A recent study by IAB and Nielsen//NetRatings found text advertising, such as paid listings on search engines move brand metrics in a positive direction. The study demonstrated that sponsored text advertising in the search environment works for an array of branding objectives. Sponsored text ads, much like the standard image based ad, had their biggest impact on "unaided brand awareness," especially where a brand held the top position on search results pages. On average, when respondents were asked to name a specific leading brand within a tested industry, they were 27 percent more likely to name the brand displayed in the top spot compared to a control group not exposed to the ad. For the articles pages (pages containing contextually targeted text advertising), the text ad caused a 23 percent lift among respondents that saw the ads.
The research findings, as analyzed by Nielsen//NetRatings, reported that there is a significant difference on core brand metrics movement depending on the placement of the text ad. Ads appearing in the top position on a search engine increased an aggregate of all the brand metrics by an average of 14 percent across the six industries, in stark comparison to results from ads in the fifth position, which only showed a minor directional lift on brand measures. Search articles pages generated an aggregate lift of all brand metrics by 15 percent.
Thankfully this won't add to more pre-movie ads but this deal between Regal CineMedia Corporation and Alloy's 360 Youth will fill theater lobbies and bathrooms with marketing. Under the terms of the agreement, Alloy's 360 Youth will deploy custom interactive kiosks, restroom media panels, and backlit poster cases in Regal theaters, comprising Regal Cinemas, United Artists Theatres and Edwards Theatres nationwide, with a rollout beginning immediately during the summer movie season. The custom-built interactive kiosks with electronic 42" plasma screens connected to the RCM Digital Content Network and 150 backlit advertising panels will initially be deployed in 50 theatre lobbies in the top-25 DMAs. An additional 550 backlit advertising panels in 150 theatres and more than 2,600 restroom panels in 545 theatres, round out this new national media network. In addition, the partnership allows for more promotional marketing opportunities including event marketing and sampling programs.
You'll have to live in England to see this one but Private Stars will follow the lives of five female porn stars and five lucky guys as they are locked away Big Brother style to have sex with each other. The show will run for 10 episodes on cable and satellite next month and promises to show it all. The men will compete against each other and be judged on who performs best, sexually, with the women. Those who can't keep it up long enough will be voted off and the winner will be awarded a porn film contract. Predictably, the government doesn't like it. Thanks to Adrants reader Charley Brough for pointing this out.
New Jersey native Blaire Allison wants to get married by the end of 2004 and she's using a website called Do You Know My Husband? and weblog to hunt for a husband. Allison, who is 27 and works in New York as an event planner and dating coach, launched her site on June 21 and has received hundreds of emails from men clamoring for her consideration as well as major press coverage from the likes of the New York Times and MSNBC.
She's looking for a man who is 25-31 who "should be honest, romantic, sensitive, creative, quirky, and of course good-looking! ** And he must be Jewish." While she claims not to be religious, she does want to keep with the her family's tradition. Allison has had over 55,000 visitors to the site since its launch, keeps a weblog detailing her dating experience with potential husbands and allows visitors to vote for their husband of choice.
Behavioral targeting company Claria and computer equipment manufacturer HP have launched new ad campaigns here on Adrants. Claria is promoting it's database-based online marketing advertising system which reaches 43 million consumers and HP is promoting a new line of printers, called Designjet 130, specifically for art and creative directors. In the HP campaign, you can enter to win an office makeover and all kinds of tech toys. So if you are interested in more effectively reaching your target audiences online, check out what Claria has to offer here and if you want a printer that will blow the socks off you and your clients, enter to win a Designjet 130 here.
Add this to the long line of niche specific websites Reebok's has created to communicate with it's various target audience segments. Created by Zugara and resembling a grown up Barbie site, Reebok Sweets is the first site geared specifically to the young female. With the tagline "eye candy for your feet," the site has a Fashion Show section where you can play dress up, a Collection section where you can check out the various shoe styles, a Sweets Match Up visual memory game and a Store Locator. There's also downloadable wallpaper.
Throughout the site are sound bites captured during the filming of a supporting television campaign which serve as information icons on the site. It's very cool but the background music, which is only about 10 seconds in length and plays over and over and over and over and over, could use a longer loop. And yes, I know how to turn it off so keep your comments to your self.
University Research Corporation President James E. Midkiff is selling openingpage.com in an elaborate money making scheme for ad agencies and clients. Purely on the perceived value of a press release headline that might read, "XYZ Corp Buys Opening Page To Internet For Cash And Stock With Potential Value Of 40 Million Dollars," Midkiff outlines how the sale of the domain in exchanged for an inflated stock price enable the buyer of the openingpage.com domain to see a return on $40 million in five to seven years. He also outlines how an ad agency could purchase this domain, resell it to a client and capitalize on an obscenely huge mark up.
Calling this purchase an asset to a company's balance sheet, Midkiff's logic assumes the value of owning this domain and promoting the purchase of the domain through PR will catapult the domain's owner into the limelight and increase its value exponentially. Of course this logic assumes that every recipient of this would be press release is an idiot and unable to see it for what it really is - another money grubbing, Florida-based, sleazy money making scheme. Or, the whole thing is a joke and I'm the idiot.
Dubbed "Sachet Marketing" by TrendWatching, this marketing practice packages brands in small, affordable quantities making them available to a broader, lower income level consumer. Everything from cell phone minutes to small, tax deductible business loans to miniature washing machines to specially packaged laundry detergent are being marketed in bite-sized quantities which appeal to a broader audience than the same brands packaged in standard quantities.
Two new companies, Snap! International and Snap Pak have introduced small packaging for sachet marketers to sell their product in smaller quantities. As their names imply, the packaging snaps open rather than having to be ripped open as is the case with most other small product packaging. Brands can either package their own products or sign co-marketing deals to place their logo on the pachages of another company's product. It's not necessarily a new concept but with the fight to place a brand in front of a consumer's eyes, sachet marketing enables a form of mass marketing in an age of dwindling mass media channels.
Canadian based 2 Magazine, a quarterly magazine for urban 25 to 34 year old couples, launched in March and is written for couples "entering life partnerships and forming new households." Articles include fashion, household appliances, travel, music, renovation, humor, career, house hunting, sex, cooking, cars, finance, decorating, parenting and health. It's a mouthful but living together is a big deal and 2 intends to be there to help.
Availing themselves of growing cell phone usage, three new magazines designed specifically for delivery via cell phone have just launched. Containing images and text, Whoopla! will deliver celebrity news and ROCsport.mob and RIENTO will provide sports news. Each of the cell phone mags will also allow its content to be used for personalization in the form of wallpaper, ring tones and photos. The magazines hail from the Sendandsee Group in Finland. Advertising is sure to follow.
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