Long-time advertising production professional "Vontra" tells us, "After 20 plus years of listening to creative whining while on film shoots, (including my own) I thought of a way to turn comments into cash: Print all the stupid shit we creatives say onto clothing and throw it back at ourselves." Thus, a Cafepress business was born called Shoots. The store sells clothing emblazoned with "all the stupid shit" creatives have said to Vontra over the years and, no doubt, still do to those of us still in the business. From "Where's all the African Americans at?" to "My room sucks. Who's responsible?" to "This looks like shit. Is that the style now?", there's plenty of bitchiness for all to appreciate.
OK. Now who's going to open the store where creatives quote "all the stupid shit" production people, AE's, traffic managers and clients say in reaction to their work? Come on. Someone step up to the plate!
Consumer-generated "marketing campaigns" are hot this Super Bowl season, an indication of either curiosity, desperation or laziness which may contribute in part to big brands' decisions to shy away from this year's pigskin adfest.
Lending legitimacy to this lame attempt at representing their companies, Compete compiled some data on which consumer-gens are faring best and worst this close to the cut.
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According to this Craig's List job posting, a New York agency wants to hire a writer to post comments on blogs and message board as part of a "viral marketing campaign." If we are understanding the ad correctly, it appears the agency wants this person to seed blogs and message boards with comments as part of a marketing campaign. While these "planted" comments happen all the time, acceptance of or retaliation against depends entirely on how the efforts are conducted. If it's seen as schilling something in an inappropriate environment or using verbiage that's overly salesy, it'll be shot down the minute it starts.
One could argue this sort of effort is clandestine and should never occur. Others might argue it's simply another form of public relations playing its part to sway opinion. We'd hope this effort would consist of more than just panted commentary and include a blog or its own. Perhaps it will. The ad isn't clear on that point. Either way, the devil is clearly in the details on this one.
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The pre-Super Bowl commercial fest continues. Now we have a seven second teaser from CareerBuilder for one of the three spots it will run during the game. And on YouTube, you can find two spots for Disney promoting their Wild Hogs and Meet the Robinsons movies. Serioulsy, why bother with the Super Bowl when there's YouTube. Oh wait, YouTube's quality is shitty and a hell of a lot more people still watch the Super Bowl than troll YouTube.
Here's where Michelin's Super Bowl spot will point you on game day. Perhaps it's because we just returned from the place, but this site makes us feel like we're in the middle of a combination of Disney World rides. While the swirling camera animation is very cool, we're not quite sure what the site's trying to tell us. But don't listen to us. We're squarely in the "don't waste time fucking around with distracting, cool shit. Just tell us what you're fucking selling" category.
UPDATE: OK, now we get it. The site's just video from the commercial (which ran pre-game Super Bowl 2007). The commercial makes sense because there's voiceover. Maybe the website needs a voiceover too.
OK, this is just gross. There's a reason why hot women (and men) are allowed to take their shirts off and strut their stuff for the general public's appreciation. That's the reason why that 2003 Miller Catfight Super Bowl spot received so much notoriety. While Miller did create a male hottie version of the pool/mud wrestling spot, the two guys in that ad stopped short of having an actual fight and got all "sensitive man" on us to which, we wrote, "Oh please...can't they just beat the shit out of each other like the girls did in the mud wrestling spot?"
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We are told these are bed ads from a Brazilian bedmaker. The images carry no logo and our source does not know who the brand is. But, they are too good to share and done in a way only Brazilians can do. Enjoy them all here.
A tipster tells us the hair care brand Sunsilk was behind the creation of the strange "bridezilla" video which was posted on YouTube January 18 and received 9 million views before it was pulled. It's back up now and in the video, a bride enters a hotel room full of bride's maids, proceeds to flip out and cut her hair off because it looks so bad. Initially thought to be an innocently created farce, it's now been revealed the four women in the video are actresses and were paid to appear in it. What wasn't known until now, according to our source, is that Sunsilk, working with Toronto-based Capital C Communications, was initially involved but backed out at the last minute. It's unclear why Sunsilk separated itself from the project.
While the four women are getting all the glory right now, we've spoken to the director of the video who has graciously promised us more details as soon as he makes sure all his legal "I's" and "T's" are properly crossed. As soon as we have more information, we will gleefully pass it along to you.
UPDATE: Sunsilk, perhaps jealous of all the media attention the four actors are receiving, is now acknowledging their involvement with the creation of the video.
In a witty ploy for press, Taco Bell, unlike other fast food brands who have derided Nationwide's depiction of the fast food career as less than desirable, has offered a job to Kevin Federline and the promise of a customized Taco Bell uniform. Taco Bell CEO Greg Creed sent this offer letter:
Dear Mr. Federline,
First off, congratulations on your upcoming Super Bowl ad. We heard it's generating a lot of talk, particularly about working in the fast food industry.
We know you respect those who work in our business. In fact, last year you said in an interview, "My kids are going to have to learn what a real job is, what life is. You don't have it easy with me. Period. My kids are going to work at Taco Bell."
We're flattered, but obviously they're too young to work for us. So here's our offer to you: Come work for us, just for a one hour shift. We'll get you a uniform, a custom name tag and show you what a great place Taco Bell is to work. We'll even reward customers who visit that restaurant with an order of our new Carne Asada Steak Grilled Taquitos for free.
We encourage you to continue to "Think Outside the Bun" and hope you accept our tasty offer.
Sincerely,
Greg Creed
President
Taco Bell Corp.
Now, that's the kind of marketing think we respect and appreciate.
Some campaigns are launched with high hopes only to be buried by more important things or simply bad planning. This is what we think happened with Wells Fargo's strange 2006 Backstage campaign, boasting music by no-name artists, a weird Stagecoach Island game, and a national tour (less Woodstock than a futile set of volleyball games).
We would never have found out about the campaign that didn't fly if we hadn't been to the bank yesterday, where we saw a card sticking out of a machine and went in to return it. The coiffed rep gushed, "good behaviour needs rewarding" and, after quizzing us on our FICO savvy, gave us a Backstage shirt. We harbor the suspicion there are about 4,000 said shirts in the backstage of the branch, but didn't say anything.
Of course, had we searched Adrants, we would have realized the game's been around in one form or another for over a year. Aren't we good?
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