The above picture is a screen-capture from a FoxNews advertisement for GMC.

Notice the copy - "The price on our tag is the price you pay. Not a penny more."

Isn't it fascinating that the price on the tag is the price you pay and not a penny more?

If you're not as fascinated by this statement as I am, say it aloud - "The price I pay is the price on the sticker. Not a penny more."

Wow.

In other words...

"Our product line is so boring, so crummy, that we're trying "ethics" as a tactic."

If you treat customers like idiots, you'll end up with idiots for customers.


Marketers are ruining the American car industry and that is very sad.

BoredRoom Bogus - if it's this bad, you might as well make a game out of it!

A long time ago, a friend of mine had a client that was so steeped in jargon, they'd nearly created their own language. It was somehow gratifying to listen to - it sounded important and confident - lot's of action and decisive-sounding words like "stragization" and "conceptize." Unfortunately, it was incomprehsible and utterly meaningless.

Kind of like listening to a fancy-shmancy French opera only to find out later, the actors were singing the ingredients of soup labels. Who knew?!

Anyway, one of their old employees looked me up and in the course of our reminiscing, I came up with this game.

Click on the pictures for a higher-rez pic that you can download and print out. Then, play-away at your next Bored Meeting!

Merry Christmas!

Validate Me. Please.

A week or so, this ad popped up in Newsweek. It's a double-page ad from American Express touting their new card-product that deposits money into a savings acount every time the holder spends.

This ad illustrates the advertisers perspective on their customers - they are unable to control their lives.

Marketing-wise, the product is a dumb idea, but that's not the point of this post. This is about something dumber - the ad itself.

Poor mother - she wants to buy her kid everything he wants, but somehow can't. Perhaps she's not celebrity-rich. Perhaps she's a bad mother. Perhaps that damnable house payment is spoiling the fun.

And then there's the kid. He won't save. He just won't SAVE! Meds won't work...and there's that unstoppable force called TV...he'll die - yes, die - if he doesn't have all that glorious, life-giving "stuff."

This is called "Learned Helplessness" and its a tactic taught by advertisers world-wide. It's wrong, it's uncreative and it's harmful.

Notice the copy assumes the mother has no options. NO OPTIONS. The only solution is the Amex Card - which, ironically, will not teach her son to save, nor will it get her everything her son sees on television.

I hate this kind of junior-grade copy/creative and so should you.

Amex could have had an effective ad with a completely different take on the card. Since the "savings" is really the same rebate-crapola that Discover™ pioneered 15 years ago, call it what it is and tout the benefits:

How about this -

"Finally, a credit card that saves money. Literally!"

"Instead of racking up points, how about racking up dollars?"

or

"I just opened a savings account for my son while I was buying his school-clothes."


(sigh)

In the meantime, tell the kid to get a job.

PeTA - The Meat & Bones under their Fruit & Nuts

PeTA are to be respected for their marketing genius - they're patient, clever and have a sound grasp of human nature. I remember handling the PR for a State-sponsored Fair when PeTA threatened to visit the sheep exhibits and splash red paint on the prize-winning animals. I can still remember the clatter of metaphorical pitchforks as the farmers and producers rattled their teeth in rage.

"Why, just let me get my hands on their tree-huggin' necks and I'll..." Silly farmers, hunters, and whoever else lets PeTA get under their skin...if the graphic above enrages you, it's simply doing its job.

The cartoon is not meant to convince kids, but to polarize adults. Once lines are drawn, the decision-making process for either side is rather simple - PeTA does nothing more than get people to love or hate them.

"Love or Hate" is an effective business model and it works in religion, politics and promoting social issues.

It's a case of "Three steps forward, two steps back" - a steady desensitization or marketing of a message until it (or a form of it) is acceptable.

PeTA will never "win" and they know that. But their donor base will be loyal, fervent and as a group, long-lived.

Solid work, PeTA!

In the meantime, Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! We're having Turkey, Ham, Stuffed Flounder and on Friday....STEAKS!

Yum!

Break-back Marketing

Hollwood exploits to make a buck. This time, they're exploiting women AND guys at the same time. This time, it's called "Brokeback Mountain." It's about two gay cowboys in Wyoming and it's virulently anti-male. It's a chick-flick man-hater film from the get-go.

And judging by the trailer alone, it's brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. It's like selling touch-less faucets and anti-bacterial spray to the Obsessive-Compulsive. It's like calling a candy "fart" and selling it to 9 year olds boys. It's like putting the Viagra logo on a stock car. It's like...brilliant.


How do we know? (gong sound) Truth is in the marketing, young grasshopper!

The picture above are two stills taken from the Brokeback Mountain trailer and they're all the clues we need.

First - the shirt. Heath Ledger hugs the blue denim shirt left behind by his "buddy", Jake Glynwhatever. STRAIGHT GUYS DO NOT HUG SHIRTS. GAY GUYS DO NOT HUG DENIM. Who hugs clothing? WOMEN HUG CLOTHING. Women hug their clothes. Women covet their clothes. Women share their clothes. Women marry for clothes. Women steal clothes. Women wear clothes once, then pay $200 to put them in hermetically sealed boxes.

WOMEN HUG CLOTHES. Guys do not hug clothes.

Second - the scene where "some actress" says to her gay cowboy husband, "You're not up on that mountain fishin!". ALL GUYS HATE IT WHEN THEIR "WOMEN" COMPLAIN ABOUT THEIR ACTIVITIES.

Who hates fishing? WOMEN HATE FISHING... FOOTBALL... HUNTING... MAKING RADIO CONTROL AIRPLANES... WORKING ON THE 1969 Nova SS AND THE BLOWN 396... Women have been dying for a killer rejoinder to every man who ever said, "Hey hon, this Friday, me'n Gary'n Keith and Wilson are goin' (fishing, hunting, drinking, working on the car, etc.).

From here on out, when ANY guy wants to go do "X" with his buddies, all his "woman" will have to say is, "You're not going there to fish!" and BAM! The guy will reply, "Huh?! You're not - you're not thinkin'...NO WAY!" And next thing you know it, those wonderful Brookies are swimming safe while the guy is sweeping the garage, eyeing his fly-rod and muttering obscenities under his breath.

Men, do not let your women near this movie. It's a Trojan Horse wearing a dress.

And there IS something wrong with that.

YEEEEE HAW!!

THIS IS NOT A "MOCK" POST!

Dangit, but this thing is cool! It's wholly useless and dumber than picking your nose with a screwdriver on a bumpy bus...but in our world of war, famine, celebrities and pavement-bound SUVs, the OCTODOG is pure, pleasurable pointlessness.

In case you don't "get it" by clicking on the photo and headline link, the Octodog maker is a plastic device that changes a hotdog into an edible octopus-shaped "thing."

According the website, it does it SAFETLY. Evidently, people have been making Octodogs at their own peril for some time now... thank goodness for innovation.

Anyway, peace, love and Octodogs.

Born from JETS! JETS! See?!? SAAB's are like mini JETS! Don't you get it?!

SAABs are cool...at least the SAABs of fame like the 900, the Sonnet and the 9000 Turbo. SAAB made fighter planes in WWII and pioneered aircraft technology (yes, jets!) and performed so well that the rest of the aeronautical world muttered, "How the...did they do that?!" But now, SAAB is a sob story in the automotive world.

Fast forward to the 90's when GM bought SAAB. Why did GM buy SAAB? I don't know. But that's not important right now because RIGHT NOW, SAAB is sucking to the point of some $500 million dollars on GM's bank account.

The real question is "Why is SAAB sobbing?!"

A. SAAB was founded on cutting edge technology.
B. SAAB made a market niche on "unique" (remember their funky styling?).
C. SAAB also did the difficult-thing of sharing Volvo's niche of "safety."

Now, SAAB is owned by GM and uses GM and Subaru technology - good, but off-the-shelf. It's styling is no longer distinctive and "safety" is no where near their public image any more.

The "Born from jets" is supposed to awaken us to SAAB's heritage - but where's the Jet-like technology? Where is the unique styling (Hello, GM...Chrysler is all over you on this). Where is the discussion of safety?

Instead, "Born from jets" brings up images of something blown through the birth-canal of a red-hot afterburner - I can see molten metal sprayed out like baby poop...

"Born from Jets" is going to fail. Using a heritage as a sell-job is always a last-ditch defense but even more so when the heritage bears no resemblance to the offspring.

It's too bad - SAABs used to be so cool...back when they actually made jets.

The Emperor is naked no longer.

Remember the story, "The Emperor's New Clothes"?

No? It's about a rich, dumb king who's vanity requires having the best, most exclusive clothing. He's duped into going naked by two crooked (lazy, dishonest) tailors who charge him a lot of money for nothing. The king then parades his "new clothes" to his worshipful public who are too terrified or insecure to point out the king's absurd nudity.

In the end, a little boy is honest enough to call his bluff. The swindlers are fired and the King comes to his senses and covers up his (undoubtedly) icky nudity.

Advertising is like "clothing" - it is the visible representation of a company. All too often "Kings" (clients) are sold "clothing" (advertising) that appeals to their vanity rather than what is true, useful and desired by the customers.

It's very cool that McDonald's is addressing the issue of food quality. McDonald's has been "naked" (barfy food) for too long. But that doesn't mean they are a bad "king" - McDonald's are a remarkable food-distributor and their customers will appreciate a consistent-quality product that uses the miracle of mass-production to provide better prices.

Let's look forward to how the ad agencies (tailors) will convey McDonald's quality and value to its customers.

Maybe art school IS valuable...

I found this graphic in a commonly available clipart library.

Interestingly, the only person who seems to notice anything wrong with a one-legged woman* giving birth to a 6 year old is the doctor - and he looks positively scared out of his wits.

Would hate to see the c-section version of this little gem.



*Or maybe the baby ISN'T waving and that limb is actually mom's other deformed leg.

And since when do pregnant woment NOT have breasts?! Uh-oh -what if that's not a woman at all but a...?!?

Put a million Graphic Designers in a room with a Mac...

When I was a little kid, I remember listening to a group of my parents friends talking over cocktails. The conversation was steeped in importance and scotch - the prattle of big words mingled with the tink of booze-coated ice cubes.

Anyway, one of my dad's friends - "Paul" - said (rather pithily), "You know, it is said that if you put a million chimpanzees in a room with a million typewriters for a million years, they'd eventually type the Declaration of Independence!"

Judging from the five logos shown in the graphic above, the same monkey-million philosophy applies to Graphic Designers, too - give a million designers a million Macintoshes and eventually, they'll come up with the same logo.

Look for yourself - it's the SAME LOGO. Five different clients, five different proposals, five different invoices, five different checks, five different bank accounts. SAME LOGO.

At least Quark had the brains to trademark it, so I guess they win.

[Thank you to my buddy Lapwin in the Netherlands for this information - if he and I were on a desert island for a million years, we'd never agree on anything and we'd get along just fine.]