Advertising News and Know-How
By David Burn
Steve Hall of Adrants is not diggin' on the new viral effort from Durham, NC-based McKinney Silver. "Doctor" Myra Vanderhood We're sure all the McKinney folks are huddled around their computers today laughing at all of us writing about their cute little effort, waiting patiently for the right moment to reveal the client behind this ploy. While you're all reading this you sneaky little McKinney truth-benders, …
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By David Burn
How well do you know millennials--those born in 1982, or after? Fast Company purports to. Millennials aren't interested in the financial success that drove the boomers or the independence that has marked the gen-Xers, but in careers that are personalized. They want educational opportunities in China and a chance to work in their companies' R&D departments for six months. "They have no expectation that the first place …
By David Burn
I like to bust on MBAs. In general, they lean too heavily on books, and often end up sounding like it when they write and speak. What is worse, MBAs never learn to trust their gut--a key to success in advertising, a semi-rational science, at best. There is a growing rate of programs, like the ones found on the online MBA rankings, so this means more graduates in the future. Lucky for them, corporate institutions …
By David Burn
NYT: The sportswear company Perry Ellis has long employed the traditional formula for men's fashion advertising: take one handsome man, photograph him posing in an exquisite setting, and repeat. The campaign features a male character in a series of settings that emulate real life. But now Perry Ellis has decided to replace its leading man with something less predictable: a comic strip. Using comics in advertising is …
By David Burn
I'm conflicted. When is trackback spam spam, and when is it okay, if ever? We received three such TBs this morning, all from M-ook: Guide to modern living The site is an Amazon Associate, and all its entries are geared to sell the online giant's ever-expanding universe of products. I don't really have a problem with that, but here's what makes it spam—there's no reference to our original post in their post. That's …
By David Burn
I don't read Slovakian*, so it's hard to determine precisely what's going on with the ads above, but it looks like Heinz and KFC have the exact same visual cliches running for different spicy products. I know there are no new ideas, but on the heels of the One Show call-for-entries debacle, thievery is beginning to look like a trend. [*via Ad Arena] …
By David Burn
"In the factory we make cosmetics, but in the store we sell hope." -Charles Revlon Michael Kiely: There's an old joke in the ad biz: "You only need one thing to succeed in the advertising business: sincerity. And when you learn to fake that you've got it made!" The truth is not so far from the exaggeration. Anyone who has (like me) been in the ad game for any amount of time (I've done 20 years hard labour) can tell …
By David Burn
Fortune Small Business is running a piece on Umbria, a market research firm in Boulder that designs software to find useful consumer intelligence on the Internet. Izze Beverage, a 45-employee Boulder company that makes sparkling fruit juices, recently engaged Umbria to track what bloggers were saying about rival brands. When a blogger had a bad fruit juice experience with one of his competitors, the result was often …
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