Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, Attitude & Aptitude, Brand Suicide, Confidence, Crap Campaigns In History, Creativity, Culture, Cunning, Embarrassing Moments, Great Ads In History, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Wieden+Kennedy
So I recently saw this ad in the tube.
To be fair, it caught my eye more than most tube ads but there’s something about it that just doesn’t feel right.
To be honest, I’m not really sure what it is.
Maybe it’s that they are advertising viagra on a transportation device that is long and hard?
OK, it’s not that.
Maybe it’s the fact they call it Viagra Connect?
It’s not that, but it doesn’t feel right either.
Oh I know, it’s the fact the company website is GetEddie.com
This bothers me for a bunch of reasons.
One of them is that asking a bloke called Eddie for erection help feels very, very dirty.
Alright, that might just be me, but it just feels very under the counter when the whole premise of the ad is that it’s not something to be shy or scared of.
But more than that, it’s the website that really makes me uncomfortable.
You see while I am sure GetEddie is meant to be a play on ‘Get Ready’, it also feels like it’s trying to imply ‘get head’, which just seems pathetic to the core.
However – and it’s a big however – I appreciate this view may say more about me than the people behind Eddie, because lets not forget the time I thought an Old Spice campaign we did at Wieden – called Smellcome to Manhood – was a play on words about teenage boys experiencing puberty, when in fant it was literally just a pun on the word ‘Welcome’.
The creative team avoided me like the plague after that, which is a shame, as it was one of my favorite Old Spice campaigns.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Advertising [Planning] School On The Web, Attitude & Aptitude, Brand Suicide, China, Confidence, Crap Campaigns In History, Creativity, Culture, Cunning, Embarrassing Moments, Marketing, Marketing Fail, Nottingham Forest, Planners, Planners Making A Complete Tit Of Themselves And Bless, Planning
So today was supposed to be the APSOTW results, but I’m still waiting on one more bit of feedback. I really, really hope that will come in soon so we can put everything out next week.
Sorry.
Fortunately, I can fill this post with something else …
Not as good – or as wanted – as the APSOTW feedback, but pretty mind blowing all the same.
When I lived in China, there was an unspoken rule that if a company did something successful, there would be hundreds of copycats in the blink of an eye.
I wrote about this a bunch of times with possible this one being the finest example of it.
Well, while it hasn’t happened quickly and it’s only been copied once, it has come to my attention that a planner in China has paid me the ultimate compliment by blatantly copying my old blog header [designed by Jill] for their own thing … including the name of it.
Take a look at this …
I suppose I should be offended but I think it’s bloody fantastic … though I do worry about the ramifications for this persons career.
Not because someone who is paid to have original thought has shown they would rather steal, but because to openly and publicly associate with Queen, Birkenstock, Nottingham Forest and me is basically ruinous.
This is not the reason why I haven’t mentioned their name in this post – though if you work in advertising in Shanghai, you might recognize this senior positioned, big named agency planner by her face – it’s because their posts are way better than mine [even they draw the line at copying them] and I don’t want to lose the last 3 people on here who come along to insult me.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Apple, Attitude & Aptitude, Confidence, Culture, Customer Service, Embarrassing Moments, Experience, LaLaLand, Standards
So before I left LA, I bought a new iPad.
Please note the words, “I bought”.
Yes, Bazza, Rodi and David were all too tight to give me one.
Pricks.
Anyway … one thing I found interesting about shopping at Apple in LA was that the people who worked were quite different to those I found in other markets like Shanghai or Singapore.
Sure, they were as knowledgable and – generally – as polite and [semi] helpful as their continental cousins, but they were all a bit Stepford Wives … that is if Stepford Wives looked like LA Hipsters rather than Virginia housewives.
But there was an exception, this guy.
Yes, that really is a genuine Apple staff member.
Now maybe he’s wearing pajama trousers and a cycle helmet because he woke up late for work and had to rush on his fixie [it’s almost certain he has a fixie] to get to Manhattan Beach on time.
Or maybe he’s fell off his bike a week ago, bumped his head and was rushed to hospital so now he is better prepared for either a bike accident or being put in a hospital bed.
But whatever the reason, I have to say he was a breath of fresh air to the kale-consuming Mr and Ms Perfect’s in the store and I was kinda disappointed he didn’t serve me.
Or I was until I saw he was wearing a ‘please notice me’ red iWatch strap, had tattoos and walked around the store like he was Mick Jagger on stage and then realised he wasn’t a victim of circumstance, but one of those people you meet all the time in LA … a ‘slash’ person.
Waitress/Model.
Barman/Actor.
Apple Retail Store Representative/Rockstar.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Agency Culture, America, Attitude & Aptitude, Business, Communication Strategy, Creativity, Culture, Egovertising, Embarrassing Moments, Marketing, Marketing Fail
This headline came out in AdAge not that long ago.
For me, it says more about the state – and ego – of advertising than it does about the state of the environment.
Don’t get me wrong, a company who is doing something positive is a wonderful thing.
But when that company uses their action to promote themselves in an industry mag … well, that kind-of takes the shine off it.
Then again, when an agency is in the press more for what they’re doing – or plan to do – than what they’ve actually done or made, then you can’t help but feel their strategy is more to distract from the truth than to celebrate the good.
Or maybe that’s just me.
I am still a cynic after all.
Filed under: A Bit Of Inspiration, Advertising, Attitude & Aptitude, Communication Strategy, Crap Campaigns In History, Creativity, Embarrassing Moments, Marketing Fail
Now I appreciate I am a social media whore and have posted all sorts of rubbish in the past, but even I would never do something like this …
I honestly don’t know who is the bigger idiot …
Nescafe for thinking this is a good idea.
The agency for coming up with this idea.
The couple – who occupy that unique space of un-influential, influencers – who decided to commemorate their engagement by selling their souls for a few quid and appearing in a social media post for an international coffee brand while pretending [1] it’s totally natural to commemorate your engagement by appearing in a social media post for an international coffee brand and [2] it’s totally believable to have a staged photo of you in bed, despite the fact there was a photographer in the room with you..
Some other questions are:
+ Why are they not looking at each other?
+ Why is he so, so, so brown?
+ Judging by how tensed up his arms are, just how heavy is that cup of coffee?
+ Why is he cradling his cock?
Seriously, this might be the most z-grade version of Hello magazine that ever lived.
Everyone involved in this – and I mean everyone – needs a bloody big smack in the head.