Hi dear friends, There is an old saying that sex sells. The fact is, it does attract a lot of lookers, but if you're selling the wrong thing, it isn't going to be very effective. For example, you wouldn't use a picture of a scantilly clad young lady or a well-muscled young man in a thong to sell children's books! Your target audience and your campaign just wouldn't match. A lot of so-called marketers (I call them desperate chumps) are trying to market using titles, subject lines and even nonsensical "stories" to try to flog their junk these days, and it just doesn't work. What it DOES do is annoy a lot of people and make it even harder for the rest of us to get out legitimate message out. (I own a number of community forums and do a lot of deleting of these ridiculous posts as part of my daily maintenance.) One of the main problems people face when trying to market both on and offline, today, is having NO idea of what they need to do and a desperate need for cash. This situation is almost completely guaranteed to fail. The net result is NO success, NO cash and a very high level of frustration. Learning how to effectively market, what to market and who to market to is the first thing you and everyone else needs to do in order to achieve success in the marketplace. Unfortunately, for most people, learning is a very expensive process. You have no idea how good an ebook or training program is going to be until after you've paid for it and gone through it. Sadly, most of these only leave you with less money in your pocket, more frustration, and no further ahead in the marketing world. If you're reading this thread right now, then you're most likely already a member of the great Adlandpro community and have already read some of my posting on a program developed by a fellow member called Everything For Success. EFS IS the most effective way most people are ever going to find out how to market online while actually earning WHILE they learn. When I originally joined EFS, I joined because I knew the wonderful lady who introduced me to it as well as the owner of the site, both fellow members of this community. As someone who has been in the online world for years, I instantly saw how good EFS is and became a gold member. My membership paid for itself easily and quickly, and I can guarantee that JUST the training, tools and knowledge available on this site are worth more than ten times the monthly fee for gold membership. You can join EFS as a free member, and I suggest that as a good way to start, kick the tires a bit, and start spending some serious time looking through the site. There's a LOT of information to go through. However, I can ALSO guarantee that as a gold member, if you concentrate on your EFS training and business, that you'll make so much money that you wonder what on earth you were doing somewhere else in the first place! This really is YOUR chance to break the mold and become a success in the marketing world. It will take a LOT of time, concentration and hard work, but it will be worth it. I'm always happy to help, and so are a lot of people here in this community. Pop by my profile at http://tipsntools.com/adlefs.html Have a most wonderful day!

Hi Dave,

you are absolutely right, but if you lived here in France you could be seriously misled into thinking something differently!

Sex dominates just about every TV commercial you see here, and some quite explicit - and far from scantilly clad, we usually get a fair proportion of naked flesh.  Sometimes it really is difficult to see quite how the ad agencies managed to sell the stuff to the clients, as so much is completely irrelevent - and I submit that even perfumes do not have nudity as a prerequisite.

Maybe they are just propagating a stereotypical French image?

Just incidentally there is a retail company in the UK that glorifies itself in the name of FCUK - really subtle stuff eh?  Guess what it means - French Connection UK.

I have been delighted to see that after their juvenile shock value, their sales have now started to slide.

But you talk relevence, and as you know I am a long-term ad-man (too long possibly), but I am thunderstruck as to how a retail fashion chain aimed at young women can use a cocaine-snorting, anorexic drug addict as a role model - and even promote her as a design guru!

Finally in this last little rant, may I say how delighted I was to hear that the ill-tempered Naomi Campbell has just been sentenced to 5- days Community Service - which means she has to wash the floors in a Sanitation Department.  Brilliant!  Just a little humility might just do some good - although doubtless it will be a little only.

Am I REALLY getting old?

Cheers,

Norm

Norm Clark

Adbooks and Cd's for Fun and Education

http://www.lulu.com/norman-clark

Hi Norm, I'm sure you could write a book... Oh, yes... that's right. You have!! lol! The latest fad in advertising DOES seem to be to use shock value. I'm sick of seeing all the online ads for the Rich Jerk et al. Sure, being obnoxious and going for the shock works for a while to get attention, but getting attention is just a small part of the package. Once you get someone's attention, you have to keep it and provide a strong and compelling reason for someone to buy your wares, whatever they may be. There are those who even use banner advertising that seems to blatantly advertise porn sites in order to get people to their websites, which have absolutely nothing to do with porn. Do these people really think that someone who is expecting porn is going to be interested at all in the latest marketing software? What is quite sad is that some (probably many) newbies are buying into this nonsense and swallowing the lies. I enjoy watching commercials on TV - they are quite often more interesting than the programs, themselves! What I find quite amusing is that many really interesting and entertaining commercials leave me remembering the skit but wondering what on earth they're trying to sell! The bottom line is, if your copy doesn't make your product memorable, then it's absolutely worthless, no matter how many people read it or see it, and if it doesn't convince me that I want and need the product, it has failed miserably. Keep ranting, Norm! God bless, Dave

Hi Dave,

maybe this should be the idea for a forum? Your favorite or non-favorite TV Commercials?

Oddly enough over my 50 years in all those different countries I AM able to point to my favorite TV Commercial of all time - and I think a lot of Admen in the UK would probably agree (especially us older ones).  This was for a now non-PC product and banned - i.e Hamlet Cigars, which were for small cigars for the 'man in the street'.

The tagline was 'Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet' and it was always provided as a reward for frustration. There was a whole series of these commercials, and I even have the commercially available video of them all, and which still make me laugh.

They all had production costs of about two bob, and were simple in the extreme, but they really worked.

My all-time favorite starred a character actor known as Rab. C. Nesbitt, who was almost bald, but had a vanity string of about 12 long hairs on his head. the whole commercial was inside a Photomaton booth (told you the production values were minimal didn't I?).  He was trying to get his three pictures done, and the mishaps were that the shots kept flashing off just when he thought he couldn't sustain his fixed smile anymore, and he moved to see what was wrong. Frustration on frustration, until he was just right - and then the seat collapsed and he disappeared, just as the final flash took place.

Next shot was a drift of tobacco smoke coming up - and the tagline 'Happiness is a cigar called Hamlet' as a voiceover.  Brilliant!

Was there a Golden Age of Advertising?  Yes, I believe there were three:

 1) which I call the age of innocence approx. 1900-1915 and was largely the Art Nouveau period where art predominated and everything was being tried and discovered, a golden age of print.

2) The Art Deco period of about 1920-35, again where artwork was King, and clean crisp images dominated, again print oriented mainly.

3) Finally the period 1975-85 (approx.) where we saw the true amalgamation of clever - relevant headlines, excellent body copy and terrific layouts in print, and exceptional originality and creativity in electronic media. I would refer to Volkswagen advertising in particular during this time.

The other periods were when the ad. business became self-indulgent and showed contempt for the viewing or reading audience. I believe we are in such a period now and have been for some 20 years.

Incidentally, this is the content of the latest book I am preparing which is 'Graphic Design styles of the 20th Century'.  Keeps me off the streets!

I would be interested in other views.

All the best,

Norm

Norman Clark

Adbooks for Fun & Education

http://www.lulu.com/norman-clark

Hi Norm, Well, I really thought more people would add their two cents to this conversation! Ah, well, the company is good! (Perhaps my subject line is scaring everyone off...!!) I think your latest book should be very interesting. I like the idea of being able to follow the evolution (or devolution as it may be) of graphic design and art over the past 100 years. Some of the ads I'm seeing on TV these days, when I happen to glance that way, are quite entertaining AND memorable. Two examples, if you get a chance to see them (perhaps on ctv.ca ) are the Telus Mobility ads (wireless) which are very well done (I think you'd LOVE the design - very colourful, very clever, well-written AND you can't help remembering Telus) and the other one is the Mac computer ads, which are exceptionally simple (just quietly and politely bash PC without obviously bashing PC - very clever). There are still, after all, artists left in the advertising world, both in word and picture. Perhaps a forum, as you suggest, would be a great idea. God bless, Dave