Advertising Is Good For You

Christina Aguilera in new Stephen Webster jewelry ads

The campaign is scheduled to debut in the April's W Magazine.

Great Branding Ads for Altoids

Source: AdPunch

Anti-Drinking and Driving Ad: Paris Hilton as role model?

After being arrested for driving while intoxicated, Paris Hilton appeared in the following ad for Seventeen magazine. (Click image to enlarge.)

Considering even tweens know what a publicity hound Paris Hilton is, I doubt this ad will have much effect beyond generating laughter.

Source: AdPunch

Unisys has achieved the holy grail of B2B new business development: a sure-fire way to get the attention of the C-level executive.

Information technology company Unisys is executing a highly-targeted -- and highly-unusual -- new business effort.

When the newest issue of Fortune lands on the desks of 20 select CIOs, there should be some audible gasps: according to The Wall Street Journal, the cover of each executive's issue of Fortune will feature each executive's own face on the cover. The back cover of each issue will include a personalized letter from Unisys.

Can you imagine the smile creeping across these executives' faces as they peruse their magazine?

More to the point, can you imagine these executives not taking a call from Unisys?

Extra Credit Points

In my humble opinion, most B2B tag lines are crap. Unisys' tag line is a notable exception that receives my highest praise: I wish I'd done it.

Advertising to Women: Men Don't Always Get It Right

AdJab reported last week that fashion house Badgley Mischka had hired actress Sharon Stone to appear in a new print campaign for its evening gowns. I couldn't see why they would choose an actress who's not particularly popular with women and hasn't had a hit movie in years (that was my polite way of calling her a has-been).

I left a comment to this effect on the blog.

A few hours later, some nasty (and cowardly because he didn't leave an e-mail address) person who called himself AdMan entered a post about how "hot" Sharon Stone is and added a rather hurtful personal dig at me. (You want to read it? Click here and scroll.)

Interestingly enough, the next day's AdJab reported about a new study from the University of Florida, Gainsville that suggests showing glamorous and seductive models in ads turns women off. And the survey points to the wide disparity between what male executives think will appeal to women and what actually does attracts women buyers.

Sharon Stone is wrong for Badgley Mischka. I was right. And AdMan sucks.

 

From Out To Launch, A New Print Ad Introducing Dark Chocolate M&Ms

It's Awful Advertising, But Very Entertaining

Click here to watch it.

Note: Clicking on the arrow on the TV screen above won't do you any good because You Tube -- the link where the spot appears -- doesn't yet support, Typepad, my blog service. Sorry.

Very Odd TV Commercial

This TV commercial for Juicy Fruit gum is just creepy. And not in the good, planeful-of-snakes way, but more in the car-wreck-you-have-to-
stare-at kind of way.

Pay Attention to What Your Competitors Are Doing

It's a no brainer.

Or so you'd think.

Cadillac and its advertising agency, Modernista, just debuted a new tag line: Life, liberty and the pursuit.

Nice.

Except that Honda and its advertising agency, RPA, introduced the SAME EXACT TAG LINE just months ago.

Source: AdFreak

Dirty Magazines (It's Not What You Think)

Purell, the hand sanitizer, and its ad agency, JWT Toronto have found an interesting way to remind people of the importance of washing one's hands.

They've distributed to physicians' offices yellow stickers to be affixed to the covers of the magazines in their patient waiting rooms. (You know the magazines we mean. The dog-eared issues that are still wondering when Brad and Jennifer are going to have a baby.)

The bygone issue dates of the magazines are visible through a hole in the stickers, resulting in cautionary headlines such as:

Thumbed through by sick people since May 2005

Exposing patients to more than germs since June 2004

Gently sneezed on since January 2006

Each sticker features a call-to-action encouraging the reader to visit WashYourHands.tv, which links to the Purell website.

It's a very clever idea, but why would doctors' offices want to remind patients that doctors are providing germ-infested publications? And wouldn't patients -- especially the ones who are sick with the flu or some other misery that's passed on by germs -- be thinking, "NOW you tell me, after I've already touched this foul thing?"

Purell should have provided physicians with a meaningful incentive to use with these stickers -- such as an ample supply of free samples to be placed alongside the be-stickered magazines. Physicians would feel they were educating their patients. Patients would appreciate the gesture. And if the samples' labels included the website, Purell would have a snowball's chance of actually driving some visitors to that site.

Source: AdFreak

This Is Just Wrong

I’ve always loved Altoids' advertising. But this TV commercial for Altoids Sours is so awful one wonders if it isn’t a parody.

Nope.

Altoids really did this.

There are two other spots in this advertising campaign, one dealing with transvestism, the other with sadomasochism. Like the first spot, these also have a creepy 1970s edge to them.

Eeeeeeeeeeew.

Which Do You Like Better?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. I know I’m obsessed with this movie. But movie posters count as advertising, so it all works out.

Here are the English and French language versions of the Snakes on a Plane movie poster.

Admittedly, four years of high school French don’t qualify me to make a balanced assessment.

Nonetheless, I’m going with the English version. Because it shows really scared people but not WHAT is scaring them. And as anyone who’s ever watched an Alfred Hitchcock movie knows, few things can scare the bejeepers out of you as well as your own imagination.

Click on images for larger view.

Source: I Watch Stuff

Have Some Candy

This is a wonderfully deviant spot JWT did for Sour Patch Kids, the candy that's very popular with teens and college kids. Although it ran in movie theater kiosks two years ago, the spot recently made its TV debut.

Source: MediaPost