Eye Catching!

I stumbled on one of the most unusual advertisements I have ever seen while browsing on the internet.  This advertisement is actually on a sewer!  An image of a coffee cup has been placed on top to advertise for Folgers.  It utilizes the steam that is coming out of the sewer to make it look like there is fresh warm coffee that is steaming.  This is brilliant!  It is amazing how these advertisers turned something so gross as a sewer into something so appealing as a warm cup of coffee.  An obvious problem may be that this advertisement is on the ground and not very visible to people.  Because this advertising method is so unique is precisely why it might stand out to pedestrians.  When people are out walking, they usually scan the ground ahead of them to look out for possible holes or gross garbage on the ground that they do not want to step in.  Pedestrians may see this advertisement as they approaching it and walk towards it.  IT will stand out because it is rather large and unusual for a picture to be on the street.  They will walk closer and realize that it is a giant coffee cup and probably take a few seconds to stop and admire the great idea.  A downside to this advertising method is that it may be covered by snow in the winter when a warm cup of coffee is craved the most.  That is, depending on where the location of the advertisement is.  Regardless, this is a very unique method that shows just how surrounded by advertising we truly are.  It is thinking outside of the box like this that will set brands ahead! 

Got Milk? Takes A New Direction

Milk processors are launching a new advertising campaign that is bound to gain a lot of attention!  Their advertisements are advertising milk to men claiming that milk helps relieve the symptoms of PMS. 

This advertising campaign caught my eye for a few reasons.  First, it is very clearly directed at men.  Men are featured in advertisements and their call to action is to buy milk for their wives so that they do not have to deal with their wives PMS.  On the other hand, I can see how this may be directed at women who may just want to relieve their symptoms.  This campaign is very different because normally typical grocery items are advertised towards women.  Although this may be changing, it has typically been the norm that women do most of the grocery shopping, so it seems that women would be buying the milk.  In this campaign the milk processors are trying to inspire men to buy milk.  I am not sure how effective this campaign will be because it is going against the gender roles.  One thing is for sure, this campaign will be effective at getting laughs, and attention from these laughs.  The shocking tack of these advertisements stands out from other methods and will cause milk to stand out in consumers’ minds.  Sales may benefit from this. 

The second reason why this campaign is so attention grabbing is because of the claims it makes.  Supplemented by the article “Got PMS? Milk Marketers Launch an Audacious, Funny New Ad Campaign”, these commercials lead on that milk does more to relieve PMS symptoms than they actually do.  The main points of the article are that a PMS study was done in which women were given calcium supplements which did seem to lower their symptoms.  Although milk is very high in calcium, it would take drinking four 8-o.z. glasses of non or low fat milk per day to reach the level of calcium that was in the calcium supplements.  Drinking this amount of milk per day may actually cause stomach cramps.  It appears that more research should have been done before these claims are released, and the research should have included actual milk!  The credibility and truth behind these ads needs to be investigated.  Regardless, this campaign is quite funny.  Hopefully it will receive the positive and comical attention that its intention is to. 

Got PMS? Milk Marketers Launch an Audacious, Funny New Ad Campaign

Priceless

MasterCard could be the first to change the way consumers accept advertising.  MasterCard’s advertising campaign has stood out to many as their “priceless” commercials were once very fresh and funny.  According to “MasterCard Brings “Priceless” to a Pricey Place” from the New York Time, it appears that MasterCard is trying to bring their “priceless” campaign to real life.  (I have attached the article at the bottom, but will also provide a brief summary).  MasterCard is going to create “priceless” cities, the first being New York, in which MasterCard holders can reap benefits for choosing MasterCard.  Card holders will have the opportunity to take advantage of certain rewards, such as VIP treatment in hotels, or other various opportunities that are not available to non-MasterCard holder.  This idea is that these rewards are actually “priceless”.  They are cool out of the ordinary opportunities.

            This idea sounds really cool!  I feel that a lot of advertisements for products are very intangible or unrealistic.  For example, it is unrealistic that a pair of running shoes will make a person run faster.  The fact that MasterCard is going to make their commercials and ad campaign come to life is really amazing.  If this is successful, I really think this will change the way consumers accept advertising because they will demand more.  Consumers will really start demanding what they see in commercials.  To a certain extent consumers already do.  They hope that if they buy a product, they will become like the actors in the commercial.  But, I have never heard of anything as successful and as close to the commercials as what this would be.  Not to mention this will really help to set MasterCard apart from its competitors.  MasterCard is already one step behind as American Express offers many perks to their cardholders, such as getting show tickets earlier than the public.  This could be the step to put MasterCard ahead of the rest if their rewards are indeed as awesome as they are sounding now.  I am especially curious to see how this turns out because MasterCard has so many customers.  What will happen when there are not enough rewards for the amount of cardholders?  I will stay on this to see how this turns out.  This would be groundbreaking. 

MasterCard Brings Priceless To a Pricey Place

Best Ad!

The fierce Pepsi-Coke advertising competition is becoming more entertaining than ever!  Pepsi has recently come out with what I think is their best advertisement ever!  I saw this “Summer Time is Pepsi Time” commercial on TV the other day and thought it was absolutely hilarious and great!  The commercial features Santa on a tropical vacation.  He goes over to the bar where the bartender gives him two Coca-Cola’s because he has a deal with them, but Santa responds that he’s on vacation and wants to have fun with a Pepsi!  Even his elves start cheering when they see Santa drinking Pepsi.  This is absolutely great! 

Even though I am a very loyal Coca-Cola fan, I must say that this commercial makes it seem like Pepsi is way ahead of Coke!  Pepsi and Coke have always taken the approach to position themselves against their competition.  This feud has been going on for as long as I can remember.  This commercial is a perfect demonstration of their positioning strategy.  It is also ingenious because their goal is to take each other’s customers.  There are not many new consumers to be had in the soft drink market, so Pepsi and Coke must try to win over each other’s customers if they want to grow.  This commercial may just do that job by showing that even Santa, the figure of Coca-Cola in the winter, prefers Pepsi.  There is one very interesting thing about this advertisement.  It is advertising that Pepsi is the drink for summer time.  Pepsi could be admitting that Coca-Cola has done such strong advertising with Santa that they are indeed the drink for the winter time.  Or, this could be a simple mistake by the advertisers.  I am sure that they will have more advertisements as the seasons change to say why Pepsi is the drink for that particular season, but it seems that Pepsi should be trying to be remembered as the drink for all the time, instead of limiting themselves.  Regardless, this advertisement was the best I have seen from Pepsi in a long time.   It will be interesting to see how Coca-Cola retaliates. 

Reaching The Sky

A method of advertising that I feel has not gotten a lot of attention is rooftop advertisements.  Rooftop advertisements are large advertisements that are created on the roofs of buildings intended to advertise to people who are on airplanes.  Advertising has become such a large part of our culture that it is almost inescapable, so it only seems right that advertisements better reach people in the sky. 

I had first heard of rooftop advertisements when my high school was considering participating in it.  This idea seems great because it will allow business/building owners to rent out their roofs to big companies who want to display their advertisements.  But it is trickier than it sounds.  These rooftop advertisements can only be displayed where they can be effective.  If you think about looking out the window of a plane, the ground is really only visible when the plane is taking off and landing.  There are usually many clouds that planes like the fly through that block the view of the ground for passengers.  According to this, rooftop advertisements should only be placed near airports where planes taking off and landing will have a good view of them.  Also, although only passengers sitting in the window seat will have a good view of these advertisements, I believe that these huge advertisements will really spark up conversation in the airplane.  I can see window passengers pointing them out to the people sitting around them and having them take a look at them.  Even if the aisle seat passengers are unable to see them, window seat passengers will bring them up and a conversation will be started about that company.  This is probably how these advertisements are designed to work, more to start up a conversation than to spark consumers to go out and buy their products because they are on an airplane and can’t!  I am not sure why this method of advertising has not taken off.  It seems that advertisers have taken over everywhere else that consumers are, it seems only natural to further reach consumers in the sky.

Remove and Lick

It is a fact that more people will buy a product if they can try it first.  So what better way to allow consumers to try a product than in a magazine ad right?  I forgot to mention this is a beverage product.  Not such a good idea anymore.  This advertising method allows consumers to peel and lick a spot on an advertisement for Welch’s Juice in a magazine ad.  This is a take-off of the way that consumers have smell perfume samples in magazines by simply peeling back the slip and taking a sniff.  While this may have seemed good in theory, I suspect it is actually very gross! 

I do not think that this advertising method has the same effect that it has with a perfume or scent.  First, I wonder how good the taste is actually captured.  Not to mention the glue that consumers probably are licking along with it.  I know they wouldn’t put it out there if it was not safe for consumers, but I wonder what it actually is that they are letting us lick.  Second, this clearly is intended for single use only.  Single use only really does not reach that many people.  Remove and sniff ads are reusable and can reach countless prospective customers.  Remove and lick ads severely limit themselves.  Also, will this be used only once?  If a magazine containing this ad is in a public place, I am willing to bet that more than one curious reader will be willing to lick this ad, perhaps not realizing at the time that many before had also licked it.  I am not sure that is sanitary!  Also, if a magazine containing this ad is again in a public place, how many people will be willing to lick this ad in front of other people watching them?  They will probably be afraid that everyone will think that they are crazy because they are licking a page in a magazine!  Although a very interesting idea, I am not sure about the success rate of this method because it greatly limits the target and may just be too “out there for consumers.  If Welch’s wanted consumers to try their product they should have a free samples stand in the grocery store in the juice aisle.  That way consumers can try to product and immediately buy it.  I foresee that having a much higher success rate than a remove and lick ad.  Creative idea, but maybe new and innovative advertising is not always the best.  I believe the advertisers needed to think this through a few more times.  But it just may be interesting enough to catch the eyes of consumers.