CHICAGO (Ad Age) — Pernod Ricard has won the auction for Absolut vodka, agreeing to pay the Swedish government nearly $9 billion for the iconic drink and some of its smaller, sibling brands. The deal will catapult Pernod ahead of Beam as the world's No. 2 spirits concern by case volume, behind only Diageo.
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Filed under: Syndicated
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AdAge.com) — As if you didn't know this already, a new report from Nielsen Online proves it: When it comes to going green, companies just can't fake it. When it comes to conversations bout "greenwashing," the most popular blog topic is the contradictory actions of companies, comprising 25% of all discussions on greenwashing in 2007.
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Filed under: Syndicated
PATTAYA, Thailand (AdAge.com) — If last week's lackluster AdFest — the regional ad show that is building a global reputation as Asia's Cannes festival — is a harbinger, there won't be big winners from Asia at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival this year.
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Filed under: Syndicated
BATAVIA, Ohio (AdAge.com) — Wal-Mart should discontinue the implied advertising claim that consumers can save $2,500 annually by shopping there, the National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Bureaus recommended in a statement Monday.
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Filed under: Syndicated
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — In October 2002, advertising industry legend Hal Riney received an honorary doctorate from San Francisco's Academy of Art College. As part of that ceremony, he presented an hour-long recap of his career and a point-by-point explanation of his most memorable commercials — all laced through with tart comments about the advertising industry. The entire performance was captured by a student videographer. That video has been edited down into this nine-minute Ad Age program showing Hal Riney explaining his own best commercials.
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Maybe I’m just not into brands as much as the next person. At the Advertising Research Foundation’s Re:Think conference today, ESPN sales dude Sean Bratches proudly trotted out the fact that 31 children have been named “ESPN,” or some derivation…
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We interrupt our regularly scheduled programming to bring you vice president Dick Cheney’s rebuttal to Al Gore’s recent comments on 60 Minutes: “First off all, Mr. Former Vice President, I didn’t actually watch the show, because the cable’s out here…
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CHICAGO (AdAge.com) — Alcohol marketers generally regard being labeled a brand your father would drink as a death knell, but Canadian Club's embrace of that distinction seems to be reversing one of the industry's longest-running sales declines.
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Print-ad revenue at U.S. newspapers last year suffered its biggest decline since at least 1950, the Newspaper Association of America reported.
Print-ad revenue plummeted 9.4% to $42 billion in 2007. Classified ads, which account for a third of the total, were hit especially hard, down almost 17%.
The NAA’s estimate showed that while newspapers’ online-ad revenue is growing, the extra ad dollars coming from the Internet aren’t enough to offset the lost print revenue.
Reports from newspaper publishers in recent weeks suggest the falloff is worse so far this year. In February, Gannett Co.’s newspapers saw an 8.3% fall in same-newspaper ad revenue compared with ad revenue in February 2007. McClatchy Co.’s ad revenue fell 13% in February, New York Times Co.’s was down 6.6%, and Media General Inc. reported an almost 18% drop in publishing-ad revenue for the month.
“We have no evidence to show that the bottom has been reached yet,” says Gordon Borrell, chief executive of media research firm Borrell Associates.
[via The Wall Street Journal]
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Eat more food to become skinny.
Or, shop Wal-Mart and save your family $2500 annually. It’s a claim the Arkansas-based retailer has been making in its ads.
According to The New York Times the claim dates to 2005, when Wal-Mart, under mounting criticism from unions and elected leaders over its business practices, commissioned a study of its economic impact on Americans.
An outside firm, paid by Wal-Mart, found that the company’s emphasis on low prices led to a 3 percent decline in overall consumer prices. That translated into $287 billion in savings in 2006, or $2,500 a household, whether a family shops at Wal-Mart or a competitor.
Sadly, fuzzy math is becoming standard practice in business today. Where Wal-Mart went wrong, is using this favorable, but suspect, data for the basis of an ad campaign that specifically tells shoppers they’ll be able to buy a used car or take that long dreamed about vacation, when they choose to shop Wal-Mart.
The National Advertising Division of the Council of Better Business Bureaus says, “the advertiser provided no support (for the claim) and, in fact, conceded that there was none.”
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In a market dominated by women’s lifestyle titles, The Economist, with a circulation of 720,882 and 24% ad revenue growth in 2007, has the No.1 spot on AdweekMedia’s annual “Hot List.”
The Economist earns dual honors this year as publisher Paul Rossi and editor John Micklethwait take home the “Executive Team of the Year” award.
New York magazine earns the accolade “Design Team of the Year”.
People.com is the recipient of AdweekMedia’s first ever “Magazine Web Site of the Year” award. Despite considerable competition from the celeb-centric blogosphere and an array of newer players chasing celebrity triumphs and scandals, People.com is one of the most trafficked magazine generated sites, growing its audience by an eye-popping 48% in 2007 and totaling 6.3 million monthly unique users.
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Filed under: Syndicated
In a market dominated by women’s lifestyle titles, The Economist, with a circulation of 720,882 and 24% ad revenue growth in 2007, has the No.1 spot on AdweekMedia’s annual “Hot List.”
The Economist earns dual honors this year as publisher Paul Rossi and editor John Micklethwait take home the “Executive Team of the Year” award.
New York magazine earns the accolade “Design Team of the Year”.
People.com is the recipient of AdweekMedia’s first ever “Magazine Web Site of the Year” award. Despite considerable competition from the celeb-centric blogosphere and an array of newer players chasing celebrity triumphs and scandals, People.com is one of the most trafficked magazine generated sites, growing its audience by an eye-popping 48% in 2007 and totaling 6.3 million monthly unique users.
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Filed under: Syndicated
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Today there are elections in Zimbabwe (formerly known as Southern Rhodesia). The Zimbabwe’s election commission just announced the first results of the presidential election. It seems like it’s going to be a neck-and-neck race between Mugabe and Tsvangirai.
Of course the final result of the elections are a [...]
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Filed under: Africa, Controversial, Informative
Much of Jeff Goodby and Rich Silverstein’s work has a timeless quality to it. Not so the agency co-founders themselves, for whom a few too many grains of sand appear to have fallen through the hourglass. A busy 25 years…
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Last Friday, I attended the IMCNE (International Management Consultants New England) ThoughtLeader Conference as both a learner and a presenter. I learned much more than I expected.
The key to my learning, or — better yet — my remembering, happened at the general session entitled Speaking to Different Audiences.
It was presented by the well-known experts Tom Kennedy, former Boston on-air celebrity and current Executive and Communications Coach and Suzanne Bates, former Boston on-air celebrity, author of Speak Like A CEO and current President & CEO of Bates Communications. During an exercise, Suzanne presented a worksheet with “My Agenda” atop the right column and “Their Agenda” atop the left column. Of course, the lesson learned is that as consultants it is never about our agenda; it is always about their agenda.
After lunch, I presented on Traditional vs. Social Media: Which Work Best for Promoting Your Ideas? About 10 minutes into my presentation, someone raised their hand to ask a question (I thought). But to my surprise, she had no question. Instead, she said: Your presentation is really good. But we already know we have to embrace Social Media. What we need to know is how.
So, without any hesitation, I tossed away the presentation that had been advertised and the one I had been asked to make (and had rehearsed for weeks), and transitioned into the one my audience wanted to hear. At the end of the session, attendees came up to thank me, to praise the presentation and to ask for assistance in launching their social media efforts.
Thank you, Suzanne, for reminding me that my agenda matters not at all. It is always about their agenda. And thanks to the attendee who had the wisdom and courage to tell me what their wants and needs were. Without her, I would have given the presentation I prepared for; instead, I gave the one they wanted. And isn’t that what we should do?
P.S. Here is what the presentation’s promotion materials said: What are the pros and cons of promoting your ideas and business via traditional media vs. social media?
They didn’t care about the pros and cons; they wanted to hear about the what and how. I suspect more that a few of us have became frustrated with speakers who don’t want to be interrupted with questions and comments and won’t change their prepared remarks no matter the audience and its comments or body language. Those speakers are intent on delivering the presentation they prepared. And they do.
Interesting… but what would have happened if instead they turned their power over to the audience?
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Once of the biggest challenges I have when it comes to Twitter is following what is being said. With nearly 700 people who I follow, it’s easy to have hundreds of Tweets fly by in a matter of minutes. During the day I have to shut down Twitter when I need to focus on getting things done.
I have come up with a couple of options that allow me to keep tabs of what people are saying and staying engaged when I cannot be actively watching and listening.
Subscribe via RSS
This is my favorite at the moment. At the bottom of each user’s page on Twitter have a small box that looks like this 
. That link is an RSS feed of the last things that person has said. I added it to my Google Reader in a category called Twitter Faves and it allows me to read them at any time. Using RSS in Google Reader also lets me search through them over time.
Use an application
Personally I use twhirl as my application of choice. I keep it open during the day and turn off the new Tweet notifications. When I have time I scroll through it and catch up. Twhirl also lets you do some cool filtering. You can filter by keyword or user as well as view Tweets by replies, direct messages, friends and followers. It also lets you search through the messages as needed. At the bottom of the window it shows if you have any replies or direct messages in the queue.
Use a web service
There are a host of new services such as Quotably that will allow you to track conversations by user and show you how they evolve over time. Keep in mind this is limited by the way that Twitter is set up (no threading, no groups, etc.) so it is of marginal value. You can also use a service like FriendFeed to keep track of what your friends are doing. Twitter is just one subset of information that FriendFeed tracks.
Services that consolidate and add value have a bright future in the conversation economy. There is a lot of opportunity out there to listen to, track the trajectory of and help people engage in conversations.
How do you listen? Do you accept the fact that people are talking and you can’t listen? Do you use something that is not on this list?
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Filed under: Syndicated
From the days of the Crusades and surely before that, innocent bystanders have often been left wounded by religious battles. So it was this Easter for Straub’s Seafood restaurant in Orange County, Fla. An anonymous ad with the message “All…
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The good news about the Ford Ka, according to these four ads from JWT Argentina, is that it seats more people than ever. The bad news, according to the same ads, is that riding in one makes you vulnerable to…
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You know, I always wondered if the Jedi kept their lightsabers behind emergency glass. Another question from childhood answered, thanks to Spike TV! These bus-shelter ads still beg a few questions, though. Surely there have to be other uses for…
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CHICAGO (AdAge.com) — The ubiquitous under-a-buck value menu that boosted the fast-food industry is hurting some franchisees.
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YORK, Pa. (AdAge.com) — Although rebates won't be mailed until May, that hasn't stopped eager marketers such as Sony and Home Depot from luring consumers to fork some of it over.
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BEIJING (AdAge.com) — Public sentiment against the crisis in Darfur and Tibet may be escalating in the U.S., but in Olympics-crazed China, protests against the country's support for Sudan or treatment of Tibet are viewed — when they can be seen at all — with surprise, frustration and even anger, but little sympathy.
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Filed under: Syndicated
CHICAGO (AdAge.com) — Coca-Cola is using the Olympic torch relay — the handoff that sends the Olympic flame hurtling toward Beijing, one of the most polluted cities in the world — to highlight its commitment to the environment.
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In "The Crack-Up," F. Scott Fitzgerald said that to effectively negotiate life, you had to be able to hold two opposing ideas in your mind at the same time. Which brings us to Hal Riney.
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SAN FRANCISCO (AdAge.com) — A study in contrasts, Hal Riney decried the client-coddling of what he called advertising's "suits," yet at times epitomized the drinking, cussing "Mad Men" era. He was a cantankerous curmudgeon who could bring tears to the eyes with a commercial about depositing money in a bank. He was a creative titan whose outsize ego was counterbalanced by an "aw shucks" alter ego.
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BEIJING (AdAge.com) — China's Haier Group is hiring DDB and Initiative Media to handle strategic planning, creative and media to promote the company's Olympic Games sponsorship in China, following a pitch against Draft/FCB and Group M's Maxus. In an unusual decision, most of the creative for China will be done from the U.S. by DDB San Francisco.
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NEW YORK (AdAge.com) — Nissan is about to take Dodge by the horns. After being rammed from its place as the third-best-selling vehicle brand by Toyota in 2001 and then shoved further aside by the Honda brand three years later, Dodge — now the No. 5-selling vehicle brand — has Nissan close on its tail.
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CHICAGO (AdAge.com) — Six years after its blunder in giving away the red-umbrella logo in a spinoff from Citigroup, Travelers and its icon of protection are back on air in a big way.
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From Japan, by Wieden + Kennedy Tokio, the latest Nike ad for Nike+. Ideal for runners looking for inspiration in spring….
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From Japan, by Wieden + Kennedy Tokio, the latest Nike ad for Nike+. Ideal for runners looking for inspiration in spring….
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Google, a company which vows to do no evil, tonight “went dark” to support World Wildlife Fund’s “Earth Hour.”
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Google, a company which vows to do no evil, tonight “went dark” to support World Wildlife Fund’s “Earth Hour.”
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This Cadillac CTS spot has been on air for a number of months, and while I should be immune to this pitch, I have to admit it’s working on me. Let me just say this, a Caddy has never before been a car I would consider buying. That’s clearly changing and not just because I’m aging. The product is transforming and the brand with it.
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Filed under: Syndicated
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