Blogs Launch, Online Ad Spend Up, Toy Explains, Brands Clueless

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- Former Gawker Founding Editor Elizabeth Spiers, now founder of Dead Horse Media plans to launch several new blogs. One will cover organic living.

- Online ad spending is predicted to increase 18 percent in 2007 while media spend in other media decline.

- If you want the background behind those 20 websites Toy, New York created for OfficeMax, here's the video that recaps the project.

- Apparently, consumers aren't the only ones having trouble understanding a brand's positioning. In a recent Louws Management Corporation study, it was found just 1/4 could clearly articulate their company's brand positioning. Oops.

- Incumbent Riney is out of the Sprint Nextel pitch. Goodby, O&M and Y&R remain.

- Boobs and bikinis are now hawking coffee at coffee shops.

by Steve Hall    Jan-31-07    
Topic: Online, Publishing, Research, Weblogs



RMX Direct Gets Best Ad Revenue For Small Publishers

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If you're a small publisher and you want to insure you are getting the most revenue you possibly can from your advertisers, you might want to check out the just launched RMX Direct from Right Media, a service that pits inventory-bidding ad networks against each other and serves the highest paying one to the publisher. Automatically. Currently, RMX Direct has nine ad networks in its system but publisher can add as many others as they want and pit them against the existing networks for bidding.

We'll admit it's one of the few sites we've been to that actually does a good job explaining what the company does and how it can benefit the parties involved: advertiser, publisher and ad network. While we haven't used the product, if you're trying to maximize revenue as a publisher, it sure sounds like something one should check out.

by Steve Hall    Jan-29-07    
Topic: Good, Online, Publishing, Tools



Madison Avenue Crap Avoided With Madscam's No Bullshit Advice

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Part way through reading George Parker's new book, MadScam: Kick-Ass Advertising Without the Madison Avenue Price Tag, we informed George we had found the perfect coaster for our scotch. Amused, he agreed but told us to get off our ass and read the book. We did. And we can whole heartedly tell you you should too. With or without a glass of scotch. The man has things to say and things you won't hear from your average "I'm a hot shit marketer and everything I say is gold" flatulence. The man has been through it all and he has no problem telling marketers they don't need Madison Avenue for all their marketing needs.

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by Steve Hall    Jan-23-07    
Topic: Good, Opinion, Publishing, Trends and Culture



OJ Coquettish About Details in Non-Confession Confession

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We're amazed by how the Patriot Act has affected every one of our rights except protection from double jeopardy, which remains Simpson's ongoing joke on a rubbernecking nation.

It was only a matter of time before the definitive chapter of his botched If I Did It... book leaked to the press. Our favourite part of what he would have done (if he did it) was the end: "Then something went horribly wrong, and I know what happened, but I can't tell you exactly how."

Laughter. And the smacking of gloved hands.

Read the rest of the chapter summary here.

by Angela Natividad    Jan-15-07    
Topic: Celebrity, Online, Publishing, Social, Worst



Live on the Fast Lane? Win Immortality in New Book

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To promote her new book Wife in the Fast Lane, Karen Quinn is running a contest for fast-lane provocations. Anybody living a zippy life can turn in a video, essay or one-liner. Winners get to be characters in her next novel, which means you'll have something to send to people next Christmas that doubles as both gift and holiday card.

Come on. How many people get immortalized in pop fiction?

Guerilla and marketing efforts for the campaign were stealthily conducted by BL Ochman of What's Next Online. She's also to blame for the Up Your Budget treasure hunt of '05 and that funny little American Greetings campaign which niched itself by highlighting quirky twists in our favourite nuclear unit.

by Angela Natividad    Jan-12-07    
Topic: Games, Good, Publishing



Time Gets Web 2.0 Facelift

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Time revamps its tired old site to better serve the interests of 2.0-savvy readers who'd rather sift through snarky blogs than stiff Reuters streams.

The new site vibes like a cross between Yahoo, ZDNet and AdAge, which can be useful if not totally confusing. Critiques about Iraq rub shoulders with Top 10's, quotes du jour and wincing-hip TV-related titles like "Whiteyz with Attitude." Urg. Well, it'll definitely make eye-candy for the scroll-happy.

Time will provide 24/7 news and, in a surprise move that contrasts those of major papers like the New York Times, rendered the entire Time archive of stories, covers and images - from its 1923 debut! - available for free.

Neat. For a brand so big we're sure they'll come up with a way to keep profits from hurting during this most curious process. And we probably won't be the only ones watching closely.

by Angela Natividad    Jan- 8-07    
Topic: Brands, Good, Magazine, Online, Publishing



Lovemarks Revealed as Tool Disguised as Book

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Saatchi and Saatchi CEO Kevin Roberts reveals that Lovemarks, allegedly written by him and out for three years running, is not actually a book but a "new-business development tool" according to AdAge in a video interview. Indeed, what appears to be text on sheets between bound paper to all who encounter it is actually the elaborate first phase of a 10-year scheme to refurbish the ethos and image of the Publicis Groupe agency, according to Roberts.

The confession comes just in time for phase two of the zany scheme which also appears in chimerical book form: The Lovemarks Effect: Winning the Consumer Revolution. This too is part of the effort to change S and S "from an ad agency to an ideas company to become the Lovemarks company," explains Roberts.

Ironic how much changes from high school, when the last thing you want is to be known for your lovemarks. Clearly Saatchi and Saatchi is onto something we aren't.

by Angela Natividad    Jan- 2-07    
Topic: Agencies, Packaging, Publishing



Strong Argument Made For Death of Page View

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Writing on his Micro Persuasion blog, Steve Rubel concisely explains why the online metric mainstay, the page view, is becoming useless and predicts its death in 2010. Citing the rise of navigate-within-page technologies such as Ajax, Flash and widgets which negate the need to leave a particular URL to experience new content, Rubel says the media community will need to face the music very soon and stop the chest beating about the importance of page views. While there doesn't seem to be a replacement metric on the horizon, aside from already existing Time Spent and Unique Visitors, the industry may need to come up with one very soon lest the usefulness of online metrics become as useless as traffic count for billboards.

by Steve Hall    Dec- 1-06    
Topic: Publishing, Research, Tools, Trends and Culture



Fallon Asks Us to Ask Our Moms What's In His Head

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It's no secret we like self-deprecating humour in part because that's half the work done for us, so we couldn't help warming to the print campaign for Juicing the Orange, Pat Fallon's new creativity-oriented business book.

Toying with the defining moment in which a doe-eyed child looks up at mom and asks where babies come from, to which mom immediately spits out an improbable lie, Fallon's print ads add citrusy twist to a domestic nightmare and lend the sense that irreverent ideas remain good medicine for the changing threads of business. Check out variations hither and thither. - Contributed by Angela Natividad

by Angela Natividad    Nov-25-06    
Topic: Good, Poster, Publishing



Gawker Craps In Donny Deutsch's Mouth

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In an amusingly scathing piece about Donny Deutsch's Gotham magazine feature "Deutsch Mark," Copyranter, on a Gawker writing assignment, takes a look at Donny's work and concludes it's all just another piece of fat-headed self promotion. Analyzing article word counts, Copyranter finds the Donny, without surprise, likes to talk more about himself and his Big Idea show than the article's subject matter. But we aren't going to complain because, Speedo aside, we'd love to be as famous as the Deutsch man, have out own TV show and have Gawker crap down our mouth too. Oh wait Jessica's gone and we haven't tasted the new shit yet.

by Steve Hall    Oct-19-06    
Topic: Celebrity, Magazine, Publishing, Strange