When you've got serious marketing dollars to throw behind wooing someone, it's a fine line between making them feel like stars and just, well, stalking the dickens out of them.
Philly-based 160over90 assists Wilkes University toward one or the other of these ends. Using mall kiosks, MySpace ads, billboards and whatever other media happened to be standing in a would-be Wilkesian's way, the university gave accepted students a king-sized shout-out.
The campaign makes Mini's "Hey Joe Shmoe" RFID-based billboard idea look piddly - it actually goes into details about the students' activities and ties them into the ad pitch.
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We mentioned this back in December but as the release date approaches and the real world ad industry continues to dish up hearty helpings of gossip, rumor, innuendo and foul play, we can't help but bring this up again. With all the juicy Sorrell/Roehm/Siefert dirt floating about our far from fine, upstanding industry, we can't really blame Hollywood for churning out movies that portray advertising executives as slimy, immoral scumbags with nothing better to do that take advantage of their power to belittle (and worse) others. No. And that's why we have movies like the upcoming Bruce Willis/Halle Berry flick Perfect Strangers.
In the movie, Bruce Willis is a high-powered ad exec who apparently kills (or not) a girl with whom he was having an online affair. Now Halle Berry, an investigative reporter, poses as an intern at Willis' agency to dig into Willis' wrong doings. Maybe Shannon Siefert should go to work for Martin Sorrell and pick up some client work headed by Julie Roehm. Now that would make a good movie.
We've learned two very important things having been in the advertising industry for some time. First, no two cultures are alike and what's funny or insensitive in one country could be quite the opposite in another. Which is why these two Dubai Lynx Grand Prix winning spots make no sense to us at all. Oh sure, they're funny but we're not sure why. Oh wait, we were talking about the two things we've learned. The second. Bouncing boobs are man magnets no matter where on this earth one lives. Especially to box headed men the second spot labeled "Hulk."
We're not sure who the client was or whether there even is one, but according to AdPunch Draft FCB France put together this simple print ad to raise awareness about journalists out yonder who die doing their jobs every day.
The text reads "In too many countries, writing an article is equivalent to committing suicide." It's a cute, avante-garde little idea but we couldn't escape the thought of a writer's block sufferer scribbling madly at his own wrist in an effort to unleash life's flow. Oh how morbid. We always vaguely suspected we were distant cousins of the fountain pen.
We'd never see this in America because...oh heavens, the innocent eyes of children would be so horribly tarnished but in Italy, fake orgies inside a car parked outside a sex shop is just fine. For Erotika, Milan agency Virus created stickers which simulated a steamy six person orgy and affixed them to the windows of a car. You can wallow in the creation of and reaction to this stunt in this video.
We're not sure the mid-90's style baggy, pleated pants the guy is wearing in this video are as intentionally spoofy as the rest of the site but that's besides the point. We're not talking about fashion here. We're talking about an agency that thinks viral marketing is fleeting and unproductive and has pioneered something much better: Disease Marketing. Yes. "Why settle for a harmless virus when you can get a full blown disease," says the trouser-wearing agency dude.
Minneapolis-based Kruskopf Coontz, calling itself "the face of disease," promises its disease marketing can lift brands to the level of emphysema: incurable and impossible to ignore. And that's not all. After introducing its "The New Viral" approach, Kruskopf whisks us away to its brand new website with an intro that brings together the finest, most complete collection of agency bullshit including B.S. Central (scroll all the way to the right), a video section of their site that gleefully tears apart the industry's obsession with awards, pointless philosophies, 25/8 dedication, its people, pontificating press releases, street cred, hipsterificness, base touching and the idiotic, self-important use of cell phones.
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While perhaps extremely pessimistic to think this way, these Court TV commercials (one, two) for the net's John Waters-hosted 'til Death Do Us Part scripted series about spouses plot the death of their life partners will resonate with anyone who's been married for more than three years. They make their point perfectly.
It's not enough to reach purchasing audiences anymore; we also need to keep one eye open for bloggers and online opinion-makers who increasingly make or break the success of a campaign. Still, few marketers will admit it's the bloggers they're targeting, much less shoot directly for them.
An Adrants reader points us to this fresh DuPont campaign called DuPont stories. Created by the interactive media futurists at Denuo, the videos are set up like a science class to illustrate the relevance of DuPont in everyday life. They're narrated by former Rocketboomer Amanda Congdon - looking hotter than ever - garbed in a lab coat who, oddly enough, isn't removing it, tossing her hair or making come-hither Freudian slips as the tale progresses. (After all, it is Amanda Congdon.)
We don't know if that's good or bad but we like that the series doesn't try leveraging the camp or slapstick humour characteristic of the standard viral. We feel like we learned something (watch Glass Houses, it's awesome). We feel enriched but somehow still not bored. By gad, could it be that viral trollers aren't monkeys after all?
This commercial isn't in English but that hardly matters. The message is clear. Most women can't find anything to wear in the morning but those that do get all the attention from their office mates. While we're not sure not finding something to wear in the morning is actually a bad thing, we like the direction in which this commercial went with the notion.
Make the Logo Bigger doesn't like this goofy new Dairy Queen spot in which three people enjoy the chain's Flamethrower sandwich countering all the YouTube LMAO/LOL love it's getting by wondering if there's an acronym for "annoying out loud." Oh wait, there is. It's AOL but that's an entirely different story altogether. Anyway, we love Bill from Make the Logo Bigger but we have to disagree with him on this one. Sure, the spot is horribly over the top but it's also absolutely fuckin' hilarious! And, it's so unlike everything else out there, it jumps right off the screen and screams, "Notice Me! I'm A Commercial!" We noticed. We like.
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