Do you think for yourself? Really? Are you sure? You may not realize it, but most people have been conditioned by the media as to what to think, as well as what to think about. Don’t believe me? Let me ask you a question…what do you think about the situation in…um…let’s say, Iran. What do you know about Iran? Do you know the name of their ruler? What about their government? Heard anything about their latest pronouncments? What do you think about them? Do you care? Read the rest of this entry »
…courtesy of my liberal arts (i.e.: lack of science) education…
IDEA #1. Back in the days before central air conditioning and refrigeration made it possible to live comfortably through summers in the South, one enterprising entrepreneur floated a huge iceberg from the northern Atlantic down to the Gulf of Mexico. The purpose? Provide inexpensive ice for evaporative coolers, which at the time were the only way to cool a room. He made a fortune.
I understand from the sound-byte journalism on TV that the reason that tropical storms that cross into the Gulf become hurricanes is due to the warm waters in the Gulf. (It’s why the eco-Nazis try to convince us all that hurricanes are a lot worse due to ‘global warming.’) Read the rest of this entry »
Recently, I’ve gotten restless, and I’ve decided to begin playing music professionally again. Trouble is, I don’t have a lot of contacts here in Amarillo. So I’ve decided to apply the same techniques I recommend to my marketing clients to my own situation. That means I’ve got to find ways to get myself noticed around town. What you see at the left here is a poster I whipped up in an hour or so this evening. I’ve secured a one-night gig – kind of a “let’s see if this works” kind of thing. Obviously, I’d like this to turn into a regular gig. So I’m doing everything I know how to do to make that happen. First, we’ll start with promotions. I’m going to print several of these posters and give them to Pizza Hut. I figure that the combination of a nice-looking poster along with taking the initiative to promote my appearance there will go a long way towards helping them see the possibilities. It won’t cost me much to do it, and it will help serve my larger goal of getting my name out there as a musician in Amarillo. With only two days before the gig, I don’t have much time to self-promote, but I figure that anything I can do is better than sitting around and waiting for something good to happen. Read the rest of this entry »
I love TV. I love GOOD TV. And I love great TV advertising. But to be good, an ad has to be engaging, resonant, and memorable. I can’t think of any advertiser in the past, say, dozen years or so that has been as consistently engaging, resonant and memorable as Jack In the Box. Their ads are funny without being too “out there,” resonant without being too earnest, memorable without the need to be repeated ad nauseum, and strike just the right chord about 99% of the time. Let me show you what I mean… Read the rest of this entry »
It’s no big secret that sex sells. What’s surprising though, is when a well-known, established brand, with products presumably in demand, resorts to using sex alone to sell it’s products. Exhibit A: Levi’s. The latest spot from the bluejeans moguls has two twenty-something impossibly beautiful people (both in Levi’s, natch) ascending the stairs on their way to what is obviously a “hook-up” (i.e.: meaningless sex between two people that barely know each other). The young man admits “I’m not really in a band.” The girl offers “I’m not really work for a lable.” The conversation continues, with each fessing up to lies they’ve told earlier. The denouement (if you can call it that) comes when he says, “truth is, I’ve been sleeping in my car.” As she strips down to her skivvies, she airily replies, “that’s okay…this isn’t really my apartment,” as the boy switches on the lights to reveal they are indeed in someone else’s apartment.
Pause with me for a nanosecond, whilst we ponder how many ways this ad trashes just about every moral value I can think of. Read the rest of this entry »
Okay, here’s the deal. From a very young age, my Dad taught me to analyze things critically. We started with TV commercials. (“Dash makes your washer like it’s 10 feet tall!” was a favorite target. My Dad would ask “why would you want a ten-foot tall washer? Would it clean better? Wouldn’t it be more difficult to use a washer that tall?) I learned to go past the hype and figure out what they were really saying, and how they used hype, tricks, and razzle-dazzle like a magician’s misdirection. He taught me to try to get to the meat of the matter – figure out what was really going on, and what they were REALLY selling. These were valuable lessons for my career as a marketing guy – but are coming in handy in what passes nowadays as “real life.” Here’s what I mean… Read the rest of this entry »
I get most of my ideas in the shower, shaving, or brushing my teeth. Why? I dunno. But this morning, my thoughts turned to thoughts about toothpaste, odd as that my seem.
As an advertising/marketing guy, I can’t watch TV spots without analyzing them (any more so than I can go to the symphony and not dissect the orchestra’s performance…such is the price you pay for being a musician). Over the years, I’ve discovered something. The toothpaste ads – all of them – are lying to us. Let me explain… Read the rest of this entry »
Seen the new WalMart logo? Like most good updated corporate identities, it doesn’t stray too far from the old logo. They went with a little less corporate blue, and dropped the all-caps lookfor the more friendly upper and lower case treatment. More interesting is their swapping a star for an asterisk. Read the rest of this entry »
As I write this, the Dallas Cowboys (a.ka. “America’s Team”) is playing a preseason game against the Denver Broncos. And of course, the Summer Olympics are receiving wall-to-wall coverage. Now seems like a great time to talk about sports marketing, particularly as it applies to heroes and role models. Read the rest of this entry »
Comments Off 
Okay, here’s the deal. From a very young age, my Dad taught me to analyze things critically. We started with TV commercials. (“Dash makes your washer like it’s 10 feet tall!” was a favorite target. My Dad would ask “why would you want a ten-foot tall washer? Would it clean better? Wouldn’t it be more difficult to use a washer that tall?) I learned to go past the hype and figure out what they were really saying, and how they used hype, tricks, and razzle-dazzle like a magician’s misdirection. He taught me to try to get to the meat of the matter – figure out what was really going on, and what they were REALLY selling. These were valuable lessons for my career as a marketing guy – but are coming in handy in what passes nowadays as “real life.” Here’s what I mean… 
I get most of my ideas in the shower, shaving, or brushing my teeth. Why? I dunno. But this morning, my thoughts turned to thoughts about toothpaste, odd as that my seem.
Entries (RSS)