26. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

I was quite surprised this Sunday with the 32 million turnout for the Oscars.  If the Oscars can’t pull in numbers with Jon Stewart as the host and nothing still on television then they might as well bag it.  Eighty years running does seem too long and even the Superbowl hasn’t been there for that long.  But going to the all time worst numbers in the the last few years is pretty upsetting, especially to Advertisers.  The worst year for the Oscars was in 2003 with only 33.04 million people watching.  So what went wrong?  It was heavily advertised, had a great host, but the Oscars didn’t add anything new.  Still predictable critic winners and boring speeches.  Bored the first hour and only Jon Stewart kept me awake.  Who cares about short animated films, let’s keep it simple Hollywood!  If the Oscars want to continue going then lets have the best MySpace/YouTube movie or the best Hollywood gossip blogs.  I know Oscars are intended to be classy but it’s not selling.

Information provided from: http://www.variety.com/VR1117981421.html 

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20. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

The days of commercials on primetime maybe a thing of the past.  Radio, Newspaper and Magazine ads will reduce in price, as more and more people folk to the Internet and other non-traditional mediums.  Thanks to a slow economy and Americans getting into worsen credit card debt we will in the coming months see Advertisers fight even harder for the last accounts left.  This years Advertising jobs will be harder to get as the industry cuts back by as high as 10% for some agencies.  The focus will be on cheaper means to advertise and may result in more expensive Entertainment because of the lessen ad dollar spending.  Gen Y prepare for one of the hardest times to get a job in American history.

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20. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

This years Superbowl had something new.  Sands Research decided to research brainwaves on successfulness in ads for this years Superbowl.  What they found was that Coca Cola ’s Macys day parade ad and Bud Lights flying man ad had the highest rate in brainwave connection (activity).  The lowest was from the ad from The Office of National Drug Control Policy.  The ad featured a drug dealer mad about losing customers to prescription drugs.  Also the E-Trade baby and Tide Jabber stain had lower ratings in the brain scans.  What does this all mean?  More research will be coming from brain scanning as companies hold to research driven marketing but still we don’t understand the effectiveness.  Since the research was only done on a select group then we really have no idea how a larger group would respond to brain scanning.  “It’s a wait in progress,” states Sands Research.

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19. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

Advertising Age recently asked Travelocity if their new slogan of getting you anywhere on time even works and the CEO didn’t even have an honest answer.  What about other companies like Toyota’s moving forward or Microsoft’s your potential our passion?  Most consumers especially Generation Y look at slogans as a joke.  They hardly ever even explain what the company is about and most of the time the slogan isn’t what sticks but the brand is.  So why are they used?  The slogans original intent was to remind consumers what a company does but statistically it doesn’t.  Most of the time companies don’t even live up to their slogan and inevitably it makes consumers mad and complain about a slogan more than anything else.  Can this be true and where are we headed with the lonely and isolated slogan?

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14. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

I had to add this video because everyone knows it will bring in the most money from a movie this year. So without further debut the official Indiana Jones 4 trailer:

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13. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

Recently, a study done by Nielson on Baby Boomers found that almost 25% of the Baby Boomers didn’t even know they we’re a Baby Boomer.   Furthermore, the study found that this group hates being labeled by advertisers as the Boomer and would prefer not to buy from companies that labeled them as such.  The real question is, does this fall for any big Generation cohort?  Could both Gen X & Y feel the same way?  Should we stop advertising to age groups but rather the experiences that one would go through in their life?  Some agencies believe that age brings new mediums to advertise too but each age group is so segmented that one can’t advertise to just a Generation.  Others think it’s just a fluke.

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5. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

Does sex really sell?  Well it did during the GoDaddy Superbowl spot, when customers we’re offered to see NASCARS, Danica Patrick nude.  The ad was vulgar and repulsive.  The original ad was banned for the Superbowl.  But it still seemed to pull in viewers, over 2 million went to the website after the ad was aired.  But the CEO of GoDaddy.com did not comment about how many of these customers even bought their service.  My guess is that traffic was high the first day the ad aired and then plateaued after.  Come on GoDaddy, Americans aren’t stupid and won’t fall for the old sex sells theory.  Because it still never goes the way you want.

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4. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

NBC’s CEO, Jeff Zucker, recently said that NBC will be stopping most pilots for fall quarter on.  The reason is because of the high cost to develop them ($10 million a piece) and the low turnover rate for a new season.  NBC points out to HBO and Showtime for their great shows that cost almost nothing compared to what Primetime spends.  “We need to have better writers and go with our gut-feelings more,” he voiced.  Well if thats true they need to start making shows more interactive in order to keep Gen Y glued.  Gut-feelings are crucial but NBC needs to make better decisions then copying other networks and bring back an anniversary season of Seinfeld.

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4. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

NBC’s chairman recently said. “that the big shows on television may be a thing of the past thanks to new mediums.”  Could the Oscars and the Golden Globes be a thing of the past?  Not necessarily.   Especially with the big numbers the Superbowl brought in.  But it’s getting harder for new shows and returning shows to make big numbers with DVD sales options, iTunes downloads and web-casting.  I figure that just the budgets will drop to prepare for new shows this fall season.

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4. February 2008 by bryan.lonn.

This years Superbowl was an exciting match between the Giants and the Patriots. I almost put money down on the Patriots. With their un-beat legacy and Brady as the quarterback, I figured all was lost for the Giants. But in the last quarter some astonishing plays by the Giants let the underdog prevail as the winner. Most viewers that tuned into this years game more than likely stayed till the very end of the game. Most Superbowls have a team stomping the other and the game is almost over by the first half. Since this game carried to the end I bet Advertisers hit their mark for all time slots. This years ads featured may funny and laughable ads, the Car.com shrinking-head and fire circle come to mind. We can’t forget that lovable child for eTrade that puked and had a weird clown in the background.

But my favorite ads of this years Superbowl directed to a Generation Y age gap, came from both Tide and FedEx. Runner-ups would include the Bud Light nerd bar skit, the Cashew nut ugly girl routine and the Bridgestone Richard Simmons workout. The reason I choose Tide and FedEx is because they went with both a creative and engaging commercial. FedEx used pigeons to move packages for a random company and soon realized they weren’t working and started attacking the local civilians. The entertainment value was high and well crafted from beginning to end. The second winner was from Tide and featured a human resource interviewing a potential candidate. Why this commercial is so well related to Generation Y is because of the push to the internet, to learn more and the creativity behind a hard-to-sell product. The ad features the candidate trying to talk about himself for the job when his stain trumps his own voice. Poor move to the possible employee but created a memorable experience full of laughs. These two videos exhibited what Gen Y wants: visual, entertaining, creative and non-traditional ads. I wonder what everyone else thought?

To check out all the Superbowl Ads go to:

http://www.myspace.com/superbowlads

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