the thought

Meridith Hinman

I have never been one to plan my life around television shows. When I’m home and have the TV on, I usually find something okay to watch. Now that the invention of the DVR is an option through the cable company, I am hooked. I would hear about all these great shows on NBC, ABC and FOX, but I was never home to see them. Now with a DVR I record a few shows a week, so when I am home and do have the time to watch them, I can watch what I want to. The DVR is great; the best part is when you are watching a show that you recorded you can fast forward through the commercials…or is that the best part?

Working in the advertising industry and especially in the media placement side of advertising the DVR might be putting us out of a job. Is it possible that the value of our advertising dollars on television don’t hold value anymore? On the positive side I have read that the DVR can offer a look at the viewers’ habits and behavior since most devices record user activity in fine detail. Since most DVRs require Internet connectivity, viewers’ information can be stored for marketers use. This still doesn’t help the fact that commercials are being ignored. Don’t you think it’s odd that advertisers’ pay cable companies to run their ads and cable companies turn around and sell a product to their customers that allow them to block the ads?

If the DVR stays around, I think the Internet will become the biggest outlet for advertising, if it’s not already. The Internet has grown exponentially in every way, so it makes sense to say that Internet advertising is definitely on the rise. As for the DVR, I love the concept of watching shows when I want to, but maybe they can remove the fast forward feature? When it really comes down to it, I love my job so much more than the DVR.

03:16 PM | Permalink

Vicky Czarniecki

I’m not sure when it happened, but Americans have become obsessed with celebrity culture. These days there seem to be more tabloids than legit newspapers in any given market. There are even popular blogs devoted solely to celebrity gossip such as perezhilton.com and thesuperficial.com, which, I admit, I check on a daily basis.

Companies are noticing this love affair that America has with celebrities and they are starting to try to use it to their advantage. In the past, American celebrities would only do commercials in foreign countries because they said that they wanted to keep their professional image in the US. Many celebrities are now capitalizing by endorsing products in the US and companies are hoping that everyday Americans will connect with their product because of their adoration for the celebrity advertising it. In a recent episode of 30 Rock on NBC, they made light of this situation. Jack Donaghy (Alec Baldwin) explained to a recently broke Tracy Jordan (Tracy Morgan) that to make enough money to keep from losing his house all he had to do was find a product to put his name on and it would sell. It didn’t matter what the product was because the product wasn’t what was being sold. What was being sold was Tracy’s name and image. Jack told him that people would buy him, not the product. Tracy came back with The Tracy Jordan Meat Machine. Hey George-isn’t imitation the greatest form of flattery??

I can’t help but wonder why the sudden change of heart? Why do the celebrities do it? Is it for the money? I thought they were all about remaining professional. Did they sell out? Or is it more that they want, in a way, to sell themselves? Celebrities have an image that they project to the world. This image has evolved into their brand. When you really think about it, a celebrity is a brand. You have your Tara Reids and Julia Roberts. Why else would they have so many agents, hairdressers and P.R. Reps? By doing commercials and being broadcast across the country on a daily basis they are trying to further their own brand. Plus, they have to find some way to pay for their million dollar homes.

Continue reading "I'm a celebrity...buy my stuff!" »

11:46 AM | Permalink

Meridith Hinman

NBC's hit show “Heroes” was up against Fox's hit show “24” on Monday night. “Heroes” won with a 6.5 adults 18-49 rating, “24” fell behind with a 5.4 adult 18-49 rating. This is the first time that “24” has been bumped out of the top rating for Monday night since the “Everybody Loves Raymond” finale in May 2005. Should “24” be afraid of “Heroes”, or was it a fluke since it was the first new episode of “Heroes” in six weeks? You have to admit that the marketing campaigns for “Heroes” are excellent. “Save the cheerleader, save the world.” Those were pretty great ads, especially for viewers that hadn’t seen the show before, it just made “Heroes” that much more interesting.

Personally, I am an avid watcher of “Heroes”; I haven’t missed an episode since the show premiered this fall. I think the show is entertaining and very intense, I love it! It’s like X-Men, but better. I have to admit that I am biased because I have never seen the show “24”. We'll have to see, maybe one of these days I will record “24” on my DVR to see what it’s all about.

03:41 PM | Permalink

Katie Bastian

You heard it here first!

In my last blog I wrote about the strong influence that kids can have over their parents purchasing decisions and how the trend for marketers to target kids is growing more than ever.

An online article published by the Wall Street Journal on November 9, 2006, further discusses this same phenomenon, and it starts out siting the exact same Toyota Scion marketing campaign to children on Whyville.net that I mentioned in my blog.

The article goes on to talk about other marketing tactics car companies have recently used to target kids. For example:

HUMMER - A HUMMER toy car was given out in McDonald’s Happy Meals in August. The company also started a website called HUMMERkids.com, with games and printable coloring pages. Then, in the fall, HUMMER started making a HUMMER kid’s bicycle, a children’s tent and a number of new ride-on products.

Mazda - Dealerships are featured in Electronic Arts Inc.’s new “Need for Speed Carbon” driving videogame. In addition, Mazda paid for its RX-8 model to be the superhero’s vehicle in the Top Cow Revved comic book series.

And, three unnamed car makers are in talks with My Gym Enterprises, Inc., a chain of franchise gyms around the country for kids between 3 months old and 13 years old, to incorporate miniature vehicles into classes.

The article confirms that car marketers are on the right marketing track. According to a study by J.D. Power & Associates, 62% of parents now say their children “actively participate” in car-buying decisions and 28% of moms say they listen to their children’s wishes regarding a vehicle purchase.

Some call it manipulation of young children, others call it fun and educational. I call it smart.

As I said in my last blog, I believe that car marketers reaching out to a younger audience will build “brand image and lifetime relationships with younger clients because not only do kids influence their parent’s purchasing decisions, but it will also help American carmakers build brand loyalty early in a customer’s life.”

06:22 PM | Permalink

April Thayer

I changed my home page to Google, and put a custom face on it to tickle my fancy. I set up a tree frog that slowly approaches my cursor, a clock with the date, three or four pithy quotes, news headlines from a couple of providers, a couple of Wiki-Hows and Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Day.

I love words. My word of the day delivery system got stuck on “palinode” for a while, so I removed it from my home page and signed up for daily email delivery of the Word of the Day – those Merriam-Webster folks are good Boy Scouts – they are prepared! Today’s word is “retronym.” Look it up.

I was feeling fondly for them until I realized my 17 year old will probably never buy a dictionary in his life. I have three – if I had space for it, I’d buy the Oxford English Dictionary to add to my collection. He’ll go online. What a shame! A dictionary is a work of art.

Well, I’m sure the fine folks at Merriam-Webster have been thinking about the same things. They have word games on their Word of the Day page (like I really needed to know that.) Can’t make much money from that, though…they should have good sweatshirts and hoodies if they don’t already. I have a couple of word freak friends who would like to wear good words, and that would solve that holiday gift problem.

But what else could they sell? Brand extension in the dictionary business isn’t easy. Any ideas?

The campaign I came up with… SAVE THE DICTIONARIES. It has a nice ring to it.

03:12 PM | Permalink

Vicky Czarniecki

I never used to be a huge football fan. (My earliest memory of the game is playing touch football in the backyard with my older brother, being tackled into the dirt and then going off and crying to my mom.) But over the last couple years, my football loving friends have sucked me into their world, and now I can’t get enough of it. Before I decided to watch the games for love of the sport (and the good looking college quarterbacks), the only game I would tune into was the Super Bowl, and even then it was only to watch the ads that would be debuted that night.

Advertisers know that they have a captive audience in football TV viewers. With the advent of TiVo and DVR, live sporting events are one surefire way for marketers to get in touch with consumers. Tie this idea in with the fact that football is America’s game and you might come to the same conclusion as Chevy Trucks.

I saw on the Today Show that the American car company will run their commercials for their Silverado truck model during telecasts of various football games. To add to the American theme, Chevy is pairing these commercials with the new single, “Our Country” by iconic American singer, John Mellencamp.

Why all the patriotism?

Chevrolet is trying to identify with their core buyer, the quintessential American. Pickup trucks are an American automobile, and football is an American sport. Recently, foreign automaker Toyota released news of their desire to gain ground in the pickup truck segment. With competition in the back of their minds, what better way for Chevy to promote their line of trucks than with an American spin to keep their brand in the forefront of pickup truck consumers’ minds?

Numerous other car companies target this group of football viewers (count how many car commercials you see next time you watch a game), and many times car manufacturers sponsor some aspect of the game/telecast. Toyota is currently the exclusive sponsor of the NBC Sunday Night Football Halftime show, show-casing none other than the all new, full-size Tundra pickup truck and the Tacoma. They also have their vehicles showcased on the website for NBC Sports.

The big question is, can Americans be swayed to purchase other truck brands or will they stay as true to their favorite truck as they do to their favorite game? Chevy is counting on the latter.

12:30 PM | Permalink

Happy Thanksgiving from all of us at Thayer Media!

Enjoy your holiday and we will write more on this blog once we recover from our turkey coma!

In the meantime, here is Martha Stewart's advice on how to make the perfect gravy:

Gravy

12:17 PM | Permalink

April Thayer

Every now and then, we get a chance to see a new client’s prior media buys – which for us, in a geek-y kind of way, is a lot of fun. And every now and then, we’re speechless.

Not so long ago, I got to tear apart an executed plan to try and unearth the strategy. (Of course, there was no strategy document, no verbiage to help orient the observer – you always wonder what they tell the new planner or buyer on the account? “Let ‘er rip! Buy low and book now!”)

So here I am, poring over flowcharts and spreadsheets looking for the secret sauce. And what do I find? Household ratings. Huh?

Another case in point: trying to unearth the strategy for an account last year, looking at old buysheets and what do I see? Daytime television for 18-34 year olds. Huh?

Media Matters, Media Dynamic’s bi-weekly e-bulletin about all things media, had an interesting article last week about the myth of demographic targeting. Their point was that, if you watch daytime television, you will consistently see advertising for products that have a target audience of middle demographics. So why do they run during programs that would be considered “out of demo?”

MDI appropriately suggested that this is a classic case of irrelevance for the large majority of viewers to those programs except the ones who are “in demo” and yet, here we are, approaching the media ratings collision with ENGAGEMENT. That would mean that older-skewing television fare couldn’t be as engaging to younger viewers as something more target to them. Can’t wait for the engagement clarification. Will it make any difference at all?

It will make media costs higher. It will make historical data irrelevant. It will make research harder to understand and more obtuse than ever. It will make advertisers angry with their media planners and buyers. And it will make media planners and buyers crazy.

And guess what? We’ll still have irrelevant advertising running in “out of demo” programming.

Guess why? Talk to those advertisers and they will all tell you the same thing: “It works.” “Sales have never been better.” “I know it doesn’t make any sense, but we’re way up year over year.”

So unravel that for me, would you? I have my suspicions but they’re too goofy to share.

08:50 AM | Permalink

For anyone out there paying attention to this advertising-centric blog, you may have noticed that we have been MIA for the last few weeks.

Blame it on the "blogmaster." She felt the need to get married and take a honeymoon to the French Polynesia. And absolutely no blogging was going on in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.

She may have been gone, but the blogging did not cease!

Over the next week or so we'll have plenty of new entries. Elizabeth writes about her latest favorite band, we have an update on some Halloween festivities that took place in our office and we've got some football commentary from a new blogger at Thayer Media.

So please stay tuned, we invite you to return once again to "The Thought" after this blogging vacation of sorts.

01:24 PM | Permalink

Kathleen Destino

Reality Television. The category conjures up distinct feelings in most people. They either love to love or love to hate the category now known as “Reality TV.” In an interview on NPR with Jon Murray, one person often credited with starting the entire Reality TV phenomenon (he co-created the original Real World on MTV in 1992), the interviewer asks, “Can you sleep at night?”

The NPR Talk of the Nation host is not hiding his feelings about the genre.

I love to love a particular reality television show called Project Runway. Maybe it’s the insight into the fashion industry, maybe it’s the dynamic personalities that appear on the show, or maybe it’s just that I love the runway show with the eclectic designs that come down it each week.

Whether you love to love or love to hate the show, credit must be given to Project Runway for its on air success as well as its off air marketing tactics.

According to an article from Media Life Magazine, the show has grown to become the most- watched show among households in Bravo history, averaging 2.88 million viewers. It is currently Bravo’s number one show and the fan base keeps growing.

Their success on air is, in part, due to their off air and online efforts. They have created an interactive environment for their audience, utilizing mobile marketing, blogging, and an ever popular website.

While watching the show, viewers are encouraged to download ringtones to their mobile phone. The choices? Heidi Klum’s signature “Are you in or are you out?” or Tim Gunn’s “Make it work.” Upon visiting the website to download the ringtone of my choice, I found I could receive mobile alerts, download wallpaper from the show, and even “adopt” my very own designer to send me messages on my phone (there is nothing like purchasing famous friends for a small fee).

Project Runway also encourages audience interaction on the website by asking viewers to vote on various topics throughout the show. They ask viewers who should be “out”, who would they like to see return, and who should be the winner of the challenge? All votes are calculated at BravoTV.com and some results are displayed during the show.

In addition to ringtones, wallpaper, and voting opportunities on the website, there are blogs by everyone from last season’s runner up, Daniel Vosovic, to a Runway producer, to the VP of Bravo TV.

The strategies the show uses seem to be working. The same article from Media Life says “Bravo… has served more than 29 million page views and recorded more than 2 million unique visitors for Runway areas on BravoTV.com since July.”

Bravo has created a marketing campaign that appeals to their audience. According to Wikipedia, “Bravo’s target audience is age 25-54, affluent, educated and tech-savvy males and females with high levels of disposable income and who are open-minded.” Bravo has taken the leap from purely traditional advertising and marketing tactics to include a variety of means to reach their viewers. Their inclusion of mobile marketing, blogging, as well as traditional television and print advertising keeps them up to date and popular with their audience.

So far, they have a winner!

10:31 AM | Permalink

Katie Bastian

What do Toyota cars and children under the driving age have in common? A lot more than you might expect.

In the past decade, marketers have realized that kids are key players in household purchase decisions. Little ones have more influence over purchases from food to cars than ever before.

According to a national survey called, “Nag Factor,” commissioned by the Center for a New American Dream:
• “55% of kids surveyed said they are usually successful in getting their parents to give in (to their nagging for a
product they want).”
• Children affect over 60% of the family’s market purchases.
• American children aged 12 to 17 will ask their parents for advertised products an average of nine times until the
parents finally give in.
• Babies as young as six months old can form mental images of corporate logos and mascots.
• Brand loyalties can be established as early as two years old.

With that said, Toyota seems to be on the right track with their latest marketing strategy. The car maker teamed up with Whyville.net, an educational online community of kids ages 8-15, who create their own personas and interact with other visitors, for a virtual promotion of its Scion model.

Members of Whyville.net, a.k.a. “Whyvillians,” earn “clams,” the currency of Whyville.net, by playing educational games. After the launch of this new campaign, hundreds of virtual Scions were purchased using the “clams.” The new virtual Scion owners could custom design their new cars, and drive around the virtual Whyville and pick up their Scion-less friends for a ride, according to an article about this promotion published in the New York Times.

Toyota says the campaign is working. Ten days into the campaign, visitors to the site used the word “Scion” in online chats more than 78,000 times and the community meeting place, “Club Scion,” was visited 33,741 times.

According to Matthew Diamond, the chief executive of Alloy Media and Marketing, “Targeting so-called tweens or teenagers long before they can buy a product is a tactic that more and more marketers are exploring. You are branding your product at a relevant time to the young person. You’re establishing that brand presence and positive association, since important buying decisions are forthcoming. But the key to reaching younger consumers is to capture them before they have any opinions on brands.”

Toyota seems to be right on the money. According to an article from the Associated Press, Toyota’s overall sales numbers are up almost eight percent for the year.

Continue reading "Pester Power" »

02:17 PM | Permalink

Elizabeth Rector

Back when my parents were kids, blowing their allowance at record stores, music genres were served up in sharp and simplistic forms: Rock, Pop, Jazz, Classical, Country. Perhaps these buckets were, as they most definitely are now, all too encompassing.

But when did music genres become as abstruse as the word sounds?

I recently attended the Westword Music Showcase to see three local Denver bands - Mr. Pacman, Machine Gun Blues and Reverend Deadeye. While perusing the performer details I found that Mr. Pacman, a wild assortment of electro reverie and golden-ager calisthenics, classify themselves as Video-game Gangster Rock. That’s a tidy description for a band that makes their music from 8-bit computers and draws inspiration from video game soundtracks.

Reverend Dead-eye, my favorite local act, partakes in an equally exhaustive scrutiny of their art resulting in the Punk-Rock Hillbilly Gospel Blues genre. Other performers included:

Josh Ivy - excelling in Booty Junk Funk
Deviant - mixing the sound of Dark-edged Electro-Rock
Oakhurst - homegrown Rocky Mountain Guerilla Grass

Pacman don’t preach…

…but the Reverend will.

To my surprise, Machine Gun Blues consider themselves a Rock n’ Roll band. It’s not a novel concept, but still begs reflection – how rare it seems to run across something as simple and straightforward as Rock n’ Roll.

It seems like everything my parents know musically has been lovingly slaughtered, dismembered and mended back together in hopes of creating something unique, at the very least listenable, and at it’s best embraced.

Someone get this man a drink!

So while new genres and bands spawn (Gogol Bordello, Eastern European Gypsy Punk) the old genres and bands don’t go away - no matter how much time passes (i.e. the Rolling Stones). This is why the theory of the Long Tail (less huge/mainstream hits and more niche options) is so vital to new music development and propagation.

Fragmentation of music + new genres + hard costs associated with brick n’ mortar establishments could result in new music deficiencies and/or limits. There just isn’t enough room on the CD rack for all the music that already exists and all that is in development.

It would be a hopeless task to look for the High Energy Celtic Pirate Folk Punk Rock section at the local record store (there is perhaps only one band that stakes this claim - the Potcheen Folk Band). What brick n’ mortar is going to assume the cost of housing space for that one band for the ridiculous genre that maybe only a handful of people are genuinely interested in? Everybody loses in that situation – the band, the fan and the music industry.

The good news is that subscription–based services like Napster and Rhapsody and vertical search engines like iTunes allow bands of all genres, no matter how obscure, a place on the digital CD rack.

So get out there and find new music. A good place to start is Pandora, a site that lets you create a radio station based on a particular artist(s) and then plays similar artists as well. Also check out allmusic and NME for band biographies, contemporaries and breaking music news.

10:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Kathleen Destino

It’s a whole new spin on TV dinners, people. Burning the pages of the monthly Mediaweek http://www.mediaweek.com magazine that gets dropped off on my desk, was a short article about restaurants offering personal televisions and Internet access at their tables.

Remember when TV dinners used to be frozen fried chicken and mashed potatoes that families ate on TV trays in front of their favorite Cosby, Family Ties or Full House episode?

Now, apparently, TV dinners are coming directly to a restaurant near you.

The Mediaweek article says that “one in four people say they would watch a small TV while seated at their favorite table service restaurant, and 27 percent say they would have no problem cracking open their laptops if wireless Internet access was available.” I don’t know how everyone else feels, but my intuition tells me this doesn’t seem like the best idea dreamed up by marketers.

Does it make sense for a restaurant to drive people out of their home to spend money at a place that offers them exactly what their home offers? Isn’t part of the “going out to eat” experience getting out of your home, away from your TV, turning off the email and chatting with a friend, relative or spouse?

As a society, we tend to view eating as accomplishing one of two things.
1) Consuming calories, and consuming as many as possible as fast as possible
or
2) Social hour – we’ve been doing this since the grade school cafeteria

So, this TV and Internet idea might be counterintuitive for a couple of reasons. The first being the nature of restaurants, especially in the quick service or casual dining realm. Restaurants want to turn tables. They want you to eat and leave so the next party can sit down. It’s one way they make more money.

I recently heard that one local Denver restaurant actually told their staff NOT to offer dessert. If they offer dessert, the cost of the dessert did not compare to the cost of a whole new table sitting down. Get ‘em in and get ‘em out seemed to be this restaurant’s philosophy. On the same token, customers want to eat and move on. We are not a similar society to Europeans, who can make the dinner hour last for three or more hours and still be at total peace.

If you introduce a television or Internet connection, the customer is probably going to linger longer. They may sip their Diet Coke a little slower or order another round of French fries, but they probably are not going to continue running up a tab (unless you have alcohol and that is a whole other blog). In addition, while the customer lingers at a Village Inn http://www.villageinn.com/ watching a personal TV, a Denny's http://www.dennys.com/en/ commercial might be shown on the program they are watching, and any marketer can see the danger zone that this is leading to.

The second reason is that those that go out to eat for social reasons and to get away from their television and Internet connection are not going to be pleased when they sit down at their table and it is staring them straight in the face. Talk about hitting where it hurts. The concept completely contradicts their expectation.

So, either the TV stays out of the restaurant or the nature of restaurants has to change. Out of necessity, restaurants would have to go from being a function of fulfilling a need – calories or social time – to being that of a “home away from home”. Perhaps like a Starbucks – comfy chairs, nice aromas, laptops, but with burgers, French fries, pizza, ketchup, noodles, pasta sauce the list goes on. I’m just not picturing it.

02:23 PM | Permalink

April Thayer

What was the article I read that said 18-24 year olds consume 20 hours of media inside of seven hours? (The operative word being “consume,” of course.) Could we change that to “witness” or “are washed over by” or “are in the same room with enough devices all running at once to eat the power required to run a Smart Car?” What are we talking about here?

Just because someone can talk on their cell phone and IM with their cousins in DC and have the television going at the same time doesn’t mean they’re consuming media. Just watching my son, I know that one of the three devices would have to stop working to get his attention. Absent a power failure, he’s in another world.

I don’t know what we should call that – partial attention deficit disorder comes to mind - but if that’s going to be the definition of media consumption, a lot of advertisers are going to get mighty short-changed and plenty pissed off!

It comes back to the concept of impressions and the value of an impression has to be protected under some rule, doesn’t it?

All the new media types still have to deliver an impression. All the traditional media types have to deliver an impression. The creative has to be good enough to be engaging. The advertiser has to get his or her money’s worth. And then all will be right with the media world. Provided we don’t have a power failure.

02:14 PM | Permalink

Katie Bastian

In 2003, Cristal was the most mentioned drink in pop music. Artists such as
Jay-Z, Sean Combs, Snoop Dog, Kanye West and Trina have mentioned the champagne in their lyrics. The hip-hop world has given free publicity to this company for over a decade. http://www.allhiphop.com/hiphopnews/?ID=2780

Recently, Frederic Rouzoud, Managing Director of Louis Roederer, parent company of Cristal Champagne, says that the attention his product has received in rap songs is unwelcome. In a special summer issue of The Economist magazine, the interviewer asked if the association between Cristal and the "bling lifestyle" could be detrimental. Rouzaud replied, "That's a good question, but what can we do? We can't forbid people from buying it.” On it’s own website, http://www.champagne-roederer.com/ Cristal is described as “elegant.”

Don’t “elegance” and “bling” go hand in hand?

The goal should be to sell more bottles, not to create negative publicity for your product. It’s obvious that this company wants to reposition their brand to appeal to a different demographic. Marketers spend hours behind the scenes designing campaigns they hope will appeal to their target demographic. So, how do you go about repositioning your brand without alienating customers that have been loyal for years?

I guess we shouldn’t ask Cristal, who has high profile artist, Jay-Z, vowing not to support any of Frederic Rouzoud/Louis Roederer products through any of his brands or in his personal life.

03:51 PM | Permalink

Kathleen Destino

Picture From: http://www.deadlinehollywooddaily.com/first-bo-reports-on-da-vinci-code/

The Da Vinci Code was a hot commodity for a while there, and some of the marketing madness is lingering. I know there are reasons this marketing trend started, but I checked out the facts just to be sure.

The book http://www.danbrown.com/ has been on the New York Times best seller list for over 161 weeks. The movie http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/thedavincicode/ experienced the second biggest worldwide opening of all time, making $224 million in the first weekend (just behind Star Wars 3 at $254 million). And the Catholic Church could not debate the story enough, while the media outlets couldn’t possibly cover more of the debate.

The Major Madness
Some big time marketers are cashing in left and right, and taking a gamble at the same time. You can not only read the book, see the movie, and debate both, but you can go on the Da Vinci Code diet http://www.medialifemagazine.com/artman/publish/article_4876.asp or buy the Da Vinci Code video game. You can even tune in to “Treasure Hunters,” http://www.nbc.com/nbc/Treasure_Hunters/ the Da Vinci Code inspired reality TV show from NBC.

The gamble comes in to play when we consider the sustainability of a trend such as movie hype. We’ve seen the major fast food chains do it for years. They promote movies on packaging and with toys, games, and promotions. It seemed to work for them as we saw it become a continuous pattern in their advertising and marketing campaigns. But can it work for everyone?

Continue reading "Da Vinci Code Marketing Madness" »

03:57 PM | Permalink

April Thayer

My 17-year old son says we’re on the way out as a civilization – he’s referring mostly to the American version of civilization here. He may have a point.

We are a consumerist, self-indulgent society. That’s probably a pretty apt description of Rome before it fell.

If some is good, more is better, all is best. We’re obese, we’re overindulged and we’re far from happy. The child’s biggest complaint is that we have too many choices. He has too many choices, and he’s still just a child (a large one, but a child nonetheless.) Imagine if he could see the adult choices that are around the bend for him.

Barry Schwartz, in his article titled More Isn’t Always Better in the June 2006 Harvard Business Review, references “choice paralysis.” One would think that the axiom holds true: The more choices, the better. Turns out the opposite is true for a lot of people. The more choices we have, the less happy we are with the one we settle on. Sounds like a boom in buyer’s remorse is in the offing.

So what does this have to do with media? Too many choices is a great theme for the current mindset – too many programs on your computer, too many games on your Xbox, too many email newsletters to read, too much direct mail to read, too many shows to watch on television, too many radio stations, too many magazines, too many billboards, and on and on. There’s too much me-too advertising, as well. Is there anything there’s too little of?

There’s too little time, too little thoughtfulness, too little paucity, too little perspective, particularly big-picture perspective. There’s too little client-specific research, too little focus on competitive differentiation, too little patience.

Note: the things on the “too little” list lead to better decisions about the things on the “too big” list.

Is it getting warm in here? Who has the sheet music?

10:39 AM | Permalink

Kathleen Destino

I recently read an article that referenced the following statistics taken from a study by Mintel International.

44% of people reported that they typically avoid watching TV commercials
40% change the channel when a commercial comes on
37% say that all TV advertising annoys them
37% say they don’t like advertising in general
33% remember the products when shopping (yeah for advertisers!)
29% say they find TV advertising interesting
26% say advertising is a waste of their time

What’s with all the negativity? Mintel’s study attributes it to the growing number of networks and channels to watch as well as the growing popularity of DVR services which allow viewers to skip commercials.

I think maybe it’s because of the negative nature of the statements. The majority (71%, in fact) of these statements are positioned negatively. Perhaps, if the respondents had been presented with more positive questions, we would have a more positive view of the way people understand TV commercials.

So I ask… Do you like commercials that make you laugh? Do you like commercials that make you think? Do you pay attention to artistically inclined TV commercials? And will you talk about those commercials to your friends and co-workers later? It is, as they say, all about engagement these days.

09:35 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Kathleen Destino

I recently came across this ad campaign for the Nick at Nite http://www.tvland.com/nickatnite/ channel and it made me chuckle. The final line in the series is:

“It’s 9pm, do you know where your brands are?”

I love these ads probably because we can relate to them here at Thayer Media. The advertisement is speaking to media buyers, such as those at our company, and reminding them of the benefit of advertising on the Nick at Nite channel.

To me, it speaks to two things:
1) Creative and Media have to work together to get the most out of the advertisement. Media is not only about the numbers and creative is not only about the talent. If media buyers don’t know what the creative looks like they could be sending the wrong message to the wrong audience at the very wrong time.
2) Placement is important. I think the ketchup and linens speak for themselves.

We focus every day on where our clients’ advertisements should (or shouldn’t) be placed to maximize their creative advertising campaign. We need to do everything we can to make sure the RIGHT person sees the RIGHT creative at the RIGHT time.

And sometimes it takes an ad about ketchup and linens to remind us of that.

04:34 PM | Permalink

April Thayer

So I was a victim recently of a direct marketing campaign from the United States Postal Service (my tax dollars at work- don’t get me started) which had to be one of the most expensive things I’d ever seen.

It was a die-cut dinosaur, with the words “media plannerus extinctus” emblazoned on the front. And there was a bunch of blather on the back about direct mail, courtesy of their integrated services division. Printed on very heavy card stock – it was quite beautiful.

But, since when do you make friends with people by flashing them with extinction messages? And talk about extinct! I can’t remember the last time I bought stamps for my personal use. (Okay, I admit it, all my bills get sent out under cover of someone else’s postage account.)

Who are they kidding? I sent a postcard back to the office last year from Greenport, LI, and had to use a couple of old stamps I found in the bottom of a summer purse I unearthed for the trip. I don’t buy stamps anymore and now that I’ve been reminded of my status in the world, I don’t want to. So there, USPS – good luck with your future too!

P.S. I want my tax dollars back for the piece you sent me – what’d it cost you?

10:29 AM | Permalink