Advertising Is Good For You

Apple's online store sold its 50 billionth app this afternoon.

Via CNN

A sign that the advertising industry is recovering quite nicely

According to a survey by the Association of National Advertisers:

Only 15% plan to decrease agency compensation this year, though marketers are still asking shops to lower costs. That's far lower than it was back in 2009, when more than half of the marketers surveyed, 56%, said they planned to cut their agency's fees.

Read more at Ad Age.

 

Number of texts the average teen exchanges per day:

Via U.S. Cellular®
Full disclosure: U.S. Cellular is a current client of Mullen, the agency where I work

Infographic: Social Media in China

I love good infographics. And I have a white-hot loathing for ones that are poorly done*.

This is a great one.

It's full of interesting info about social media in China. (E.g. "91% of the online population in China has an account on a social media site, as compared to 67% in the USA.") And it's presented in a way that's inviting and easy to read.

It was compiled and designed by Go-Globe.com

Click the image to enlarge it or go to Alltop.

* Click here to see an infographic that pissed me off.

10% of all the photographs ever taken were shot in 2011.

— Fortune Magazine, 24 September 2012, page 166

 

The advertising industry has more than one kind of diversity problem

 

Women bring in more

than half the income

in 55% of US households.

 

Women control 80%

of consumer spending.

Yet, only 3% of creative

directors are female.

 

Some advertising agencies are making great strides by committing to racial diversity. Unfortunately, gender diversity in creative departments lags behind, especially at the management level. Read more in an article from Fast Company.

Don't even get me started on the ageism that's prevalent in the ad industry!

And, now, the best of 2012

20 Top Commercials from 2012 according to GB Creative Blog

20 Most-Viral Ads of 2012 according to AdWeek

2012 VIP (Very Innovative Product) Awards awarded by Good Housekeeping

Best Political Ads of 2012 (as of 9/25/12) according to the Washington Post

 

Click here to see the Worst of 2012.

Image via Campus Times

BlueStacks creates outrageously insulting icons for its infographic

This infographic from BlueStacks illustrates the average female Mac user.

It's cute and fun. Until you get to the part referring to average ages. Let's look at a close up.

Okay, it's kind of a blurry close up. And I can't fix it because my husband is the Photoshop wiz in our family and he's not here to sharpen the image. But you're smart. You can see what's going on here.

The icon for women aged 51 to 60 years looks like Queen Elizabeth II. It even includes the monarch's ubiquitous handbag. Trouble is, the Queen of England is not 51 to 60, she's 86.

The icon depicting women over 60 looks like England's beloved late Queen Mother. She was 101 years old when she died.

F*ck you and your ageist icons, BlueStacks.

P.S. This is what 50+ looks like. And, yes, I use a Mac.

The Worst of 2012

Here are a few of my favorite from this year's crop of 'worst' lists.

Worst Product Flops of 2012 from 24/7 Wall St.

6 Ill-Advised Marketing Campaigns that Backfired Hilariously from Cracked

5 Worst Political Ads of 2012 from USA Today

52 Worst Photoshop Mistakes in Magazines from Hongkiat

And my personal vote for Worst Celebrity Endorsement of 2012 Ever

Image via Campus Times

The Calorie Control Council takes all the fun out of Thanksgiving

According to the Calorie Control Council, the average American will consume more than 4,500 calories on Thanksgiving Day.

You can go to the above link for tips on how to be a wet blanket watch your weight on Thanksgiving Day.

Image: Found in Mom's Basement

HR may get suspicious if you don't have a Facebook account

London’s  Daily Mail published a roundup of sources indicating that not having a Facebook account is “suspicious.”

For example, the article refers to a Forbes.com report that:

Human resources departments across the country are becoming more wary of young job candidates who don't use the site. The common concern among bosses is that a lack of Facebook could mean the applicant's account could be so full of red flags that it had to be deleted.

The Daily Mail also refers to a recent article in the German magazine Der Tagesspiegel that noted:

Neither the alleged Aurora movie-theater shooter James Holmes nor Norway’s Anders Behring Breivik had Facebook accounts.

For the record, I don't believe not having a Facebook account makes you more likely to be a mass murderer.

Hat is available for purchase at Zazzle.

It's estimated that one in 20 American homes contains a piece of artwork by Thomas Kincade, The Painter of Light.*

I wonder what the Founding Fathers would make of that?

* Daily Mail

Boomer women account for at least 45% of all $ spent on fashion

Women born in the 1950s and 1960s are spending $47 billion a year on fashion, accrording to numbers released by NPD Group, a market research firm.

That's about 45% of the total that American women spend on fashion.

And that explains the huge advertising budgets devoted to... Oh... Wait...

Via Daily Mail, Answer Bag