Steve and I got around to watching the first episode of the new season of the TV Show “Eureka” last night. During the mid-show commercial break, a “Made in Eureka” commercial came on for Degree deodorant. At first we thought it was in the show or a joke, but it was a real commercial. “Holy Crap!!” I shouted. Continue reading Degree Deodorant Sponsors the TV Series “Eureka”
Category Archives: Advertising
Online Content Viewing Driving the PC-TV Convergence
According to this article 20% of viewers watch some portion of TV content online. Continue reading Online Content Viewing Driving the PC-TV Convergence
Selling Thru the TV: Tivo and Amazon vs. “Bookmarking”
Selling stuff directly through the TV to the consumer is apparently the grand dream of advertisers and probably the worst nightmare for consumers. Time shifting and the ability to skip commercials is the primary reason I have and use Tivo. I understand Tivo’s desire to make themselves appealing to potential advertising customers, but I have to ask whether Tivo has changed who their target customer is — it is consumers or is it advertisers? For now, it looks as though they are shifting to advertisers in order to get their software into more houses. In the end, though, will consumers be pleased or annoyed? Continue reading Selling Thru the TV: Tivo and Amazon vs. “Bookmarking”
Franchises Squeezed by Dollar Menus
I read an article about this a few months ago and this seems to be a follow on to that original article. Anyhow, I’m quite guilty of eating off of fast food value menus exclusively lately and ordering free cups of water instead of a bottled water. It’s a great value for me, but I can see how this (particularly customers not buying soft drinks) hurts franchise owners as commodity prices rise and they can’t raise food prices to reflect this. It’s a tough problem and I see both sides of the argument — a squeeze on the franchise owner and the company, on the whole, fighting for market share. The rising price of commodities is making everyone’s life miserable. Anyhow, here’s a link to the articles.
Consumer Electronics Super Buyers
Here’s an interesting article from Marketing Daily. Here’s a fact from the article that dismays me:
Nearly 40% of survey respondents who earn less than $35,000 and spend $2,000 or more annually perceive consumer electronics products as too expensive, compared with 25% of those who average yearly salaries between $75,000 and $99,999.
I wonder who the folks that make under $35K a year are. Are they folks with families or are they students or people who are still living with their parents so they don’t have to pay for the necessities of life? I guess I’m not surprised to see this, considering that within my own family, the ones that are in poverty generally have better electronic stuff than my-geeky-self. But they, also, have hungry children and are in a constant state of being on the edge of eviction and days away from having their utilities disconnected. What’s messed up is that they may be better customers than families with more money, so it’s tempting to advertise to them to get that money they are so easily willing to part with. Usually, this is associated with some terrible credit purchasing terms. Half of me feels very guilty about preying upon this segment of poor consumers. The other half of me says, “you reap what you sow,” and feels no pity when folks with illogical priorities find themselves in trouble. At the same time, though, you can’t get money from someone who has none, so in the end, this kind of culture of illogical priorities coupled with greed catches up with society, like it has in the US now.
More Rambling 