vivid shining brands

From BtoBonline.com : In the report, “Emerging Technologies B2B CMOs Should Watch in 2011,” Forrester analyst Jeff Ernst recommended CMOs explore online content curation to bolster thought leadership; listening platforms to gauge customer sentiment; brand advocate platforms for spurring word-of-mouth; and appointment scheduling applications to engage potential customers who are ready to buy. Even though only the third item is identified with branding, I believe all four of these tactics can be part of a comprehensive strategy for brand leadership in the online and social media spaces.  Especially interesting is the last entry – appointment scheduling apps – as it gives prospects a significant feeling of control over the sales process. This alleviates some of the friction that naturally results when a sales call is received at an inopportune time.  Even if the prospect may be interested in the product or service, poor timing of such a call can not only negate the sa...

I was intrigued by some speculation that the Apple event tomorrow might turn out to be all about a breakthrough product...but that that product was not the much anticipated tablet. Well, now the New York Times has put its credibility on the line to say that indeed, a tablet is what it will be all about: “The iPhone was a harbinger,” said Trip Hawkins, a founder of Electronic Arts and now chief executive of Digital Chocolate, which makes games for cellphones. “When you have a device that is this convenient and fun for consumers to use, you can get a lot more people interested in paying for and engaging with the content. Big media companies should be all over this like a cheap suit.” Indeed, they already are.  The New York Times Company , for example, is developing a version of its newspaper for the tablet, according to a person briefed on the effort , although executives declined to say what sort of deal had been struck. [emphasis added] If the tablet delivers, this will br...

Now that the tinsel and mistletoe dust have settled, let's take stock of the near future for retail advertising. According to Calculated Risk , December retail sales were down .3% from November on a seasonally adjusted basis, but up 5.4% YoY from December 2008. This graph shows retail sales since 1992. This is monthly retail sales, seasonally adjusted (total and ex-gasoline). Click here for larger chart. Retail appears to have bottomed, and should begin a long, slow climb back to better times, although given anemic consumer confidence, that climb could be slower and more arduous than anyone would like, and this includes the retail segment of the advertising industry, whose fortunes have been tracking the industry it serves. A report in Bloomberg News  notes that: Americans also bought more consumer goods, computers and telecommunications equipment from overseas, signaling a revival in overall demand and business investment. But most analysts say that demand is we...

Reporting in the NY Times today , Miguel Helft captures the frank admission of Andy Rubin, whose title, paradoxically, is VP Engineering: “There is an opportunity to make some margin on the unit sales, but that’s not the objective here,” Andy Rubin, a vice president of engineering in charge of the Android technology, said during a press conference at Google’s headquarters here. “Our primary business is advertising.” [emphasis added] Interesting, I think, that the core notion of needing a big agency to handle your advertising continues to erode with advances in technology. The advantage is heading toward the smaller, more nimble agencies with great outside technological and graphic design resources that they can tap, but need not own. Overhead disappears. The focus shifts to creative strategy and administration. Clients certainly benefit, but it is admittedly a bewildering time to run an agency, with everything in the game changing seemingly at once.

Dean Donaldson writes in AdAge Digital about how that old-school marketing maxim - Location, Location, Location - still holds true, even in the new frontier of online advertising: Historically, we create ads in an assortment of shapes and sizes and stick them everywhere, only to find ourselves surprised when the same creative generates a range of results across many environments. It's relatively obvious, actually: Surely the impact of a piece of creative that works effectively in one in environment will differ -- sometimes radically -- when placed in another. This article has a great set of guidelines for where you should try and place your online ads, depending on what you want the viewer to do.

We've seen a lot of innovation around ad length in the past couple of years, from Miller's 1-second mini-spots to this three-minute adventure from Chanel. I have to say, give me a good story with compelling visuals, like Chanel has done, and I'll watch forever. Perhaps Miller is best left doing those fivers, because I can't imagine they could ever come up with material to sell cheap beer that could ever compare to this: Imagine, an ad so compelling I willingly replayed it several times over. That's the power of creativity.

There's a reason Tootsie Pop waited nearly forty years to rerun their classic "How many licks..." ad on TV again. Too bad somebody from Tootsie Pop wasn't advising JC Penney, which has decided to run it's very popular "Doghouse" viral video again this year ( from AdAge ): Regardless of whether the  ad critics  liked JC Penney's " Beware of the Doghouse " viral video last year, the masses did. The idea behind the film was that men who gave their wives lame holiday gifts, such as vacuum cleaners, would be dropped down a rabbit hole called the doghouse to be judged by a jury of scathing, scorned wives. The campaign racked up millions of views in its quest to promote JC Penney's jewelry department -- jewelry, of course, being the ticket out of the doghouse. I very much enjoyed the original , even though it was long (why does everybody have so much trouble with good things being longer than stupid things?), but I have to say I was bare...