Is it egotistical to want top billing at one’s own funeral? Faced with the onslaught of propaganda in stained glass and frescos — not to mention the sermon — consider it lucky if you get mentioned at all.
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How the ASB became the Facebook police for business
The Advertising Standards Board has moved into the online sphere, with a number of high-profile Facebook incidents in recent months. SmartCompany’s Cara Waters examines the difficulties.
READ MORECut the paper, cut the rates? Fairfax’s new equation
Fairfax Media will be forced to substantially renegotiate its hard-copy ad rates, leading industry executives say, after the ailing giant revealed the page size of its major metro mastheads would shrink by 30%.
READ MOREEat, pray, loveless: man takes out front page personal ad seeking Bali date
Interested in moving somewhere exotic? Keen to make friends and perhaps meet someone special? Lovebirds take note of the work of American teacher Dan Feltenberger, who took out a personal ad on the front page of The Bali Times.
READ MOREAn hour to ponder why Fairfax bothers turning off the lights
It surely can’t be long before Fairfax finally tiptoes away from their embarrassing Earth Hour commitment, says David Salter. It’s nothing but an advertising con.
READ MOREHow to fake a celebrity endorsement
It costs a lot of money to have a bonafide celebrity endorse a product. But that doesn’t stop PR agencies sending out press releases linking celebrities by saying the company has approached the star…
READ MORETrue tales from Mad Men days
Jane Maas was working as a copywriter in those heady days at Ogilvy & Mather on Madison Avenue in the sixties. Was there as much alcohol, sexism and sex as Mad Men portrays? Yes … and no, says Maas.
READ MOREWhat’s in a name? Lots of money…
A snappy and memorable product name is critical to commercial success. It’s not just the brand name, the recent Coca-Cola “share-a-Coke” campaign created a Pavlovian response in people, writes Moensie Rossier.
READ MOREBest ads from the Super Bowl
Millions are spent not just on the airtime but on the production of epic advertisements that screened today during half time of the US Super Bowl. Mumbrella wraps up the best of them.
READ MORENormie’s ‘no hormones’ ad only appeals to hormone replacement set
Normie Rowe is “fuming over claims he’s sold out to big business” by appearing in the infamous “no added hormones” meat ad for Coles supermarkets. But the real story is that it’s just so awful.
READ MOREBest Aussie ads of 2011
mUmBRELLA picks the best television and cinema advertising in Australia for 2011. Sydney’s Opera House gets the top spot for its clip of music stars including Paul Kelly, Martha Wainwright and Neil Finn.
READ MOREThe campaign to rid anonymous comments from the internet
The Communications Council, which represents the advertising industry, would like the trade press to ban all anonymous comments. Mumbrella’s Tim Burrowes goes inside the debate.
READ MOREBlogger bribes: new dodgy advertising methods
An US marketing company pays bloggers on major US websites to insert links to company’s websites in the middle of an article — and its clients include Dell and T-Mobile, says Hamilton Noltan.
READ MOREThe latest marketing buzzword? ‘Artisan’
Once upon a time the word “artisan” meant something had been carefully hand made. Now you can buy Domino’s Artisan pizza and artisan sandwiches from Starbucks. Bruce Horovitz opines on the newest marking cliché.
READ MORESorry too hard a word for LinkedIn over privacy faux pas
Supposedly-professional social network LinkedIn has responded to criticism over its privacy faux pas with a blog post. The word “sorry” is nowhere to be seen, and neither is any evidence of real change.
READ MOREManly men and their testosterone burgers
Health experts have lined up to pillory the KFC Double Down for encouraging irresponsible eating. But it also marks the latest in a string of ads that try to appeal to masculinity.
READ MOREHow toy ads reinforce gender stereotypes
A look at the language used in advertisements for children’s toys finds them deeply gendered. Boys toys refer to “battle”, “power”, “hero” and “action”, while girl ads speak of “love”, “fun”, “magic” and “babies”.
READ MOREThe feminism brand is designed to do itself out of business
Feminism is a brand that’s been thoroughly trashed. If it was a commercial product it’d be a good time to buy in, because when stocks are low they only have one way to go, writes Karen Pickering.
READ MOREThe best ads from the Super Bowl
With air play costing up to $3 million per 30-second message during the Super Bowl screening in the United States, the unleashing of brand new advertising is a yearly tradition. Check out the 20 best from yesterday’s game.
READ MOREThe most powerful ads in history
Advertising is a powerful concept, and not just for making us open our wallets. BBC lists the six ads that made us view the world differently — from DeBeers convinving us that engagement rings had to have diamonds to Lyndon B Johnson paving the way for political attack ads.
READ MORETracking the PR embarrassment
Here’s a note of PR advice from Tim Burrowes: don’t send out your company press releases with the “track changes” function still enabled on the Microsoft Word document. Otherwise the whole internet gets to witness your embarrassing marketing lingo.
READ MOREWhen advertising overrides editorial
An absolute shocker by The Age this morning. Hopefully part of the latest ‘transformation plan’ at Fairfax includes remembering that news should always over-ride advertising, writes Dave Gaukroger.
READ MOREWanna buy a blog?
A whole new world of internet advertising is developing in the Forbes blogs stable, far more involved than the old sponsored post. Instead advertisers can pay to run an entire blog alongside the normal blogs run by Forbes journos.
READ MOREIf Don Draper was selling Twitter
A clever mock-up of vintage style advertisements spruiking new media. How would have Facebook been sold in the 1960s? “For leisure or labour…” says the tagline.
READ MOREThe Age probed over real estate agent junkets
The Victorian Government will probe Fairfax Media over its real-estate junkets program, after the company decided to extend the controversial free-trips scheme into 2011.
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