Juni 2013

Broadcast Rules: I Guarantee It

Some Friday frippery...

Broadcast Rules. I
Guarantee It.

Last week, George Zimmer, founder of The Men’s Wearhouse,
was fired as their TV and radio spokesman. This made headline news all across
the U.S. and created a firestorm among Men’s Wearhouse customers. I’m just
wondering, exactly who would give a shit if some online advertiser changed
their ad campaign? Who would even notice?

And

The Seven Secrets Of Successful Lazy-Ass Bums

I hate working.

I hate sitting in an office. I hate going to meetings. I hate writing performance reviews. I hate "nurturing" people. I hate listening to bullshit artists and know-nothing loudmouths who dominate our business. Yet somehow I managed to be reasonably successful.

Here are my 7 secrets of success.

1. Assume everyone is faking it. Nobody knows a thing about advertising. All the

It's That Time Again

Once a quarter I make you pay for access to this semi-lucid blog by filling you full of shameless self-promotion. Today is that day.

We're going to start off with the book, 101 Contrarian Ideas About Advertising. We've been the #1 selling advertising book in the U.S. for several months now at Amazon. But today I'm going to throw you a curve and reprint some excerpts from Amazon reviews in the

Historical Novel Society Conference 2013

Very chuffed to see Spirit of Lost Angels highly recommended at the HNS 2013 conference in H.F. "Off the Beaten Path".

Beware Of Marketers With Ideologies

In 1996, Seth Godin had this to say to Fast Company...

"I guarantee you that by the year 2000, Internet banner ads will be gone."
Oops.

Let's be fair to Seth. He's a very smart guy and he has been right about a lot of things. But the problem with the above statement, like so many aspects of marketing these days, is that it is rooted in ideology.

Seth's ideology was "permission marketing."

How To Make Printed Marketing Materials Work for You

The very-talented Jane Dixon-Smith, of JD Smith Design fame, and my fellow Triskele Books colleague, blogs this week about marketing options available to authors. Choosing well-presented, professionally-designed material can make your books stand out from the crowd.
Check out Jane’s advice on this week’s Triskele blog.

Apple Has Nothing To Say

Almost 2 years ago, when Steve Jobs stepped down as ceo of Apple, I wrote...

Advertising will be an early indicator of whether people without vision and taste are moving in at Apple.
One of the things I said to look out for was "Creeping Brandism"...

Creeping Brandism: The Apple
brand was built bottom-up. That is, the products defined the brand.
Virtually every Apple ad was about a

The $7.5 Billion Ad Swindle

There are two outrageous scams going on simultaneously in adland. They are interconnected and both are related to banner (or display) advertising.

The first scam is the unscrupulous selling of online display ads.

The second is the tacit cover-up of frauds perpetrated by online ad networks and ad exchanges.

First, the sales scam.

A recent study by comScore, reported in The Wall Street Journal

Father's Day

This story comes from my book "101 Contrarian Ideas About Advertising."

The Talkative Child

Since Sunday was Father's Day, and I'm sick to death of writing about advertising, I thought I would serve up a little Father's Day reminiscence.

My daughter was a very talkative child. In fact, when we went on car trips it was not unusual for her to talk non-stop for 3 hours. Anyone with a

Half Of Display Ads Not Seen By Anyone

The Wall Street Journal reported yesterday that...

"An astounding 54% of online display ads...between May of 2012 and February of this year weren't seen by anyone...

"A significant number of display-ad "impressions"... are based on fake traffic. Malicious software makes a website
think a person is actually on a page and ads are served up to that fake
visitor. In other scams, ads show up

SPIRIT OF LOST ANGELS SHORTLISTED

A lovely surprise to see Spirit of Lost Angels shortlisted in the Writing Magazine Self-Publishing Awards this year.

Big Data And Appalling Mischief

The snot really hit the fan last week when The Washington Post and The Guardian reported that the US had secret spying programs that are "tapping directly into
the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies."

It was inevitable that our industry's obsession with Internet data collection would come smack up against questions of civil rights and individual liberties. But no one in

Indie-friendly Book Reviewers

Having trouble finding reviews for your indie book? Read my article on Indie-friendly book reviewers in this month's edition of Words with Jam.

Stormy Weather At Yahoo

I am a heavy Yahoo user. Yahoo has been the home page on all my computers since the beginning of time.

However, like most users of most brands, I'm not terribly loyal. I'm just too lazy and disinterested to change.

But lately, despite all the hoo-hah about their new ceo and all the miracles she's planning to perform, I'm thinking of leaving Yahoo.

According to the news reports I've read, she

Everything Gets Bigger

Over the past few weeks I've been mildly obsessed with the damage that globalized ad holding companies have done to the ad industry. Just allow me one more post about it and then I promise to move on to whining about something else.

There is very little good that has come from the consolidation of the ad business. The only beneficiaries have been the sharks at the top of the food chain. So why

Land Of Linkin'

What do you do when you're too lazy to write a post?

Here are some links of interest

Cliche festival disguised as futuristic ad wisdom: Here

My ranting about over 50's confirmed by University of Michigan: Here

I'm shocked, shocked I tell you: "Research" done by online video ad company finds online video more effective than TV. Here

What are the best and worst times to post on social

Triskele books launch at Foyles

Just home after a fabulous, if not tiring, weekend in London for our second big Triskele Books launch at Foyles Bookstore in Charing Cross Road. It was great to meet my lovely fellow Writing Asylum writers in person. Thanks so much for your support everyone, and I hope you had a great time!

The Triskele Books girls: Gillian Hamer, JD Smith, JJMarsh, Liza Perrat, Catriona Troth:

My interview with Gillian Hamer:

My interview with Catriona Troth:

Finally worked out that damn microphone!

The calm before the storm:

Chatting with fellow Writing Asylum colleagues:

The books:

The crowd:

New Author Interview

Many thanks to Lorraine Mace for her interview of me for The Writer's ABC Checklist.

How Many Global CMOs Does It Take To Sell A Can Of Soda?

There's wonderful news from never-never land. The folks at Pepsi are at it again. This can only mean more fun and laughter for the rest us.

Having completely forgotten that their job is to sell sugar-water to pimply-faced geeks in Newark, they are doubling down on their bonehead search for worldwide, universal truths.

They have just hired a Senior VP-Global CMO for the Pepsi Trademark. Don't

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