Bob Bly, master of direct marketing has, after trashing them, launched a blog of his own. In his first post, he lays out his ten attributes of direct marketing, most focusing on direct marketer's desire to make the cash register ring with little to no patience for branding efforts.
The launch of Bob Bly's blog is welcome. Very welcome. Let the squishy brand believers duke it out with the diehard get-the-sale-no-matter-what direct marketer crowd. We need some healthy mudslinging.
NetZero is running a television commercial that mirrors a currently running commercial from AOL. The AOL ad had members showing up at AOL's offices to offer suggestions on how to make the Internet better. The humor came from the exec asking the receptionist how many members had shown up, to which she replied, "All of them." Then the camera pans out the window to a sea of AOL members, surprising the exec. As Rick Bruner and The Media Drop point out the NetZero ad copies the AOL spot almost exactly - even down to the actors and the set. In the NetZero spot, members show up to say they are leaving AOL for NetZero. The exec asks, "how many," and the receptionist replies, "all of them," as in the AOL spot. Again, the camera pans out the window to the sea of people. This time, they are holding signs which say , "Bye," "See Ya," and "$9.95."
It's both a smart and questionable strategy. Leveraging AOL's much larger media budget, NetZero hopes to broaden awareness of its own campaign by association. But, many viewers may simply confuse the two spots not realizing who the advertiser is or simply remember AOL because it is more ubiquitous. It's very funny though, but the proof will be in the number of $9.95 sign ups NetZero gets.
The original AOL spot can be viewed here. Once we locate the NetZero spot, we'll post a link.
UPDATE: We contacted NetZero and they were gracious enough to share their spots. You can view them here.
While not new, there seems to be a rash of high profile real estate agents who've left the impression of discretion behind and are now marketing themselves like celebrities. From the legendary Barbara Corcoran to The Apprentice contestant Jennifer Crisafulli, who was fired from her real job at Douglas Elliman for in show comments about "two old fat Jewish ladies," The Observer's Gabriel Sherman takes a deep look inside this expanding trend of personal branding.
McDonald's President and CEO Charlie Bell has resigned due to a continuing bought with cancer. When Bell was named CEO in April, following the death of Jim Cantalupo, Bell, soon after, had surgery for cancer. VP Jim Skinner has been named new CEO and McDonald's USA CEO Mike Roberts has been named President and COO of the global business.
LA based agency Zugara has launched another engaging website for its client Reebok. The site, Rbk Streets, is a virtual cityscape where you can visit the Recording Studio and submit a demo to 50 Cent who will review it and choose a winner, visit the 40/40 Club and spin a scratch challenge, visit The Crib and view musicians rap about Rbk shoes, pit Allen Iverson and Steve Francis against each other on The Court, check out House of Rbk for the shoe collections and visit the Barbershop to get the 411 on the whole block.
All of the areas in the cityscape let you earn Street Creds which count towards prizes. Dope.
It's as if a company's marketing department has a big L stamped on its forehead if it doesn't have some sort of viral ad thingy going on.
Borders Books' marketers decided not to be branded losers so they've gone all hip and launched a viral ditty, called GiftMixer 3000, that provides shoppers gift suggestions based on the settings of five equalization sliders. John Keehler points to this viral of the minute where shoppers can move the sliders from one to ten for these categories: Romantic, Adventurous, Brainy, Imaginative and Funny. Once a setting is made, a drugged up, wise-ass, Hal 9000-like voice gives a running commentary on the selection.
Whether it sells books, we don't know but it did keep us amused for a while.
Earlier, we reported The Sopranos star James Gandolfini lending his image to the Kobold watch company website to promote its new Soarway Diver SEAL diving watch. Now the company has extended the campaign to print, again, using Gandolfini's likeness, albeit with an interesting use of Gandolfini's hand to represent the company's spot as number one in...well, that really isn't clear. The ad will appear in The Economist. Larger image here if above link dies.
Chicago-based agency Blue Ant, in a backdoor effort to show the importance of well written ad copy, has launched adHacks, a site much like stock photography sites yet with stock copy. At the site, those who don't wish to pay the high fees associated with good copy can obtain basic stock copy by navigating through categories. Upon finding relevant copy, users can buy the full text for $199.
Of course the whole thing is a joke to gain publicity for Blue Ant. No fault in that but upon reviewing Blue Ant's own site, some tweaking is in order. Blue Ant commits one of the most egregious agency website crimes. In its portfolio section, which provides links to case studies, half or more of the links are blank. That's not very reassuring to a potential client looking for a solid body of work. Also the agency's positioning statement, "Meet Blue Ant, a new kind or marketing agency.
Or ad agency. Or whatever kind of agency you want to call us," doesn't quite adhere to another very important rule in advertising: clear messaging. Perhaps Blue Ant should spend more time properly developing its positioning and building out its portfolio before building spoof sites. Then again, any publicity is almost always good publicity.
Here's one of those brilliantly executed spots whose sole purpose is to be brilliantly executed. It's for some cool new phone from Motorola. Oh wait. I get it. The phone is so cool that your house full of electronics can all fit in the phone. Like so totally cool. Now if only I knew what it was called so I could buy it.
Howard Stern sidekick Robin Quivers has signed a deal with Sony Pictures to create a pilot episode for a one hour daily talk show to air as soon as next year. While specifics are not available, the show will, reportedly, not to adhere to traditional talk show formats.
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