Before you talk to a target audience of 50-plus-year-old adults, you’d better relearn how to talk to them, an August 5 MediaPost post (link unavailable) advises. This is particularly important because, as the Python Generation, they’re already a growing plurality, if not yet a majority, of American consumers. “Knowing the preferred terms when talking about…
Author: bgoldman
How to make QR codes less ugly – and how not to
There’s a technical term that graphic designers and art directors use to describe QR codes, Dr. Kevin Berisso, of Memphis University’s Department of Engineering Technology, said in a telephone interview. That term is: “Blech!” For scanners, not people QR codes were originally designed to be read by scanners, not human eyes, so function not only…
America's drinkers desert beer for wine and liquor
There’s a problem that all of Budweiser‘s pseudo-craft beers and music events and commercials masquerading as marketing can’t solve. And that’s that Americans just don’t like beer as much as they used to. According to a study whose results Gallup published August 1, all except America’s oldest adults are switching their preferences to wine and…
Mobile advertising's not all it's cracked up to be
Mobile advertising is huge. Every day, Americans collectively spend over 1 million months on their smart phones, according to a SolveMedia report, and men are more likely to sleep with their smartphones than to wash their hands after using the toilet (something worth knowing before you ask to use some guy’s smartphone). But looked at…
Clorox loses a battle in the war on men
When we wrote last week that advertising’s war on men – and particularly fathers, whom television commercials consistently portrayed as mindless, bumbling oafs – may be ending, we were wrong. But not as wrong as Clorox. Just days after Father’s Day, Clorox put up an essay titled “6 Mistakes New Dads Make” on its website.…
At last, a commercial that doesn't diss men
A new commercial that launched July 4 is doing something remarkable in television advertising. It’s actually treating men with respect. From the black-and-white sitcoms of the 1950s through last year’s disastrous Huggies campaign, television has depicted America’s husbands and fathers as the most hapless, clueless, clumsy, inept shlubs in the universe. This Chevrolet Silverado truck…
Why Geico's catching up to Allstate – for now
According to SNL Financial data, Geico’s about to replace Allstate as the second-largest US auto insurance company. According to a June 28 Advertising Age report, maybe not. For the first quarter ever – January 1 to March 31, 2013 – Geico overtook Allstate sales, writing $4.72 billion in direct auto insurance premiums while Allstate wrote…
Yet another Apple commercial flops with viewers
The latest in a series of Apple commercials – one boasting about how good their products make people feel – is making people feel…bored. In Ace Metrix advertising effectiveness research, the latest spot scored below the other 25 commercials that Apple’s aired this year, below industry average and way below the brand’s earlier advertising, Ad…
Logos and branding are now terrorist weapons
Terrorists are getting more corporate these days. Last month, there was the discovery of a ten-page Al Qaeda memo giving a North African regional manager a poor performance review for lousy work attitude, lack of initiative and failure to file expense reports. Now, says a June 23 review, there’s a book about terrorist organizations’ branding…
New research shows that, yes, the rich are different
Back in 1926, some 87 years ago, F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote, “Let me tell you about the very rich. They are different from you and me.” According to two June 19 MediaPost reports on recent consumer research, he was right – and also wrong. In order to understand why, it helps to define just who…