Audible has introduced an analysis tool which will measure how many times a podcast has been downloaded, whether it was listened to and for how long. The company will charge three cents per download for basic service. Also offered, for five cents per download, are tools to disallow a podcast from being emailed to others, presumably to make sure every listen is counted from the source. For half a cent per download, the service will insert relevant ads in the podcast. Measurement will occur when the MP3 player is synced with podcast software.
A recent eROI study which examined open and click rates of mailing lists of all sizes across all the days of the week found, on average, Sunday was the best day with an open rate of 30.8 percent and a click rate of 7.2 percent. Before all marketers rush out and clog up everyone's lazy Sunday afternoon with e-trash, the study also indicated that the best day to mail varies with list size. The bigger the list, the less efficient. Lists over 200,000 do well on Saturday. Micro mailers (extremely small) do best on weekends. Small mailers do best on Friday. Mid-sized lists do best on Monday and Friday.
IBM has encouraged its employees to blog about the company and has provided blogging tools to its employees. Over 2,200 employees are currently blogging which the company sees as a powerful marketing opportunity akin to testimonial advertising and Lee Iacocca's "speak to the people" ads in the eighties. Bits and bytes. Woo hoo.
To help promote MSN's The Wall, a project that allows people to create virtual grafitti, The Wexley School for Girls created a contest whereby entrants could submit their grafitti. Wexley then projected the winners' work tagged Atlanta using high-powered light projectors, throwing artwork on various buildings. There are plans in place to roll the promotion out to other cities. See the work here.
Almost a year after their broadcast ad was rejected by all three major networks - ABC, NBC and CBS - as too controversial the United Church of Christ has won the Association of National Advertisers Annual Award for Multicultural Excellence for its gay and minority-inclusive "Bouncers" ad and The Initiative campaign. The ad was created by Gotham NY ad agency. The award "recognizes the efforts of a corporate marketer for an outstanding multicultural advertising campaign" among all major corporate advertisers, from Coca Cola to General Motors, nationally and internationally.
Sometimes Obituaries can be fun to read, especially if you don't know the person then you can either marvel at or snicker at the individual's life achievements crammed into a 250 word summery. With the recent intentional or unfortunate placement of a State Bank of The Lakes ad with the headline, "Dead End," directly next to the obits, reading about strangers life achievements just got, at least for a day, a bit more amusing.
To promote its new electric razor that automatically dispenses Nivea cream while using the razor, Phillips, has launched an ad, created by Tribal DDB, in the UK which pokes fun at the razor wars with a freakish razor called the Quintippio, a 15-bladed razor that's so large it would be impossible to use. Funny. And not far off the mark. After all, if Gillette and Schick already have four blades, what's to stop them from one-upping to five, then six, then...well...insanity.
The American Chopper guys are crossing the pond to Europe with their Discovery reality show, taking the dignity out of England and modifying it to suit their less than dignified style. In the spot, the three American Chopper guys basically rip the dignity out of England, in a humorous way, of course, and laugh at a tiny scooter as if to crush it with their loud, obnoxious Harley's. The spot was created by Convert of The Ebeling Group.
California business partners Dawn Westlake and Bruce Rheins have submitted a patent request for a wine label which reads "Jesus Juice" and contains a Jesus and Michael Jackson-like image in a crucification pose. the two hope to market wine under the label and are currently seeking business partners
Maine Root Beer has launched a site called Free Range Root Beer which pits itself against the big guys whom Maine Root Beer portrays as large, tasteless entities which add all kinds of filler to their product. The site contains humorous videos including one in which a stealth Free Range Root Beer team attempts to free cans of root beer which have been taken from the wild and placed in a corporate jail cell. There's a history of root beer, an area for kids, a photo contest for people to send in photos of Maine Root Beer placed in strange locations and a section where root beer lovers can express themselves through art therapy. Funny stuff.
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