Author Archives: adverblog

An “Age” of Advertising in 1,873 pages

Everything you want (and don’t want) to know about advertising has been collected by Advertising Age in the upcoming Encyclopedia of Advertising. The New York Times has an interesting review of the book today. I especially enjoyed the final analysis by Edward Rothstein who writes:

But the accumulated detail of the encyclopedia makes clear that the ordinary academic model of advertising and its effects is inadequate. Advertisements are a form of communication, not mere manipulation: they help make sense of the world, defining its differences and essences, filtering through its variety, making claims and constructing images.

File under: advertising age, advertising encyclopedia

Buongiorno merges with Vitaminic

This is not exactly about web advertising, but I thought it was interesting to talk of the two main (and only?) dot.coms that today have merged. I’m talking about Buongiorno and Vitaminic, Buongiorno is one of the main web and wireless advertising providers in Europe, with Vitaminic is something like Mp3.com, for what concerns music. You can read the press release online (pdf). This time it’s in English

File under: buongiorno, italian news, merge, vitaminic

Avis tries harder…

Avis has created a “Who Tries Harder?” contest. As explained on MediaPost Avis has launched a competition to give away prizes to its customers and employees. The contest will go on on www.wetryharder.com and it’s aimed to increase customer loyalty as well as customer trials.

File under: advergames, avis, customer loyalty, online contest

How is Mr “Sem Roi” doing?

Sorry I could not stop stop myself from using this funny title (I really can’t hide my sarcastic copy soul But talking about such a serious stuff like Search Engines are (here comes the sarcasm again…), this post is to highlight you a recent article by Chris Sherman on SearchEngineWatch entitled “Measuring Search Engine ROI“. It features the results of a survey by NetIQ in which more than 800 partecipants responded to questions about their search engine marketing efforts and the way they measure success, which, by the way, the 31% of them don’t even measure…

File under: paid search strategies, search engine marketing, search engine roi, SEM

The movies and the Internet

Film fan sites can now really influence a Hollywood release. It’s not just a question of promoting a movie online, it’s also about considering Internet based communities. It’s like the case of “committed minorities”. As The Guardian writes today:

The studios are becoming increasingly eager to keep online fans happy by releasing promotional footage early and giving them snippets of information as the hype for releases builds.

Quoting a famous ad, I would say “Never underestimate the power of the Internet”… of course this works also the other way around

File under: committed minorities online, internet and the movies, online movies

Celebrating Bruce Lee online

To commemorate the 30th Anniversary of Bruce Lee’s death, Egovision has created a special Web site. The site is to be promoted via a campaign aimed at 18- to 35-year-old fans of action movies and gaming. More details on the campaign created on account of Medusa Films, can be found on Revolution Magazine.

File under: bruce lee campaign, online celebration

Let’s limit pop-ups

UK online media owners will become the first in the world to be asked by their trade body to cap the number of intrusive ad formats appearing on their sites. The news is reported today on New Media Age.

File under: format, limitations, online advertising standards, pop-up

Tribal DDB picks DoubleClick

In a press released just posted on Silicon Valley Biz Ink DoubleClick has announced a partnership with Tribal DDB Los Angeles. Tribal DDB Los Angeles will use DoubleClick’s DART for Advertisers product exclusively, in order to deliver, report on and measure online marketing and advertising campaigns on behalf of its clients.

File under: DoubleClick, partnershio, tribal

WSJ: don’t take things too seriously, please!

I just received a protional email from the Wall Street Journal. The title of the message was: From the President of the Wall Street Journal Online … This title sounded kind of scary to me… or maybe I perceived it as funny. I’m not sure. Anyhow I think it’s an high-sounding way of addressing people. Ok, you wanted people to immediately understand that wasn’t spam, but please don’t make it sound like an heavy statement, don’t take yourself too seriously. In medio stat virtus.

File under: email marketing campaign, wall street journal

Coupons online? I’m uncertain

As often happens, Joseph Jaffe came out with some interesting points in his latest column on iMediaConnection. The question is how does a marketer entice, incent or engage a consumer to the point of trial? Product samples and coupons. This is Joseph’s answer, that of course is supported with a some good examples. In some ways I like the idea, but if I think about using it in Italy I don’t think it will be successful. Coupons are not an important part of our daily shopping experience, and most of all people that will be more inclined to use coupons are not online, I mean housewives, that are still a big segment in my country.

File under: online coupons, online offers, product samples