Month: December 2013

  While holiday retail commercials were stronger this year, according to one index, actual store traffic was weaker, according to another. Stronger commercials This year’s ten top holiday commercials were stronger than last year’s on the Ace Metrix index. Ace constantly tests commercials on representative panels of more than 500 consumers and scores them on…

Come New Year’s, local television will be deluged with a flood of commercials from health insurance companies. “According to trade association TVB [formally, the Television Advertising Bureau], insurers will spend more than $500 million on local television ads in 2014,” the Washington Post’s Wonkblog reported December 16. That’s more than double the $216 million they…

There’s some good news and some bad news about Facebook as a holiday gift e-commerce advertising medium. The good news, Advertising Age reported December 11, is that Facebook accounts for a whopping 80 percent of holiday purchases from social media. The bad news is that social media account for only 2 percent of holiday e-commerce…

Just as Chevrolet bowtie logos are slated to appear on the Manchester United soccer team’s jerseys, Chevrolet is beating an ignominious retreat from Europe, according to a December 6 Marketing Daily report. Chevrolet’s parent company, GM, paid more than $600 million in 2012 to put them there starting 2014 – including a $100 million “activation…

  Send that armored car back to the bank. It’s too late to spend that $4.5 million burning a hole in your pocket on 30 seconds of Super Bowl advertising time. As of December 4, Fox’s inventory of commercial time was all sold out, MediaDailyNews reports. Not only that, but it sold out earlier than…

  The Federal Trade Commission’s one-day look into what’s variously called “native advertising” and “sponsored content” – ads and videos deceptively designed to mimic genuine editorial website content  – ended inconclusively December 4. The repercussions are just beginning. The FTC’s “Blurred Lines: Advertising or Content” workshop, Advertising Age reported, “focused on whether publishers and advertisers…

Despite “technical enhancements,” there are still “problems plaguing HealthCare.gov,” The Hill reported November 30. Before it could even start functioning (or malfunctioning, as the case may be) the Obamacare website was “suddenly taken down down for 11 hours — just before its long-awaited ­relaunch,” according to the New York Post. On the front page of…