday by a state appeals court, which said state agencies can't be sued for false advertising." Something in that is scary. I'm actually a fan of those ads-they are very well done. But, the fact that a state agency cannot be sued for false advertising is a bit strong of a position to take. Is it perhaps the same as political advertising which has no standards and can blatantly use false information without penality? Perhaps. But that is wrong as well. There's more reason for state and political advertisements to have a stronger set of standards and practices to live up to than the average product advertisement. I'm disappointed that the courts have gone along with that in this case.

SuperAdgrunts can view the ads at AdLand here:
Sheep, Rooster, Breaking Out and Spritz.

+ Tabasco returns to Super Bowl with a new ad this year. Their last SB ad was in 1998, titled "Mosquito", which they got a lot of milage out of. I saw it just the other day in fact. This new spot is titled "Tan Lines." "The only hint lies in the message on the altered diamond-shaped label on bottles of sunscreen the company sent out promoting the ad: "From sidelines to tan lines Tabasco has you covered like SPF 100 sunblock." The coconut-scented potion was shipped in the red-capped bottles that usually contain Tabasco sauce." The spot will air in the beginning of the 3rd quarter.

+ Google AdWords- the new grammar police.

Since when does anyone care about grammar and style on the Web? Would my little colloquialism really bring so much chaos to the searching experience of Googlers?

From Google's point of view, the answer is yes. Clarity is more important than tone.

Is Google an Internet incarnation of the grammar prescriptivist, insisting that language has rules and that communication without those rules leads to confusion and the decay of civility? Could advertising's dangling participles and the unrelenting trend of sentence fragments be at the root of our collective information overload? I consulted a leading prescriptivist, Robert Hartwell Fiske, the author of "The Dictionary of Disagreeable English: A Curmudgeon's Compendium of Excruciatingly Correct Grammar." This is a man who does not confuse lay and lie, a man who describes as boneless those who too readily expand their lexicon to include misusages. Yet Mr. Fiske shrugs at sloppy usage in advertising.

"Advertising is a creative profession, so I feel copywriters and the like should be allowed a certain license that others - in more staid jobs, let's say - are not permitted," he said. "If a misspelling or questionable grammar serves a purpose, I have no objection whatever to em instead of them, or, say, like instead of as. Your em, I gather, is meant to suggest a tone, a friendliness that them would not so easily convey."

Kinda amusing actually. I guess in some ways it does make sense but at the same time, if there is no ability to insert tone in google ads, how do you keep your branding (and corporate tone) throughout your advertisements? I suppose then it might require a bit more expertise from professional copywriters rather than someone just throwing something together. heh.
Saturday, January 08, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Cars, animated women, floss and Lil Jon ]

+ The Canadian arm of Toyota has dropped "Tsunami" from the name of it's sporty version of the Celica. They announced the new vehicle in Jan 2004 with that name but after recent events have changed it to the Celica Sports Package.

+ If you're a SuperAdGrunt, head over to AdLand and check out the new Dove- Unstick Your Style spots featuring Wilma Flintstone, Velma (from Scooby Doo) and Jane Jetson. Brilliant work by Ogilvy!

+ You better floss. A judge ruled that Listerine couldn't claim that using mouthwash was as effective as flossing, has they had in their advertising.

The judge said "substantial evidence" demonstrates that flossing is important in reducing tooth decay and gum disease and that it cannot be replaced by rinsing with a mouthwash.

The judge also noted that the authors of articles on which Pfizer based its advertising campaign had emphasized that dental professionals should continue to recommend daily flossing and cautioned that they were not suggesting that mouth rinse be used instead of floss.

Chin said Pfizer based its findings on two flawed studies of people with mild to moderate gingivitis who did not use floss properly. The studies, he added, proved only that Listerine is "as effective as improperly used floss." [snip]...
The judge said Pfizer had received complaints about its advertising, including one from a dental professional who said he was "aghast" to hear of the company's claims and another who said the claims "can set back years of progress by the ethical dental profession in convincing patients that flossing is essential for their oral health."
[snip]...
The judge said he found it "highly troubling" that Pfizer took the position in the lawsuit that floss can be replaced by Listerine even though it had told dental professionals for two years that it was not suggesting that was the case.

Tsk Tsk. Proof that when you lie in your ads, you get found out. Honesty people, honesty!

+ Probably most well known from spoofs on Dave Chappelle's show, Lil Jon has gone the route of many rappers and pop stars. In March 2004 he "teamed up with Sidney Frank, a liquor-business veteran and the creator of Grey Goose vodka, to make Crunk!!!, an energy drink named for the slang term for acting crazy or excited." BusinessWeek Online spoke with Lil Jon about how he plans to set Crunk!!! apart in the crowded energy-drink market, why hip-hop lends itself to entrepreneurship, and what his next business move will be. Check it out- they talk branding, strategy, and Lil Jon's business role models.

[ :: adgruntie :: No ass on FUX during Super Bowl ]

+ Thanks to FUX you won't be seeing Mickey Rooney's bare bum during the Super Bowl (see link for still from the ad.)

The network rejected a cold remedy commercial that includes a brief shot of the 84-year-old actor's behind, said Fox Sports spokesman Lou D'Ermilio.
"Our standards department reviewed the ad, and it was deemed inappropriate for broadcast television," he said.
The commercial for the over-the-counter product Airborne is set in a sauna and depicts Rooney panicking when someone coughs. His towel drops as he rushes out, revealing his rear.

FUX claims that the decision isn't based upon last year's "nipple-gate" but is a part of their usual standards and practices. Which seems odd to me. Not that I want to see the ass of an 84-year old man. I mean, really who does?

Rider McDowell, co-owner of Carmel-based Airborne Inc., also defended the ad Friday: "There's nothing titillating about this spot, nor was there intended to be a sexual aspect to it." He continued on to say, "We had to come up something sensational that would leave people with a lingering buzz or chuckle," he said. "To edit that out would be to emasculate the ad somewhat."

Sensational? Funny? Please. More like disgusted and nauseated. Beyond the fact that FUX does seem to have strange standards and practices- considering the stuff they air on their channel- they probably made the right move to keep the public from throwing up their buffalo chicken wings and chips and dip. Then again, I'm sure there would be a percentage of the viewers who would find it amusing. Most likely the same viewers that found Bud's farting donkey spot from last year funny would get a laugh out of seeing an old man's ass.

Wednesday, January 05, 2005
[ :: adgruntie :: Ads, pulled ads, and Bollyads ]

+ BBC reviews UK ads of 2004.

+ BA and others pull advertising after tsunami.

British Airways has pulled television and press adverts that include images of waves lapping on a beach in the wake of the Asian tsunami disaster.

The airline decided it was inappropriate to advertise holiday flights following the December 26 earthquake and tsunami, which is expected to have killed more than 150,000 people.

BA's television, press and poster advertising campaign was due to launch on December 30 and an embargoed press release was sent to travel journalists the previous day. But the airline has decided to abandon most of the campaign.

"Due to the situation in Asia we have pulled TV advertising and main newspaper advertising," a British Airways spokesman said.

+ Clay pointed out a post on boingboing regarding a Coke ad released in Spain, Portugal and Italy with a Bollywood feel- and homage to the Absolut Mulit ad from a two years back.

[ :: adgruntie :: Happy New Year, a few days late ]

+ Dove's great campaign has been accused of air brushing their real models.

Dove Firming campaign: advertiser insisted the women had 'minimal make-up and styling'
 Beauty brand Dove today denied the photos used in its ground-breaking advertising campaign last year were airbrushed to make the women with "real curves" more attractive.

Abigail Storms, the UK brand manager for Dove, used today's launch of the brand's latest ad campaign to deny long-standing industry rumours that the pictures, which featured ordinary women in plain, white underwear, had been digitally altered.

"What many people don't believe is that none of those women were airbrushed or retouched in any way," Ms Storms said.

She also insisted that the six women who modelled for the press and television adverts for the Dove Firming range had "minimal makeup and styling".

One magazine beauty editor, who did not want to be named, said rumours of the pictures being retouched had spread widely through the beauty industry after the campaign broke last March. She added they had never been proven.

Strange. Is someone jealous? Or is there a basis for this? I can't imagine that with an ad campaign that is based on honesty- yes honesty- that there would be any reason for Dove or Ogilvy to put something that is so basic to their new direction under wraps.
Maybe the idea that women who aren't stick thin aren't covered in celullite and whatever else beauty editors feel they should dictate as beauty is frightening and scary. I don't know.