December 2009
3 posts
This Site is Taking a Break.
After 5 months and 85 posts, I am putting the Almost People microblog on hiatus. I have a lot of writing and teaching to do in Winter/Spring 2010, and I anticipate not having time to create content for this site. I appreciate the positive feedback I have received, and I look forward to starting a similar project in the future!
—Chris
Gatorade Discontinues Tiger Drink
Indicating that plans to discontinue Gatorade Tiger Focus had been set for some time, Gatorade has announced it will stop selling its Tiger Woods branded drink. At BrandWeek.com, a Gatorade representative indicated that “[w]e decided several months ago to discontinue Gatorade Tiger Focus along with some other products to make room for our planned series of innovative products in 2010. We...
The Economist: The Power of Oprah's Personal Brand
In this week’s The Economist, the Schumpeter column is devoted to consideration of the power and potential of Oprah Winfrey’s personal brand and her connection with her fans, in light of her recent announcement that her talk show will be ending in 2011. Reference: “Schumpeter.” (2009, November 26). Brand royalty. The Economist, 393, 78.
November 2009
13 posts
Coke Zero and McDonalds Invite Consumers to Hold...
In partnership with the new Avatar film, Coke Zero and McDonald’s are introducing Avatar-themed augmented reality products, according to AdAge.com. These products’ packaging—not the actual colas or burgers themselves—will activate online content when they are held up to consumers’ webcams. For a Coke Zero ad highlighting this packaging, click here.
Reference:...
Connecting Workers to Their Organization's Purpose
Forty percent of U.S. workers feel unmotivated and a quarter of U.S. employees do not feel loyal to their current employer, according to an August/September 2009 survey conducted for Career Builder.com by Harris Interactive.
In a new blog post at Harvard Business’s Conversation Starter blog, Jim Hart highlights the importance of delineating a company’s purpose in order to improve...
Taylor Swift Knows What You Want to Say to Your...
Singer Taylor Swift will be penning her own line of greeting cards and stationary for American Greetings. These products will show up in stores in the Spring, along with a set of customizable online greetings. As quoted on Brandweek.com, the CEO of American greetings highlights the strengths of associating with Taylor Swift: “Her abilities as a storyteller and songwriter make her a natural...
Research Report: More Pros & Cons of Product...
New research on the effects of product placement in TV and movies indicates that repeated prominent product placements can negatively impact consumers’ attitudes toward a particular brand. However, subtle product placements can results in positive attitude effects, even with repitition of the subtle placements. Interesting, repeated prominent placements may have negative impacts on...
Research Report: When Product Placement May Help...
A new article by Eva Van Reijmersdal of the Amsterdam School of Communications Research outlines important findings about the effects of product placement. Specifically, she describes how product placement can improve brand memory but, under certain circumstances, can harm brand-related attitudes. She also discusses how product placement can impact attitudes even without audience members...
Research Report: When is Product Placement...
A new study by researchers at Arizona State University and Indiana University explores the effectiveness of product placement in films. The researchers’ analyses indicate that product placement in successful films does predict increases in stock prices. They show how placement effects are improved by brand equity and tie-in advertisements but are harmed by violent film content and lack of...
Advertisers Ask What They Can Do for the Consumer?...
A new posting on AdWeek.com considers the question of “What can we be doing to help consumers, and improve some aspect of their lives?” Euro RCSG co-CEO Jeff Brooks shares his thoughts about the importance of advertising yielding some benefit to consumers.
Reference: The Rise of ‘Advertility’ Posted on AdWeek.com on November 9, 2009, by Jeff Brooks
Consumers Rate Business Leaders and Athletes as...
According to a new survey by Harris Interactive and AdWeek Media, U.S. consumers find business leaders and athletes to be persuasive endorsers of products. In the same survey, politicians were rated as the least persuasive endorsers.
Reference: Business Leaders, Athletes Make Best Spokespeople Posted on MarketingCharts.com on November 5, 2009
Mickey Mouse Gets Naughty...ish
Disney is experimenting with updating the personality of Mickey Mouse. According to a New York Times article, as part of his re-branding, Mickey is going to star in a video game for the Nintendo Wii in 2011, and this game will help introduce a Mickey that is adventurous, enthusiastic, curious, and even and a little naughty.
Reference: After Mickey’s Makeover, Less Mr. Nice Guy Published on...
How Video Game Characters Can Alter Our Self-Image
A new article offers a shift in perspective from typical studies of the processes whereby video game players identify with video game characters. Specifically, Christoph Klimmt at Johannes Gutenberg University of Mainz, Germany, and his colleagues offer a social psychological framework for focusing on characters’ effects on players’ self-perceptions rather than on the often-utilized...
Employee Interactions Shape Consumer Perceptions...
Newly published research explores ways in which employees’ behaviors influence consumers’ perceptions of brand personality. These three studies by Daniel Wentzel of the University of St. Gallen in Switzerland show how employees’ impact on brand personality perceptions is influenced by consumer beliefs related to how representative the employee is of the brand and how much...
Positive and Negative Experiences of Alonetime...
A recently published study by Dara Greenwood and Chris Long (i.e., me!) suggests that people who typically experience solitude as positive or as negative are likely to feel particularly close to their favorite TV characters, but probably for different reasons. As Greenwood notes in a University of Michigan press release, “Media programs are, after all, inherently social and may offer...
October 2009
20 posts
The Resurgence of Live Reads in Radio
Radio hosts are trading on their celebrity and their relationships with their listeners to do more live reads of advertisements on their programs. According to AdAge.com, the radio industry is using the actual brand preferences of hosts like Steve Harvey and Ryan Seacrest to attract increasing ad investments from companies who may not have focused on these types of live endorsements in the past.
...
Personified Windows PC Beaten Down Again
Continuing the seemingly endless series of ads in which the personified Mac gets the best of the hapless personified PC, Apple has a collection of new spots highlighting potential problems with Windows 7. View these at AdWeek’s AdFreak blog.
Reference: PC breaks promises, plenty of fashion rules Posted on the AdFreak blog on October 23, 2009, by Tim Nudd
Dress Like a Mad Men Man
Brooks Brothers has begun to sell a Mad Men-inspired suit, according to AdLand.tv. Right now, the price is $998 for a suit “directly inspired by the razor sharp 1960s tailoring favored by the characters of Don Draper (played by Jon Hamm) and Roger Sterling (played by John Slattery).” If you have $998 to spare, here’s your chance to dress like you belong among the titans of...
Live in Concert: Cheez Doodles!
Want to win a Fender Stratocaster Guitar, a Fender Precision Bass, and a Tama drum kit? According to MediaPost.com, all you have to do is create your own cardboard or paper stage for a virtual Cheez Doodles rock band! Once you’ve made your stage, print out the augmented reality codes from the Rock the Cheez website, attach the codes to your stage, aim your webcam at your stage, and then the...
Project Yourself into a John Mayer Music Video
You can project yourself into your own version of a new John Mayer music video, simply by holding a printout in front of your webcam. This will trigger your webcam to project your face as the face of an extra in the video for John Mayer’s new song “Heartbreak Warfare.” According to Wired.com, you will see yourself standing behind Mayer as he performs.
Reference: John Mayer’s...
Ask.com Asks You to Dance
Ask.com search engine has launched a new campaign featuring actors dancing with delight at the deals they found on Ask.com. In addition, the search engine is asking you to dance, too, by uploading video of your Ask.com deal dance to askdeals.com. Perhaps this represents a much-needed outlet to express the joy that you feel when a search engine saves you some money.
Reference: Ask Wants to Start...
Augmented Reality Browser for Your Phone is Now a...
DraftFCB’s Welcome to Matters blog and Lifehacker.com have separately posted brief descriptions of a new augmented reality browser for mobile phones. The browser, called Layar, uses GPS info to overlay augmented reality info over images generated by a phone’s camera. Find out more at Layar’s website.
Marge Simpson is a Girl Next Door?
Marge Simpson will appear on the cover of Playboy’s November issue, according to AdWeek.com. Depending on what Marge’s images on the inside of the magazine look like, this issue of Playboy may bring parasocial interaction with prime time animated characters to a somewhat icky place.
Reference: Marge Simpson poses for cover of ‘Playboy’ Posted on AdWeek.com on October...
Disney Stores to Become More Interactive
Disney plans to re-energize its Disney Store brand to help customers’ interact with its characters and media. In collaboration with Apple and Steve Jobs, Disney stores will be updated to include mini-theaters, satellite links whereby shoppers can interact with characters, displays that interact with chips implanted in store merchandise, and more. According to BrandWeek.com, the new store...
Soap Opera Viewers May Want Soap Opera Lives
Recent research indicates that regular soap opera viewers share several characteristics that may be interesting to consumer researchers: Specifically, these viewers show evidence of perceiving television reality as “normal,” aspiring to have the possessions and lives of the characters on the shows, and parasocial substitution of soap opera relationships for real life relationships....
Your Notebook PC is an Expression of Yourself...or...
At BrandWeek.com, two new articles explore customization of notebook PCs. First, you can read about Dell’s efforts to use design, art, and customization to make your notebook and expression of your personality. Then, if you decide that self-expression through your notebook is not your thing, you can find out about purchasing an HP notebook designed to express Dr. Dre’s preferences....
You Can Write Music with Tommy Lee
At website The Public Record, you can listen to the initial outlines of new tracks for an in-progress Tommy Lee album, and you can submit your own ideas for fleshing out the music and lyrics. Of course, any work you submit to the site becomes Tommy’s property, but this could be your chance to create some rock music history…or whatever a Tommy Lee album is.
Reference: Fans help rock...
Today, Be Black Dynamite
Just in time for the holidays, you can now make yourself into Black Dynamite, using the online Black Dynamite Yo’Self application. According to BrandFreak.com, the application is designed to promote a new blaxploitation-esque film opening soon. Reference: “You’ve Elfed and Scrooged yourself. Now, Black Dynamite Yo’Self” Posted on BrandFreak.com on October 6, 2009, by...
Drink the Godfather's Vodka
According to Brandweek.com, Paramount Pictures and Iconic Brands have announced that they will be introducing a new vodka named The Godfather Italian Organic Vodka. Soon vodka drinkers will be able to drink the kind of vodka that Vito Corleone would have consumed… or produced… or something.
Reference: Bada-bing! ‘The Godfather’ Vodka Debuts Posted on BrandWeek.com on...
Bloggers Required to Disclose Compensation for...
AdWeek describes a new FTC rule requiring bloggers who receive money or product samples for a product review to clearly specify that they were compensated. This rule is designed to clarify which blog entries are effectively paid advertising and which are uncompensated opinions.
Reference: FTC: Bloggers Must Disclose Payments Posted on AdWeek.com on October 5, 2009, by Brian Morrissey
On New Show, Leno Spends Lots of Time Selling...
BrandFreak.com links to a video compilation of Jay Leno’s incorporating copious references to various brands at almost every opportunity on his new show.
Reference: Brand references as common as jokes on Jay Leno’s new show Posted on BrandFreak.com on October 1, 2009, by T.L. Stanley
Phone is an Important Actor in New MTV Series
A new MTV-produced show features a dead character’s Verizon phone as an important catalyst to each episode’s action: Every episode of the new series ‘Valemont’ opens with the apparently dead character’s Verizon phone displaying a text or video message from the apparently dead character. While the first two episodes will air on MTV, the remaining 23 episodes will be...
Echo from Dollhouse Will Hang Out on Your PC
Fox TV has released an application for your PC that allows Eliza Dushku to stop by your PC every once in a while. When the application is active, Dushku—as Echo, her character from the Dollhouse TV series—will occasionally make an appearance on your desktop and give you one of a series of messages. Visit http://www.fox.com/dollhouse/virtualecho/ to find out more about the...
New TV Ads Incorporate Elements of Programs during...
AdAge article describes the practice of crafting program-specific TV advertisements that integrate elements of the programs into the ad content. Exhibit A is a new Palm Pre campaign airing during Desperate Housewives episodes.
Reference: Desperate Spokeswives: A New Marriage With Ads Posted at AdAge.com on September 28, 2009, by Brian Steinberg
To Sell Perfume, Faith Hill explains "the Beauty...
Faith Hill will sell her perfume by appearing in a series of webisodes in which she will discuss “the Beauty of Being a Woman” and respond to questions and themes suggested by fans. Read more at AdWeek.com
Reference: Faith Hill Parfums Smells Success Online Posted at AdWeek.com on September 28, 2009, by Sarah Knapp
September 2009
20 posts
Make Your Own Milk Mustache Ad Online and Share It...
America’s Milk Processors give consumers the opportunity to make their own milk mustache ad using an online tool at bodybymilk.com. For each of the first 500,000 milk mustache ads created, $1 will be donated to VH1’s Save the Music Foundation. The online tool makes it easy to upload a photo of yourself and to share the milk mustache ad you create.
TGI Friday's Surprises Itself By Quickly Gaining...
TGI Friday’s surprised themselves with the success of a social networking promotion they launched this month. The deal was this: If 500,000 people on Facebook friended a TGI Friday’s character named Woody, who is depicted as a TGI Friday’s fan, each friend would receive a coupon for a free burger or chicken sandwich. According to AdWeek.com, the promotion soft-launched on...
A brand is...
Branding consultancy BLACKCOFFEE has compiled a collection of its website visitors’ definitions of what a brand is. Many of the definitions highlight the social and anthropomorphised aspects of branding. Here is the full list Via Brand Mix blog
Parasocial Interaction with NASCAR Drivers
The Indy Idea blog recently discussed parasocial attachment between race fans and their favorite drivers…and how NASCAR gets this right: “NASCAR has mastered what sociologists call parasocial interaction: a relationship between two individuals in which only one is actively engaged. In the case of NASCAR, that individual is the fan. The object of the parasocial relationship is the...
Lonely People Perceive Products and Pets as More...
Researchers at the University of Chicago and at Harvard University recently published a series of studies demonstrating that people who are chronically lonely (or are made to feel lonely) are particularly likely to perceive consumer products and pets as especially humanlike. The researchers highlight how their studies indicate that anthropomorphisation of nonhuman objects and nonhuman animals can...
"In Gayle We Trust" is a Web Series Designed to...
American Family Insurance and NBC Universal have developed a 10-episode web video series featuring Gayle, a friendly insurance agent. According to an article at AdWeek.com, American Family wants to show how its agents are trustworthy, socially connected members of their local communities. For instance, the article notes that in one episode of In Gayle We Trust, “the main character rebuffs...
Is Using Hitler in Your Ads a Good Idea?
A BusinessWeek blog post considers a new German ad that uses sex with Hitler to make a point about HIV. Reference: Images of Hitler and 9-11 Haunt Some Ads Posted at BusinessWeek.com by David Kiley on September 9
How Young Women Think About Favorite Characters...
New research suggests that, for young women, wishing they were like their favorite female TV characters is predictive of feeling ashamed of their own bodies. Similarly, wishing they were like their favorite female characters is related to worrying about they way their bodies look, as is feeling particularly dissimilar to their favorite female characters. According to this study by University of...
Communication Prof Explores Why Viewers Don't...
“Audiences develop parasocial interactions with news anchors, and they want anchors who are credible journalists, have likable personalities and appear to be hardworking. Couric seems to be all of that, but viewers haven’t connected,” says Jeffrey M. McCall, DePauw University professor of communication, in an Indianapolis Star op-ed. For the entire column, go here.
Reference:...
Tony Stewart Will Not Lie
According to BrandWeek.com, NASCAR Driver and Burger King Whopper endorser Tony Stewart is going to take a polygraph broadcast live online to prove that he is a true Whopper lover. Visitors to www.truthabouttony.com will be able submit questions for the polygraph session and will eventually be encouraged to vote on which questions will be asked of Stewart. The campaign, which implicates consumer...
Changing Logos Can Put Brand Relationships at Risk
According to BusinessWeek.com, results of recent research indicates that brand logo changes are more likely to upset consumers high in commitment to the brand, as opposed to casual consumers. Rice University’s Dr. Vikas Mittal, one of the researchers, notes, “Changing a logo is a pretty expensive proposition, not just in terms of direct cost. If you offend the customers that are most...