"We need to be as creative as we can about finding sources of revenues to ease the burden on taxpayers," Mr. Yassky said yesterday. "We sold advertising on newsstands and bus shelters and other so-called street furniture. There's just no reason not to extend that to trash cans."
Works for me.
It's certainly a better idea than advertising on report cards.
Source: New York Sun
Found at the hysterically funny I Can Has Cheezburger.
I get a kick out of seeing ordinary objects turned into paid advertising. Like Portable toilets. Barf bags. And Airplane window shades.
But replacing artwork with advertising is wrong.
The Allegheny County Airport Authority is considering replacing Peter Calaboyias' Silver Grid Wall sculpture at Pittsburgh International Airport with paid advertising.
As if there aren't already enough jokes about why not to visit Pittsburgh.
Source: Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
NTT Communications is launching a test to see if the aroma-emitting properties of its digital signage will make it an effective marketing tool.
Specifically, the signs will be located in an underground shopping mall. While the signs' images will be advertising beer, the aromas the signs will be emitting will be lemon and orange. The signs' effectiveness will be measured by their ability to drive foot traffic into a mall restaurant.
Perhaps they should first have done a test to determine something that relates to beer better than the smell of citrus fruits.
Source: Pink Tentacle
Advertising on airplane fuselages always looks fun. For example...
Trouble is, if the unthinkable happens, all you can do is rush to the crash site with a can of paint, as China Airlines did after one of its planes crashed this summer.
Before China Airlines arrived with paint and brushes to obscure its logo...
After the whitewash, as it were...
SkyEurope Airlines' advertising included the image of a supermodel on its planes.
The people behind FreeMailPost.com have done what many thought impossible: they've come up with a direct mail idea that hasn't already been done.
Here's how it works...
Advertisers pay to put their ads on envelopes. Consumers get the envelopes and postage to use for free in exchange for agreeing to receive email advertising messages once a week.
In Tokyo, advertising makes free photocopies possible.
Source: Adland
A company called Tada Copy (which means 'free copy' in Japanese) allows students at a number of Tokyo universities to make free photocopies on paper that has paid advertising printed on the reverse side.
The photocopy paper even seems to be a better quality than usual; it's thicker than ordinary photocopy paper to prevent bleed through.
Great idea.
Source: CScout Japan
A while back, I posted about rooftop advertising. This is even better. Artfield is a German company that creates crop field graphics (think UFOs and aliens) for advertisers. Take a look...
The Boston Globe is trying something new. The paper is giving advertisers the option of putting an advertising message on a Post-Its-like sticker that is affixed to the front page of the paper.
It's an interesting new medium that could be used in many creative ways. Too bad the company behind this morning's yellow stickie didn't have more imagination.
Today's Globe features a message from a car dealership, with the 'handwritten' directive to "Call Me!" It leaves unanswered the question, "Why should I?"
Nonetheless, I called the number. I got a recording that told me a representative would be on any moment and if I would please stay on the line after speaking with the representative so the recording could ask me some questions about the quality of my conversation with said representative.
Well, okay. Now I know what's in it for the dealer but I still don't have a darn clue as to why I should lift a finger.
Too bad the dealership didn't use the stickie to direct consumers to an online preview of next season's cars -- or a list of bargains from this year's line. Or the stickie could have offered consumers some sort of incentive to come in for a test drive. A discount on post-winter car servicing would have worked great. Heck, just about anything would have worked better than the actual promotion.
Social networking site Facebook co-sponsored a conference over the weekend called 'Authentic Communications -- Examining Social Media & The Online Conversation.' The keynote speaker was FaceBook's VP of Corporate Development and Chief Privacy Officer, Chris Kelly.
I don't know for sure what was said at the conference but I'm betting it was something along the lines of... Social networking sites present a marketing innovation that will revolutionize the advertising industry, change the way companies talk to their customers, blah, blah, blah...
Before you start wondering, "What exactly is a paradigm shift, anyway?" take a deep breath.
Social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace have been made popular largely by the exhibitionist tendencies of the young. These sites do indeed present an exciting, new way to talk to young people. But that hardly means EVERYBODY should start advertising on one of these sites.
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It's become a popular trend to give a brand its own MySpace profile. Which makes sense if your brand is one that young people care about, such as Rocky skateboards, retailer Abercrombie & Fitch or rapper Akon.
But brands like Girl Scout cookies and the Multiple Sclerosis Society now have their own MySpace profiles. Why? Who but a bunch of advertising/marketing geeks will actually go looking for these profiles? Because Facebook and MySpace are websites, my friend. One doesn't accidentally come across a MySpace profile the way one does a magazine ad.
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Remember the dot com crash? Actually, all that crashed were the dumbass ideas that rejected basic marketing principles. Don't forget that the next time someone tries to tell you that your company will be obsolete if you don't slap something up onto Facebook right now.
Addendum (posted 2 April 2007)
The conference, 'Authentic Communications -- Examining Social Media & The Online Conversation,' hasn't happened yet. It will be held on April 24th. Sorry for the misinformation and thanks to Steve for pointing it out!
Source: Wikipedia
