Opportunity Marketing

Is it a coincidence that the home page of Amazon.com is promoting the Kindle as "easy to read in sunlight" and "thin and lightweight" when the recent nytimes review of the iPad says "You can’t read well in direct sunlight. At 1.5 pounds, the iPad gets heavy in your hand after awhile"?

reBlog from thebrandbubble.com: The looming crisis in brand value and how to avoid it

I found this fascinating post today:

The 19th century U.S department store merchant John Wanamaker once famously said, “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half”. And such is the case with measuring the value of brands. While many forms exist, I took the opportunity to write about our model, which relies on measuring the momentum, creativity and vision of a brand. Through BrandAsset Valuator, we are able to quantify the impact of creativity on contribution to building brand and shareholder value. The more creativity, the more momentum and energy and thus the more sales and profitability to the firm.

Read the whole article on Measuring The Contributions of Brand to Shareholder Value at The Brand Bubble by John Gerzema, Chief Insights Officer for Y&R.

Oscar Winning Short - Logorama - Here for the Long Run

I was one of the lucky few...I managed to watch this Oscar nominated and ultimately Oscar winning short before it was removed from youtube. Yeah, now it is no longer available due to copyright claims etc. What you see above is the trailer. The "trailer" of a "short"! The short gets shorter. Remember we are in the world of "tweets" now. No more than 160 characters please. 

Anyway, the idea here is the all pervasive "LOGO". I think anyone who has ever worked in an ad agency will agree with me on the "make the logo bigger" refrain from clients. Even big brands are not spared.

The art of creating a logo is not easy and it has a science behind it. Ever wondered how some logos get imprinted in your minds? Well, those are the best ones actually.

Anyway, logos are an integral part of branding and they are here to stay. So are shorts by the way!

Travel & Tourism Ads

Images via adsoftheworld - Click to enlarge

After my foray into travel writing and my recent visit to the NY Times Travel Show, I am looking a little more closely at travel ads. These ones by Swiss Tourism for instance have a neat layout, a clear message and the right colors. The creative idea isn't out of this world but it pretty much does the job, doesn't it?

Killing a Cause

A recent controversy on a photograph put the ad shown below on the front page of leading newspapers during my stay in India.

"Ex-Pak air chief photo ad goof-up: PMO orders probe" screamed the Times of India headline. Further details revealed that a government advertisement has featured the photograph of a former Pakistani air chief alongside Indian icons in a campaign to mark National Girl Child Day. Really? That's the issue here? 

What about the ad which suggests that the sole purpose of women is to bear children? So what next? Kill women after they have given birth to sons? Female foeticide is a rising concern in India and many Asian societies. And in my opinion, this ad is doing more harm than good to the cause.

On the same day I saw this billboard for the Save Our Tigers project. Notice the difference. I must say that India has a better chance of saving its tigers than its women!

Turn OFF the lights

Image from www.adsoftheworld.com (Click on ad to enlarge)

Advertising Agency: Prolam Y&R, Santiago, Chile

Executive Creative Director: Tony Sarroca
Creative Director: Claudio Wilton
Art Directors: Giovanni Repetto, Fabrizio Capraro
Copywriter: Giovanni Repetto

Can't help but begin the New Year on a cautionary note...and of course, there's not much to explain about the strategy or the message in the print ad shown.

"Save Electricity" should be part of everybody's New Year's resolution. Many people thought that this ad was way too dramatic...but drama's what you need when you want people to sit up and take notice. Believe me, global warming is no hype...it's happening even as I type!