"Ground-Breaking" Baloney

It looks like online ad sales organizations are getting desperate. Their research is starting to look almost as dubious as traditional ad research.

Earlier this week I read a press release entitled .Fox Networks and comScore Reveal Ground-Breaking Findings About the Branding Impact of Online Advertising which claimed that...
".Fox Networks (pronounced “dot-fox”), the leading global online

Meaningful Relationships?

If you haven't seen it, an interesting piece showed up last week in The Harvard Business Review called The Social Media Bubble. It's by a guy named Umair Haque who is Director of the Havas Media Lab (do you think they have test tubes and Bunsen burners?)

The article is not about social media marketing (which is what I'm always going off about) but about social media itself.

His overall point is

"You First Must Learn How To See"

Last week I posted a piece called Reality At The DMV. It was about understanding who our customers really are by visiting the DMV and looking around.

One ignorant commenter wrote the following:
"My point is that the scum of the earth waiting in line at your local DMV is not our target audience for anything other than target practice."In response to that, a wise commenter named Rob wrote the

Reality At The DMV

Last week I had the good fortune to spend an hour renewing my driver's license.

Most people would consider a trip to the DMV about as appealing as listening to a 50-slide powerpoint about search engine optimization while wearing ski boots. But I'm thinking of making a monthly visit to the DMV a condition of employment for everyone on my staff. 

I want them to see what the people they're making

More Bogus Toyota Nonsense Exposed

For the past few weeks we've been commenting on the hysterical, irresponsible post-recall Toyota reporting (full disclosure: Toyota's a client.)

Over a two-day period a few weeks ago, there was a frenzy of media delirium over two stories. First the guy in Southern California who claimed his Prius got up to 94 MPH on its own and had to be stopped by a highway patrolman. Second the story of a

Gutless Ad Weasels

There is growing movement among self-hating ad people to declare failure and join the army of digital dimwits.

They have started to believe the "advertising is dead" nonsense.  They have accepted the fiction that there is a new breed of humans who don't believe anything that isn't on the web. They no longer believe that advertising is about persuasion, and think their job is to create "

TV Viewership At Highest Point Ever. And Growing

Being The Ad Contrarian isn't all merriment and high living.

Sure, there's all the money, and the women, and the parties...but there are also moments of loneliness and doubt. Okay, loneliness.

Once a quarter, however, I get to sit back and treat myself to a large pitcher of self-admiration. You see, every three months Nielsen releases something called it's 3-Screen Report. It shows us just how