Reality versus reporting

Something very interesting happened this Black Friday…it went well for retailers. But it wasn’t expected to. The news media kept reporting that sales were expected to be lower, with fewer people shopping and shopping for fewer items. In fact, they reported this while they reported that people were camping out for sales and even that [...]

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New selling points

The economic-banking-credit crisis has spawned some new advertising selling points and language for financial institutions. These seek to reassure current and potential customers that their money-investments-assets are safe.  For instance, SunTrust Bank is using a new tagline: “Live Solid. Bank Solid.” Obviously, solid is a good word to describe a bank, especially in light of [...]

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Publicizing your image

Nothing makes a celebrity like publicity. In fact, without publicity, there would be no celebrities. Yet, we often hear of scuffles between celebrities and the paparazzi or stars taking tabloids to court. Of course there is a not so fine line between publicizing and slandering, and anybody should be careful of crossing that line.  Some [...]

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Fast food is healthy

As if. But MacDonalds, the king of marketing, would like you to believe so. Or at least it is trying to use mothers as emissaries for this message–they call it their “quality correspondents program.”  I am not making this up. It is reported in today’s Washington Post, and it is an attempt  to maintain already [...]

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When does it become too much?

In the case of Verizon FIOS, about 100 million messages ago. OK, I am exagerating, they could have stopped at 1000. In all seriousness, Verizon is marketing the hell out of FIOS. They want everyone who has ever been near a Verizon phone to sign up.  There is TV advertising, telemarketing (these people have been [...]

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Churches…advertising?

OK…now I have heard all types of advertising. I am listening to a rock station here in DC and a local church just advertised its “services” (almost a wordplay, right?).  The speaker (hard to say if it was the pastor) quoted, get this, the SPICE GIRLS (about stuff in your past). If this is not [...]

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It’s a new day

That’s the name of a new song by Will.I.Am (most clever singer name ever, IMO). But it is also a new day in marketing. Marketers are trying to find new ways of doing old things–that is, getting people in the door (and better yet, to make a purchase). A couple of stories in the Washington [...]

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Where there is chaos there is opportunity

I was just watching television and I saw a response to the credit crisis. It is something called Purchasing Power. Apparently, it is a payroll deduction system for paying for stuff you can’t  afford. So instead of paying a credit card issuer, you have your pay docked each pay period until you pay off your [...]

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Political communication is a two-way street

Well, it finally is here. Election Day. Never before in my lifetime have I seen such a long election cycle, and yet so much interest. We have seen positive ads and negative ads. We’ve seen staying on message and going off message. We saw how the current economic situation shifted the message. But the bottom [...]

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Is it time for a change?

There is a pizza joint across the street from my building. It’s one of those take-out/delivery places that also serve subs and other greasy food. A couple of weeks ago, there was a sign posted that it was under new managements. And then, the renovations followed. They added floor to ceiling windows, painted the place [...]

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