Fifty-eight percent of consumers are "very aware" or "somewhat aware" of custom publications and once they were presented with specific examples of custom publications, 93% of respondents were familiar with at least one type of custom publication, according to a new national poll conducted for the Custom Publishing Council by Roper Public Affairs this summer. The survey, "Americans' Relationship with Custom Publications and the Companies that Provide Them," found that 85% say that if they are going to get information from a company, they'd prefer to get it in an interesting collection of articles, rather than an ad.
Though only 58% immediately knew the term "custom publishing," once surveyers explained what custom publications were – e.g., a magazine from the manufacturer of an automobile that you drive – 80% said they often find interesting information in these magazines and 75% said that they felt better informed after reading these publications.
Tango, a magazine about lofty issues such as love, life and the pursuit happiness, has doubled its rate base to 200,000 effective with its February 2006 issue. The magazine, which launched as a quarterly, will also shift to bi-monthly publication in 2006. Tango has also hooked up with P & G which most recently chose Tango as its media partner to promote the second annual "National Date Night": a "national initiative designed to motivate couples to spend that much needed time with their spouse."
Coinciding with National Coming Out Day, Planet Out's Gay.com on Tuesday launched a new ad campaign with the tagline "More Than Meets the Eye" which fixates on the apparent relationship between foot size and...well...dong size. Along with a promotional online video in which a guy plays footsie with men of all different foot sizes until he finds foot-measure-breaking Mr. Bigfoot, print ads and outdoor ad to the campaign. Too bad there isn't an accompanying hetero campaign in which the relationship between booty size and breast size was explored.
Facing the proliferation of on screen guides, TV Guide, back in July announced it would revamp the magazine in a, some would say, pointless, effort to stay afloat. This week, the magazine launched its first redesigned issue which focuses more on features, stories and gossip than listings. TV Guide also announce a dramatic reduction in rate base from 9 million to 3.2 million and a cover price drop from $2.49 to $1.99. With Entertainment Weekly, TVgasm, TV Sqaud and countless other television news sources, who really needs TV Guide anymore? They should have just slapped JLH on the cover and called it good. We think people would snap that up quite quickly.
Hoping to teach every guy how to turn his living space into a swanky love nest, Maxim has launched its Maxim Living microsite on which furniture and other lad-pad elements are featured. A house ad, created by Della Femina is currently running in the October issue of Maxim. Guys, check it out to improve your chances with the ladies. Ladies, check it out to see the lengths men will go to get into your..uh...show you a good time.
Austin-based advertising and branding agency, McGarrah/Jessee, has developed an ad campaign for the Spoetzl Brewery's Shiner brand for the launch of the brewer's Shiner 96, a new, limited-edition, commemorative beer created to celebrate the brewery's 96th anniversary. Spoetzl is Texas' oldest independent brewery and producer of Shiner beers, named for the town where the brewery began in 1909. Shiner 96, a Marzen-style ale, is the first of the company's annual series of commemorative beers which will lead up to the brewery's centennial celebration in 2009.
In the print ad, the headline reads, "In 1909, B.Y.O.B. meant build your own brewery." The ads feature an image of the beer and its label, along with an old photo of the Shiner Brewing Association, circa 1909. Out-of-home ads stick with the headline, a Shiner logo extension, and the new beer label.
Hopefully not just another pre-movie ad attack or more trash for theater staff to pick up after the movie, The New York Times will launch, OnMovies, an 18X per-year, digest-sized magazine from the paper's Culture desk which will be handed out to 1.25 million moviegoers at Lowe's cinema as they buy their tickets. This could go either way. Pessimistically, it will add more agony to already slow ticket lines with cashiers frantically handing out the magazine along with tickets, create more noise in theaters as moviegoers thumb through the magazine even as the movie rolls, dramatically increase movie exhibitors trash bills or cause moviegoers heads to explode as they attempt to process the onslaught of pre-roll ads on screen and athe d-supported content in the magazine thereby causing huge riots and a sudden upturn in business for home theater contractors.
Or, more optimistically, with lovely content such as film reviews, movie grosses, filmmaker interviews, actor profiles and trivia, it could give Entertainment Weekly a run for its money. Debuting December 16, the glass half full, glass half empty challenge will commence. Either way, we're betting the weblog OnMovies.net will be pretty happy with its increased accidental traffic.
It's one thing for a spoof ad or a renegade ad to get published online but to have the same appear, twice, no less, in a print publication and then, as marketer, disavow any knowledge of how the ad was created doesn't quite add up. Boeing, which created the ad with Bell Helicopter, has apologized for an ad which shows its combination airplane/helicopter V-22 Osprey delivering troops atop a mosque in a simulated battle scene. Needless to say, Islamic groups were not overjoyed to see the ad. Apparently, a month ago, the ad first appeared in the National Journal followed by complaints which Boeing reacted to informing the publication not to run the ad again but, oddly, it appeared in the magazine again last week. National Journal admitted it's error in a statement. It would seem traffic manager is going to get the boot and a renegade Boeing marketer is gleefully celebrating a marketing coup.
Smartly acknowledging all people can't be gorgeous hotties with six packs and D cup breasts, Listerine, to promote its Oral Care Strips, is running ads featuring, shall we say, less than pretty people. Of course, it's all done in jest so as not to offend actual ugly people. Check out the ads here.
In a shift from higlighting amateur, barely-legal, girl-next-door hotties, American Apparel is, apparently, going after an older demographic, namely, geriatrics. Of course this ad, which appeared in L Magazine, is just a joke but all the same, why can't old people look hot too?
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