Hacienda, a Mexican restaurant, came up with this billboard to promote their drink in northern Indiana. Shortly later, it was taken down because of all the complaints. Any idea why? Here is the billboard. Think about it.



The billboard looks fine to me. The idea behind it was how people belong to clubs and teams. The company wanted to develop a cult following like-minded people. The problem with the billboard is that it refers to the 1978 Jonestown cult massacre where 900 people died from drinking cyanide-laced grape punch. Obviously, the billboard was a major offense to the people of the town. The billboard was a complete accident. Whoever came up with the idea didn't know about the massacre. I found that kind of funny but at the same time, it's serious. How many people will go to Hacienda now? They are either offended or scared to do so. This is a good example of how in the advertising world, everything you say has an impact, either good or bad, and people will always remember it.

Info found here

The top 50 list

I was recently reading Fast Company and came across the world's 50 most innovative companies. Apple was no doubt #1 for “dominating the business landscape, in 101 ways”. Here are the 101 ways:



Twitter came in at #2 for “five years of explosive growth that has redefined communication”. Facebook was #3 for “600 million users, despite Hollywood”. Nissan came in #4 for “creating the Leaf, the first mass-market all-electric car”. This surprised me because it was up there on the list mixed in with the social networking and technology companies (Groupon, Google, Netflix, and Zynga are next in line). Also, as the all-electric car sounds cool, I didn't really think it was popular. I haven't heard much about it. Like I said, many of the social networking companies are on the list. LinkedIn and Foursquare are among them along with Wieden + Kennedy coming in at #25 for “dominating the airwaves and the Internet with its Old Spice campaign”. Here is the “true tale” of how they came up with the idea, in comic book form.

View here

Anyway, the point I'm making with this blog post is that the social media companies take over the first half of the top 50 list. This means that advertising is changing. There are so many options out there now. There's more than just Facebook so we need to think outside the box of what can be done on the Internet.

Going viral

We've been working on a project where we have to come up with a viral video and I think a lot of us had trouble with staying away from commercials. At least I did. I felt like I had to mention the brand in there somewhere but that's not what viral videos are all about. It's just meant to be cool. Whatever you're doing in the viral video doesn't have to relate to the brand. I think this is a good example of that.



What they are doing is blowing out and re-lighting these candles with a cannon. And what's the brand? Erbert & Gerbert's subs. This brand has nothing to do with cannons or candles except for the fact they were celebrating their 20th anniversary. However, it does show how fun the brand is without directly saying that. Anyway, the thing that's going to help us with our viral videos is maybe stepping out of our branding boxes. We all watch youtube everyday so we know what's out there and what people on the web find funny. All we have to do is think of something new.

Video found on YOUTUBE

2011 Super Bowl

I didn't think the 2011 Super Bowl commercials were as great as previous years but there were some really creative ones. My favorite was this one, done for VW.



Many of the Super Bowl ads were in your face humorous, such as the Doritos and Pepsi ones. The thing I liked about the VW one was it's simplicity and subtle humor. There's no conversation going on at all, just different scenes. Even though the kid has his face covered, you still can feel emotion through his body language. The part I liked the most was when his mom slides the sandwich over to him. You see that "Oh, mom..." emotion that we all recognize. I also think the brand did a good job of hitting their target audience, being families. Whenever I think of targeting families I feel limited in what can be done so this ad really inspires me on how a family oriented commercial can also be hilarious.

Video found on YOUTUBE

Bud – weis – er (1995 Super Bowl)

I was under 10 years old when this commercial came out but I'll never forget how popular it was. I remember my family making a big deal out of it, thinking it was just hilarious. And it still is.



So what makes this such a great ad? It's simple and repeats the brand name over and over and over. All you need is the frogs hanging out to make people laugh. Genius. Off hand, I can't think of any other commercial that does this, just repeating the brand name. I found this website interesting. It talks about the best commercials in the Super Bowl from back in the day and then talks about how that commercial would look in the year 2010. It's funny to read it now that it's 2011. According to this website (about the Budweiser frog commercial), “Due to intense cost-cutting moves after a 2008 acquisition by Belgian brewing giant InBev, one of the frogs is laid off and the two remaining amphibians lose their personal secretaries and pension plan. The “Wise” frog’s voice is dubbed in a sound studio in Vancouver by a non-union voice actor working below scale.” Just for fun, let's take a look at what Budweiser really did for their Super Bowl commercial in 2010.



So no more frogs, but still humorous. The point in this one is to show how much people love Budweiser and what they would do to get the truck into the town. I, however, prefer the simplicity of the Budweiser frogs spot. That's just something that's always going to be funny.

Technology, in a shoe

A couple blogs ago, I talked about QR codes used in fashion. I thought this was the new cool thing out right now, until I came upon this. This video will explain how a microchip is placed in a shoe. At certain locations you will find a pad with the shoe logo. You can step on the pad and a number of things can go down. You can get your picture taken and added to Flickr instantly, you can update your Twitter with where you are at that moment, you can get discounts at bars or coffee shops, you can use it as a ticket to get into concerts and other events and with two people, you can instantly become friends on Facebook. I guess I should mention that you have to register your shoe first with a code on the shoe. You give it your name and all your Twitter/Facebook/Flickr info. It would be a little creepy if it knew all that information already. Anyway, watch the video. It will make a lot more sense.



Alright, so some features I found pretty awesome, others kinda creepy. Actually the only one I found to be creepy was the Twitter one where it lets everyone know exactly where you are. I thought the Facebook friend request was pretty cool. When you meet someone new and want to add them on Facebook it really sucks when you forget their name the next day. I also liked how it can be your ticket to concerts because we all know how much it sucks to lose expensive tickets. Getting discounts at specific places is cool because who doesn't like a discount, right? Plus it helps that coffee shop or bar advertise for themselves as well as the actual shoe. Very clever. Putting an instant picture on Flickr can be a little creepy because people might be able to tell exactly where you are at that moment, however, it's also cool because not many of us carry around cameras anymore to events and we might want our picture taken to prove we were really at that cool place. I also think the shoe can only be really cool if all your friends have it too. That way you can get these discounts and pictures taken together. For the most part it sounds pretty awesome.

Found on Creativity

Finally..

I'm sure most of us are aware that Verizon is finally coming out with the Iphone after a long wait. Verizon has promised the Iphone to customers for awhile now and luckily, most Verizon customers were loyal enough to wait for the special day. First of all, being a Verizon customer myself, I think Verizon is a great company and this is a reason why their customers didn't just switch over to AT&T right away. They knew Verizon would stick to their word even though it did take awhile. I also think that more people will switch over to Verizon now, not only for the Iphone but also for the good service. Regardless of the services and company, I really just wanted to talk about the commercial out for the new Verizon Iphone. But first, let's take a look at the first Iphone commercial ever.



At this point we didn't know what the Iphone had to offer so, of course, the commercial had to focus on the phone and what it could do. Makes sense and turned out to be a cool ad. Now let's take a look at the Verizon ad for the Iphone.



Here, we don't see the product at all. We already know everything about it so why do something that was already done? I think this is a clever way to promote the Iphone to Verizon customers. If you are a Verizon customer, you would know the feeling of just waiting for this day to come, being anxious and wondering whether it would ever actually happen and the commercial captured that feeling perfectly. I also like how they mention something like “thank you for being loyal customers and waiting”, which shows how the company cares about their customers, making customers feel special that they stayed with Verizon. Something clever I saw in the commercial was in one of the shots you see a Mac, giving a little bit of a hint to what the commercial was for but still, never showing the product.

So, I love Verizon, I loved the spot and the Iphone does look pretty cool. I actually just had an upgrade on my phone and I could of waited a few weeks to get the Iphone but I'm sticking with my Blackberry. I just can't give up my brick breaker and BBM. But, I'm sure more people out there would rather switch to the Iphone and Verizon's business will only grow.

Videos found on YOUTUBE