Chalk One Up For Corporate Advertising

If you are going to mount a traditional advertising campaign, follow the rules completely.

1. Have panache. Assert some personality. Your company has one (hopefully), so what better way to show it than cleverly crafted advertising art?

2. Deliver your message. Enforce the brand image. Show the product. Make them want you.

3. Connect with the audience. Show it at the right time, in the right place. Make sure it is seen by the right people and that it is designed to impact them. No denture ads with buxom young models during Saturday morning cartoons.

4. Follow up. Have a plan to involve your new, interested, taking-time-out-of-my-day-to-wander-around-your-website prospect. Really good offers, thoughtful partnerships, or a payoff are particularly effective here.

All that being said, congratulations to J. C. Penney for their campaign during the MTV Video Music Awards. It exuded persona, showed they can be hip, had interesting and alluring commercials, and was well integrated with the broadcast, both on and off the air.

If you are trying to start a relationship by using the media, take some notes from J. C. Penney's performance, because they nailed it.

Mold For Your Fruit

Every so often, a trend pops out at you. It may even seem downright unavoidable. The train of thought runs you over before you have a chance to think about it. This week has revealed such a happening. Here are three slightly scary examples of the progressing passion for premier produce! Vegiforms are plastic molds inside of which fruits or vegetables are grown. As they grow, the fruits or vegetables are pressed against the mold and when they are removed, out comes an eggplant elf, or perhaps a cucumber clown. Disney , through its Imagination Farms division, is launching the Disney Garden brand of produce. More or less like any other fresh, Florida-grown consumables but with stickers of beloved Disney characters plastered all over. They quote a grandmother who believes that she will be able to have her granddaughter shiver with the same level of enthusiasm over the Disney-laced produce as the young girl does over hot chocolate and candy. Finally, there is the CBS partnership wi...

List Of Convenient Excuses To Avoid Change

1. "That will never work." 2. "That said, the labor laws make it difficult for us to do a lot of the suggestions you put out. And we do live in a lawsuit oriented society." 3. "Can you show me some research that demonstrates that this will work?" 4. "Well, if you had some real-world experience, then you would understand." 5. "I don't think our customers will go for that, and without them we'd never be able to afford to try this." 6. "It's fantastic, but the salesforce won't like it." 7. "The salesforce is willing to give it a try, but [insert major retailer/corporation/partner here] won't stock it." 8. "There are government regulations and this won't be permitted." 9. "Well, this might work for other people, but I think we'll stick with what we've got." 10. "Our team doesn't have the technical chops to do this." 11. "Maybe in the next b...

Le Tour De France

In one of the single, greatest, individual efforts in all of sports, Floyd Landis overcame what should have been an insurmountable deficit to pull himself into third place in this year's Tour de France. He failed miserably the day before and then made up for it through willpower and determination. He will probably win. But that is not the story. The story is that Americans had no idea. While it made front page headlines across Europe, Australia, and Africa, it was on page thirteen of the sports section in the local, metropolitan newspaper. While bicycle racing is one of the less popular sports here in the States, the Tour de France is consistently one of the top two sporting events in the world each year. This year, its attendance and viewership were eclipsed only by the dramatic World Cup . Take a chance to recognize greatness, even if it is outside the boundaries of daily life. Floyd Landis' legendary effort has already been forgotten by the mainstream, even though it ...

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