Innovative Advertising

Powerful Ads Resonate On YouTube
January 25, 2007, 10:11 PM
When I see a great ad on TV, I know I can go straight to YouTube and find it already uploaded. And once it gets there it will be virally sent on it's merry way. Here's one I got from a fellow blogger and mother of two via email this week. She's probably sent it to a hundred people, knowing her as I do, and she probably got it after it had already reached 500 people. Project that out to it's probable reach and this ad is getting more free play than it got actual TV airtime.

Mr T At Hitachi
January 23, 2007, 1:43 AM
I was alerted to this imaginative ad of Hitachi 's, featuring Mr T, by a friend and fellow blogger and marketing junkie , Jeremiah Owyang. This one's really funny, and aids Hitachi by showing that the sometimes stodgy company knows how to have fun (great way to soften their image).

Testimonials, For The Win
January 22, 2007, 12:42 PM
I´m in Las Vegas today, covering the Affiliate Summit West , and as I was touring the Forum Shops at Caesar's Palace, I saw the Banana Republic store with their testimonials smeared all over their glass fronts, touting the fit of their pants. The first thought that popped into my head was, "Hey, I´ve heard they have great pants, I should get a pair and see if they fit me as well"?¦". I turned to my husband, aka the camera man, and told him we needed to try their pants. And as I was explaining that I´d heard they were ...

Mountain Dew Mashes It Up
January 19, 2007, 3:32 PM
I'm heading out the door to go to the Affiliate Summit , but I had to share this Mountain Dew viral with you. Look for a followup at the Super Bowl, if my guess is right. Currently at 23K views, and was just posted on January 5.

Getting Users To Make Your Ads
January 10, 2007, 10:14 AM
I am seeing a trend lately in companies who are choosing to go 'user gen' in their ad creation, not to mention using YouTube in their advertising plan . Today's example is Dove. Now, Dove is an old-lady's brand, with little relevance for today's younger consumers. The stodgy brand is attempting a more youthy feel by direct placement on YouTube and an appeal for homemade advertising. It's a bold move, in that most of what they'll get is derision on YouTube, but as we've seen with Scoble and what ...

Co-Marketing Widens Both Of Your Audiences
January 08, 2007, 10:46 AM
One of the least expensive and most effective ways to get your brand in front of more people is to join forces with another company. I recently saw it with Moo and Flickr, and then again with Moo and Skype . But today's co-marketing innovation goes a step further and takes two smaller web 2.0 companies and sees them integrating their marketing in a more subtle way. I'm a happy Meebo customer, username: Duzins. Well, customer is probably stretching it, as Meebo is a free service, but I can't stress how much I love the fact that this IM client ...

Bend Over Backwards Customer Service
January 02, 2007, 8:52 PM
I love to see a company step out beyond the norm and really treat me like I matter to them. Of course, it's not the norm. Recently at Sonic I had a cup holder thrown AT ME in my car window. At McDonalds I was given a chocolate milk in a kids meal that had no seal and was half empty. Clearly the item had been consumed by an employee, yet calling them to complain only took me to a fax machine, repeatedly. Verizon forgot to put insurance that we asked for on our phones and because we didn't notice ...

Advertising Your Church
December 22, 2006, 11:36 AM
YouTube has become a much more acceptable way to promote a product, and I'm seeming more and more successful church advertisements make it onto the front page. Here's one of the most popular videos for today, advertising a church in Nevada (Central Christian Church in Las Vegas). Here's another, that's gotten subscribers even, promoting their church and their message that traditional doesn't always mean better. It's been favorited 145 times. The others in the series are here: Part 2 , ...

Update: Control Room and Ford Pull Crotch-Shot Ads
December 19, 2006, 12:33 PM
SVP of Digital Entertainment at Edelman , Matthew Grossman sent me a tip that Control Room had pulled the offending ads. The statement follows: December 19, 2006 "It has come to our attention that the intended placement of certain online ads planned by our marketing department would have been inappropriate given the content on, and context of, the targeted sites. Control Room is in the business of delivering the highest quality live concerts from leading artists to digital platforms and such advertising tactics are not consistent with our vision or marketing practices. The ads have not yet been posted and ...

Ford's Bold Porn
December 19, 2006, 8:03 AM
Ford's advertising for the Edge was the focus of yesterday's column, but today we'll look at the crotch-shots that Ford's ads will be appearing alongside in the coming months. Control Room, formerly Network Live, is in charge of producing the upcoming Pink concert to air on MSN Music. The concert will stay on MSN for six months. However, it's the shorter-lived ads that are causing the controversy. The ads that pitch Pink as a modern-day feminist compared to Lindsay Lohan, Paris Hilton and other celeb-tarts, will run on PerezHilton.com, TheSuperficial.com and TMZ (AOL's gossip blog). The ads are promoting the ...