Better Marketing

Finally, someone in the media states the bleedin' obvious, that Apple is a much better advertiser than many of its competitors. Case in point, the ads that Motorola have been running for its new Xoom tablet are, to put it mildly, a big cluster. Instead of following Apple's lead and simply (but elegantly) showing you what their product can actually do for you in eveyday life, Motorola has decided to eschew such money-making ideas, and instead opted to show you how, once activated, their Xoom tablet will transform into a spaceship that will surround you and fire its jet engines as it hovers above the ground. Or something.

How some folks make it in the advertising world is beyond me. True, some rather annoying and confusing commercials actually seem to work for some companies, but it's looking like the Xoom tablet isn't among that elite. And while some wacky ads are kind of cute, and definitely memorable, they don't really tell me about what the product being sold actually does in real life. Whether it's a talking lizard, an insurance agent appearing like a genie after the recitation of a jingle, or a computer tablet turning into a spaceship, these commercials may amuse me, annoy me, or make me go 'wow' at the special effects, but they don't do much to sway me toward the product being advertised.

And isn't that the entire purpose of a commercial?

Comments

Yesterday's Restaurants

The local newspaper has a feature from one of Champaign-Urbana's most legendary restaurateur's, John Katsinas, on what his favorite area restaurants were that have now since closed (or will soon be closing). It's a nice little read, and has made me stop and think about the restaurants that have come and gone that have left an indelible (and edible) impression on me throughout the years. Here we go....

Watching The Hours

A Twitter friend named Paula has asked for folks to submit ideas for a blog-a-thon about what we think will be the classic films of the future. In other words, what relatively recent movies (namely, from the 21st century), do we think will be considered classics in the decades to come, possibly airing on such venerable stations as Turner Classic Movies ? While a number of films come to mind for such a category, one in particular stood out from the rest, and thus is my entry for Paula's blog-a-thon.

She's Madonna

Today we're going to talk about something very important. We're going to talk about Madonna. "Madge," as she's affectionately known around the gay scene, has been making music for over thirty years. I grew up with her songs, many of them pop classics. In recent years, it can be arguably said that her popularity has waned a bit. During the past decade, Madonna has put out seventeen singles. Of those, three have charted in the US Top 40. Ten Failed to chart at all on the Billboard Hot 100. We now have at least one possibility offered as to why Madge's chart power is waning: Ageism. At least, that's what Diplo (just, Diplo), a producer of some of the tracks off her latest album, thinks . I know it's difficult to be objective about something you've worked on -- whether you were the producer or the artist -- but, as a listener/fan, I have to say that Madonna's most recent work has simply not been that good. Still, we'll hear what ...

Left to my own devices

Search This Blog