marketing synergy: Mad Men goes Barbie

Brilliant marketing move for two companies: the newest line of Barbies will include men-Mad Men. According to the New York Times today, Betty and Don and Roger and Joan dolls will launch in July to help promote the start of Season 4.

Mattel will issue 7000-10,000 copies of each doll but you won't find them in toy stores, only in specialty stores and two websites: amctv.com and barbiecollector.com.

Of course, dolls come with period accessories like fedoras, pearls and padded bras. But no cigarettes, ashtrays or cocktail shakers. Ironic that Betty can smoke and drink while she's pregnant but not while she's Barbie.

why i'm on a horse isn't where's the beef

Since the Old Spice commercial launched on the Superbowl, "I'm on a horse" has entered pop lexicon. It's been a frequent retweet on twitter where the guy on the horse, of course, has his own account. It's engendered countless blog posts and news nods and chatter on Facebook and even interviews with its creators from Wieden and Kennedy who explain how the spot was a accomplished in a single, incredible shot. (57 takes)

Ad phrases that become catch phrases are nothing new, but what is new is that the commercials that spawn them are now the beginning, not the end of consumer engagement. When media flights for "spicy meatball" and "where's the beef?" ended, so did consumer involvement with content. But now the impact of brand messaging only begins with traditional ad buys, if content is compelling enough to inspire people to share it. The Old Spice spot has already exceeded 7 million views on youtube, numbers achieved because the spot went to social networks in conjunction with (not instead of) conventional buy on TV. (When Google gamed the value of running TV, its Superbowl spot which had been on youtube for weeks, jumped from a few thousand views to 4.4 million today.)

Evidence of even more successful engagement is when consumers not only share but repurpose content, inspired to spread the brand story themselves. As in this parody where Old Spice content is appropriated to spoof Apple. Why is appropriation good, some marketers may wonder, holding tight to their proprietary decks and brand bibles? Because consumers who not just share the story but participate in it, tend to be avid enthusiasts whose WOM messaging is likely to achieve far higher conversion rates.

According to Facebook, Old Spice "has been helping guys improve their mansmells for 71 years." Interestingly, the babe-baiting strategy behind "I'm on a horse" is the very same one executed in this spot from the 80s. One can only guess how creative impact might have been extended if social, um, tools had been in place.

brand fiction wins big at Shorty Awards

The 2nd Annual Shorty Awards (for Twitter content) were held last night in Times Square and I'm thrilled to report that @BettyDraper won a Shorty in Innovation. Just as exciting for me was the fact that it was a big night for brand fiction. @FrankAdman (fictional art director from the 1960s) won for Advertising and @TrueBloodHBO (official profile of the show) won for Entertainment. Proof that a new kind of story telling for brands is getting attention.

A winner in the Brand category was @SesameStreet (tied with @WholeFoods) and one of the highlights of the evening was the chance to meet Grover and his "handler" Eric Jacobson.

For the first time, winners were chosen not only by popular Twitter vote, but by judging of a newly formed Academy whose members include Kurt Andersen and David Pogue. Congrats to the winners:

Advertising
Frank Adman, @FrankAdman
Application
TweetDeck, @TweetDeck
Art
deviantART, @deviantART
Brand (two-way tie)
Whole Foods Market, @WholeFoods
Sesame Street, @SesameStreet
Celebrity
Nathan Fillion, @NathanFillion
Cultural Institution (three-way tie)
Jonah Holland of the Lewis Ginter Botanical Garden, @lewisginter
Reduced Shakespeare Company, @reduced
Poetry Society of America, @Poetry_Society
Customer Service
Bonnie Smalley, @ComcastBonnie
Design
Smashing Magazine, @smashingmag
Entertainment
TrueBlood HBO, @TrueBloodHBO
Finance
Suze Orman, @SuzeOrmanShow
Food 
Foodimentary, @Foodimentary
Government
Cory Booker, @CoryBooker
Health
Rachael Dunlop, @DrRachie
Humor (two-way tie)
David Thorne, @27bslash6
Mrs. Stephen Fry, @MrsStephenFry
Innovation
Helen Klein Ross's Betty Draper, @Betty Draper
Journalist (two-way tie)
William Bonner, @realwbonner
Rachel Maddow, @maddow
Literature
Arjun Basu, @arjunbasu
Music (two-way tie)
Ivete Sangalo, @ivetesangalo
Ted Leo, @tedleo
News
The Diane Rehm Show, @drshow
Nonprofit
To Write Love On Her Arms, @TWLOHA
Politics
The Nation, @thenation
Science 
Jen Scheer, @flyingjenny
Sports
Bill Simmons, @sportsguy33
Tech
Mark Watson, @soldierknowsbest
Travel
Paul Smith, @twitchhiker
Weird
The Llama, @DoWhatITellYou
Special Humanitarian Award
Carel Pedre, @carelpedre

david ogilvy on the future of advertising

There's been a lot of speculation lately about the ad agency of the future. Ironically, I've been reading a new book about an ad man from the past and I'm struck by the prescience of David Ogilvy. He famously insisted on the superiority of advertising that provides measurable results. Ogilvy, Benson and Mather (as it was then called) was the first ad agency to integrate direct marketing (the ancestor of digital) into traditional campaigns. His preference was informed, no doubt, by his experience as a door to door salesman. He began his career hawking stoves, of all things. Not exactly an impulse buy. (Especially to canny Scots in the depths of a Depression. He learned to go around to the back door, to sell the cook first because if she didn't buy in, there was no hope of making a sale to her employer.)

Here's a few Ogilvy mantras that ring as true today as they did in the typewriter era. (Ogilvy never actually used a typewriter, he wrote longhand using only freshly sharpened pencils. For other untold tales about D.O. from the POV of a man who worked with him for years, pick up Kenneth Roman's excellent--and first-- biography King of Madison Avenue.)



The public is more interested in personalities than corporations.

This never changes. The only time someone wants to talk to a corporation, is when they're trying to wangle a refund from it. It may be the age of "conversational marketing" but consumers won't engage with a monolith company unless they're given a reason to do so. (See Alan Wolk's now-famous post on this topic.)

It has been found that the less an advertisement looks like an advertisement, the more people will stop and look at it.

Hence the rise of embedded marketing, iphone apps, branded entertainment and widgets.

You aren't advertising to a standing army; you are advertising to a moving parade.

Of course, the parade moves a lot faster now, and to many more places. Still, a brand message must move nimbly with it.

Every advertisement must contribute to the complex symbol which is the brand image.

A brand message has to live in myriad environments these days, but no matter where it goes, it must carry the same DNA and core values.

Our business is infested with idiots who try to impress by using pretentious jargon.

In his day it was "suboptimize." In our day it's "folksonomy" and "glocalisation" and other words meant to make consultants appear worthy of exorbitant day rates.

Advertising isn't an art form, it's a medium of information.

Ogilvy alienated some colleagues by speaking out against over-the-top TV production extravaganzas and awards. He was interested only in creating messaging that produced results for the client. Here's a pep talk he gave (virtually) to one of his direct response departments. Just substitute the word "digital" for "direct" and it makes for an informative webinar.

Campbell's new label ingredient: biometrics

According to the Wall Street Journal, Campbell's is changing its iconic label in an effort to (duh) make people buy more soup. They spent two years researching package and logo designs by tracking microscopic changes in skin moisture, heart rate and other biometrics to see how consumers react to them. This "neuromarketing" approach is an attempt among consumer-good companies to understand how consumers respond to marketing and advertising.

In interviews, participants said the soup pictured on the can and shelf labels didn't look warm, so steam is added in the new label. And the big spoon full of soup provoked little emotional response, so it was removed.

The company hopes the label and display changes will help shoppers connect on a deeper level to the products and boost its condensed soup sales by 2% over the next two years. Hmmmmmm, good luck with that, Campbell's.

Full article here.

film promo goes beyond trailer, to retailer

Olympics got you hankering for a higher performance bod? Check out a new website where you can put in an order for a bionic arm that "handles twice the load of a human arm" (special 2 for 1 pricing) or a human heart "guaranteed to give you the blood pressure of an Olympic athlete." Faux site may not sell many organs but my guess is, it will be brilliantly effective at what it's intended to do: get you to shell out $12 for a ticket to an upcoming film. Repo Men, starring Jude Law as reclaimer of bionic body parts from unfortunate buyers behind on their payments, is due out March 19. Faux website courtesy of Goodness Mfg, LA ad agency staffed by creatives from Crispin.

Found on AdFreak

Dodge Superbowl spot generates direct response on youtube

Thank god it's the era of CGC and youtube so that Dodge's $3 million man-as-endangered-species spot could be rebutted for a fraction of the price by New York-based writer/producer MacKenzie Fegan. Her skillful parody airs views from Venus. Or is it Mars? I can never remember. But hey, how come only the guys get the car? (Full transcript here.)



Fegan is someone Dodge's agency W+K might consider wooing to Portland. They're in dire need of a female car creative out there, if this spot on Dodge's youtube channel is indication of what they think women want.

found in the twitterverse, via Edward Boches