Men: Of course, men are always fair game. You can insult men as much as you want under any circumstance. This is especially true of fathers. Nothing is quite as stupid as fathers.

Women: This is far trickier. Mothers can be insulted by teens, but never by their husbands. One woman can insult another, providing the woman being insulted is not the one buying the product being advertised.

Teens: A teenage girl will always show up a teenage boy, but both can make fools of their parents.

Age: The older they get, the funnier and more idiotic they get, isn’t that right? Pretty well any person over the age of 40 is fair game, but the male/female standard still holds: an older woman can only be put down by another woman, but anyone can make fun of the older man.

It’s a pretty simple process, and most ad agencies seem to understand the principle quite well. Special kudos, however, go to  DraftFCB for its unremitting display of Old Man Bashing in the TD Bank commercials.

And I’m sure I’m alone in seriously thinking of switching my account away from the TD bank. It probably just proves I’m a grumpy old man.

The Hathaway Shirts man revealed

An article by theatre critic Richard Ouzounian in Tuesday’s Toronto Star, (Time in a Mad Men World) travels the well-tread ground of blaming Madison Avenue for pretty well every ill confronting the modern world.

Having attended “a scholarship Jesuit boys’ prep school on the Upper East Side of Manhattan” during the early to mid sixties, he and his friends “wore jackets and ties and moved within that bubble of artificial but attractive sophistication that was Manhattan in the 1960s.”

It was during this time that the “real-life equivalents of Drapper and company at Sterling Cooper” force-fed Ouzounian and his friends with the lies that would scar each of them for life.

“Hathaway delivered to us a mysterious gentleman with an eye patch who wore shirts that bespoke a world of sophistication filled with stripes and colours that our white-on-white world could only gawk at, culminating in a campaign for one shade called ‘Cezanne Blue’ that had us wishing we dared to wear such an assertive hue.”

God help us! Images of men in shirts! Striped shirts!

Blue shirts!!

As if fully clothed men weren’t bad enough, Ouzounian complains that these propagandistic messages were completely devoid of warnings, such as: “Pursue this dream and your life will eventually self-destruct.”

If this seems over the top, just look at what happened to his friends.

The “Pete Campbell” of his group became a “cold-blooded creature with a weakness for vulnerable women,” who entered the priesthood, only to leave it for “the secular world and marriage, still searching for meaning.” You have to admit, this could only have been caused by advertising. Certainly the Jesuit school had nothing to do with it.

Meanwhile, the “seemingly solid Harry Crane of our world went through four wives and an equal number of treatment centres before falling off the radar permanently.” What else could cause multiple marriages and the need for therapy? And certainly nobody would ever lose track of old school buddies if it weren’t for advertising.

And the closeted gay “Salvatore Romano” among them married, moved to suburbia, and raised a family. “It was decades later,” says Ouzounian, “when he was dying of cancer this past summer that we learned he had finally admitted his homosexuality after years of repressing it through alcoholism.” Ah, for those bucolic days before advertising when gays could live openly and without shame!

There is more — oh, so much more, in Ouzounian’s muddled scree against Madison Avenue. But what really puzzles me is why he, like so many others, seems determined to present himself as a helpless, empty-headed automaton. During the same period of time in which Ouzounian and his buddies were being brainwashed into drinking Beefeater martinis (“because that’s what we were told to consume”) and smoking Benson & Hedges (” because they bespoke true sophistication”) millions of his contemporaries were reaching out to new ways of living, completely separate from the diabolical messages of advertising. They protested war, they turned their backs on materialism, and they most certainly didn’t get freaked out by shirts in Cezanne Blue.

With an infinite number of influences in our lives, why do people want to give all the credit to advertising?

It’s a guy wearing an eye patch, for Christ’s sake — not Svengali!

No, really. She does all her makeup herself, and only uses Cover Girl. ("Nothing covers bruises like Cover Girl.")

I must have been around eight years old when I saw a Candid Camera spot that taught me almost everything I needed to know about “man on the street” testimonials.

It involved a restaurant owner asking his customers what they thought about a new brand of coffee. The catch? Each cup of coffee had several heaping teaspoons of mustard added. The camera, of course, was hidden, but the ketchup bottle, which he waved conspicuously in front of their faces, had a thick cord running out the bottom. The customers, then, were led to believe they were being “secretly” interviewed for a commercial.

They waxed poetic. It was the best coffee they’d ever tasted. This was the way coffee was supposed to taste. And so on. Of course, what the camera caught (that their words were meant to hide) were the expressions of shuddering disgust. The most amusing was one customer who was asked if he’d like another cup. His face showed pure horror, even as his mouth said, “I’d love one.”

I learned then and there that testimonials in ads are completely worthless. People will agree to whatever the interviewer asks, so long as they believe they’re going to appear in a commercial for giving the right answers.

Some interviews, of course, are more subtle than others. In one campaign, shoppers coming out of a store were asked if they would trade one of various items they bought for two items of a different brand. I no longer remember what the product was, but let’s say it was Tide.

The spot went roughly like this:

Interviewer: Would you trade one bottle of your dish detergent for two bottles of another brand?

Shopper: Sure.

Interviewer: Would you trade one box of facial tissues for two of another brand?

Shopper: Sure.

Interviewer: Would you trade one box of Tide for two of another brand?

Shopper: No. Definitely not.

Now forgetting for the moment that the brand-loyal testimonials are culled from what may have been hundreds of responses, look at what the interviewer did in this case. Each item was mentioned in a generic fashion, except for the one being advertised. This alone was enough to clue-in most shoppers which product demanded their loyalty if they wanted a chance to be in the commercial. And there was no hiding the fact that it was a commercial. The cameraman stood behind the interviewer who, in turn, held a very distinctive microphone in his hand.

There’s really nothing more I want to say about this, except to wonder just how many consumers are actually influenced by on-air testimonials. The stars who act as spokespeople for various products are well paid for their efforts, and we all know it. Do any of us really believe that Mischa Baron sits at home washing her hair with Herbal Essences products? Or that Rhianna applies her own makeup using Cover Girl? For that matter, do we really believe that all those “real-people-not-actors” who heap praise upon various cleaning products and skin creams didn’t know they were being filmed for a commercial? Or that if they did, that they nevertheless answered honestly?

Do we really believe this?

I don’t know. It’s obvious that the major ad agencies think so. But then, the major ad agencies also seem to think that anyone over 40 is only interested in buying adult diapers and health insurance, so maybe they’re not exactly in touch with things the way they should be. And let’s not forget Zig’s rather disastrous campaign for Ikea (“Ikea’s advertising guerrilla ordered to clean up after itself“).

All I know is that from the age of eight, I never again paid the slightest attention to testimonial-based advertising — except to keep my eye out for whatever trick was being used.

God bless Candid Camera.

Note -- this is not one of my twins who plays bagpipes in China.

I just talked to my twins on the phone.

I don’t hear from them too often, and see them even less, because for the past three years they’ve been earning their living by playing bagpipes in China.

That’s right. Bagpipes. China. Earning a living.

During our conversation, John (or was it Aragorn) mentioned the difference between “product business” and “marketing business.”

“Marketing business is based mostly on your marketing efforts,” he said. “Product business is based mostly on your product.”

Of course, all business requires some degree of each, but I could see his point.

To illustrate it, he compared Starbucks with Tim Horton’s.

“Starbucks is a marketing business. They’re not selling coffee, they’re selling a coffee gourmet experience. When the recession hit, people weren’t willing to pay so much for a mere experience, and their sales went down. Tim Horton’s, on the other hand, sells coffee. And while they’ve been hit like everyone else, it hasn’t been to the same degree.”

It’s true. Advertisers and marketers often forget that the product, if not being all-important, is at least very important. An old, and possibly apocryphal advertising story tells of a client who presents the ad man with two identical dollar bills. “Tell me why I should buy this one instead of the other one,” he demands in a challenge of  marketing ability.

Whether true or not, it’s bullshit. The actual worth of a product is a large part of its sales potential. During flush times, consumers are more willing to spend, and bad products along with products depending on a particular perception can do well. But when money gets tight, consumers automatically move to the products that deliver the best value. Note — I’m not saying to the highest quality products, as these can be out of reach, but to the products that present the best balance between quality and cost.

In other words, they turn to product businesses over and above marketing businesses.

Now all I have to do is figure out whether bagpipe players in China are a product business or a marketing business.

Best of luck, John and Aragorn. Nice hearing from you.

Just a quick note:

From WARC:

NEW YORK: The “green” messages of many major advertisers in the US are failing to resonate with consumers, despite the fact an increasing number of Americans are placing a heightened emphasis on environmental issues, a new study has found. (US brands see green messages fall flat.)

Well, duh! With everything from light bulbs to bathroom tissue promoting themselves as the latest word in “green,” the message is bound to get muddied. I pointed that out in Prius Gets It Right — With the Help of a Contrarian:

The purpose [of the Prius ad] is solely to promote the brand as being eco-friendly — a feature which, in the present market of eco-friendly cleaners, bathroom tissue, light bulbs, and drain cleaners, is becoming less and less of a distinction.

What with the present obsession with Word of Mouth (WOM), social networking, and promotion of “green” it’s a wonder any ads manage to sell a single product these days.

It is against the law to use the phrase "I'll be back" without accompanying it with a picture of the Terminator

I’ve had a few e-mail queries asking if I’ve gone the route of Bob Hoffman (better known as The Ad Contrarian) and folded up shop. Not true. But this semester has presented me with two classes in a course I’ve never taught before, two new campuses in which to teach, and a reworking of the curriculum I already had reworked last year — but that now has to be done again so I can accommodate certain changes.

Oh, and I’m taking courses myself towards a journalism certificate.

As a result, I’ve not had a chance to attend to either Ad Nauseam or Editor’s Sidebar.

But it is only temporary.

On YouTube, the video received 500,000 hits the first week.

But note — the spot was also widely aired on TV and in movie theatres.

Note too — the spot also tells you what the ad is for.

Best of all, however — it’s just plain fun.

See how it's in the freezer? That's where it hides before pouncing.

Alcohol played an integral, but not excessive, part of agency life back in the ’80s and early ’90s. Probably not so much now, what with all the law suits and societal disdain towards getting tipsy in the afternoon.

I remember the sound of glass tinkling in the hallway outside my office at JWT as the president pushed a cart loaded with various bottles of hooch and mix, stopping at each door, and fixing whatever drink was requested. It wasn’t a frequent event, but it was a welcome one. And of course there were the liquid lunches at JWT South, a particular bar on Yonge Street that I won’t name because it wouldn’t be prudent  – but it’s true that one of our female employees (I think she was in traffic) quit the company to start dancing there.

And then there were the in-house parties. Halloween, of course. And Christmas. Also Valentine’s Day, St. Patrick’s Day, Flag Day, and on occasion, Tuesday. And of course there were celebrations for landing an account. Or losing one.

The point is, we drank, and we worked, and the one never interfered with the other.

I was always very good at holding my liquor. I could drink a fair amount, but always knew when to stop before I embarrassed myself.

But sometimes mistakes happened.

The worst, for me, occurred at a party held by a friend of mine who ran a public relations firm in the city. I no longer recall the reason for the party — if, indeed, there was one (perhaps it was Tuesday) — but the entire affair was attended by marketing and advertising people from numerous agencies.

There was also plenty of alcohol, including something I’d never run across before: Polar Ice.

Now Polar Ice is a particularly pure brand of vodka, and the custom at the time was to throw it in the freezer until it was literally ice-cold — but not frozen, of course, because of the alcohol content, which I believe was in the neighbourhood of 110%.

The nice thing about frozen vodka is that it doesn’t have the bite of regular vodka. It also takes a while to metabolise, which means you can drink several glasses before realising the effect it’s having.

In short, I got drunk.

Not bad on its own — there were a lot of intoxicated people there, and even drunk I can normally handle myself with at least a modicum of dignity. Which I did.

Oh sure, I performed a couple of magic tricks, but only by request, and those watching were suitably impressed. The fact that I didn’t screw up surely meant I was in control, if somewhat wobbly.

Now it’s important to understand that up to this point I had been behaving in an entirely acceptable fashion. I’d been having a discussion with a woman beside me on the couch about Thompson’s 25-year mark with the Pepsi account, and I could tell that I was being coherent because my wife was still smiling at me.

And then he walked in.

“He” was the man who had re-imaged the entire concept of the detergent commercial, for both laundry and dish. His spots featured people talking happily while doing the washing-up, and while the product was never spoken of, it was prominently displayed as part of the cheerful scene. One spot featured a little girl helping her mother bring in the laundry and getting excited as her teddy bear was taken down from the line.

I wanted to tell this man how much I respected the direction he’d taken with the new spots. I wanted to explain to him that, while ads which didn’t mention the product were normally ineffective, his use of visuals had overcome this objection beautifully. I wanted to tell him that he was an advertising genius.

Unfortunately, somewhere between standing up, and reaching for his hand, a whole bunch of Polar Ice which had, until that moment, been hiding somewhere in my metabolism biding its time, took that moment to strike. To stay on my suddenly untrustworthy feet I grabbed his jacket lapel while shaking his hand.

Remembering that there was something I’d wanted to say, I blurted out, “I looove the teddy bear!”

That was the extent of my verbal acuity. I stood for a moment longer, attempting to work out how much of what I’d meant to say had actually been said, while also trying to figure out why I seemed incapable of standing without support. Since the standing part was temporarily being taken care of by hanging onto this fortunately-placed jacket lapel, I opted to continue my discourse on advertising.

“I looove the teddy bear,” I said, vaguely aware that I’d already said something similar. Unable to think of how to progress from there when I had a sudden flash of insight, and said, “I looove the teddy bear.”

It was sad. And I never touched Polar Ice again, nor got that intoxicated.

Even worse — I never could remember his name.

But if by any chance he stumbles upon this blog and is reading this, I just want to tell him: “I loooove the teddy bear.”

Stop! That duck isn't an approved Talk Talk agent!

In Britain, Talk Talk is engaging in a reverse pickpocketing scheme. In a move intended to show that companies can put money back into the pockets of consumers, as well as taking it out, the mobile phone and broadband provider has sent out 20 “putpockets” into the streets of London  where they will slip five pound or 20 pound notes into the pockets and purses of unsuspecting people. “With so many scams out there, Britons have become very sceptical of companies giving money away,” said TalkTalk’s Mark Schmid. “We have turned to put-pocketing to give something back. Whilst unconventional, we don’t think anyone is going to mind finding a crisp £20 in their pocket.”

Many of the putpockets are actually reformed pickpockets, such as Chris Fitch, who now heads the project.  ”Every time I put money back in someone’s pocket, I feel less guilty about the fact I spent many years taking it out.”

Each participant has been given a special ID card and is accompanied by a “minder,” just in case they’re caught. While the initial action is taking place in London, the plan is to expand the reverse thievery across the country, with at least 100,000 pounds being given away eventually.

The company claims that it informed the police before embarking on the stunt, but Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) is denying this. “This kind of thing would not be approved by the MPS because it could lead to misunderstandings and confrontations and it might lead to a form of cover for actual pick-pocketing,” said a police spokesman. Still, they have no intention of asking Talk Talk to cease and desist, although they are warning that it might cause trouble.

I don’t know how well this will work as advertising — so far only a small percentage of the news stories concerning the stunt are even mentioning the sponsoring company’s name. On the other hand, unlike Ikea’s latest gaffe, there aren’t likely to be many people actively complaining about it.

We await further developments with interest.

I'm telling you, Schultz. With guerrilla advertising the consumer will know nothing! Nothing!

Imagine the scene. The Allied forces are storming the beaches of Normandy. People are getting shot all over the place. There are explosions and screams and the firing of automatic weapons. Finally, after hours of fighting, the German forces retreat and the beachhead has been won.

You know what didn’t happen next? What didn’t happen next was the Allied forces gathering up all their stuff and then buggering off home. And you know why that didn’t happen next?

Because that would have been a guerrilla warfare tactic. And they weren’t using guerrilla warfare tactics. And do you know why they weren’t using guerrilla warfare tactics?

Because they weren’t bloody idiots!

Because they had billions and billions of dollars worth of weaponry and armaments. Not to mention ordinance. Just tons of ordinance. And when you’ve got all that, you don’t have to use guerrilla tactics.

You see, guerrilla warfare is only used when you’re in a weak position. Such as the resistance groups who fought behind enemy lines. They’d go out, blow up a bridge, and then retreat through the tunnels to Stalag 13 in time for one of LeBeau’s perfectly-cooked dinners and a night cap, before Sergeant Schultz came around for his nightly inspection.

The same is true in advertising — except the dinners tend to be rubberised chicken.

Suppose you’ve got a small business. Maybe it’s repairing bicycles. Since your name is Bill, you’ve called it Bill’s Bicycle Repair. Good for you. You’ve also got an inventory consisting of a tool kit, a few useful spare parts, and a batch of bicycle frames in such bad shape that if you scraped the rust off them there’d be nothing left but decals.

You also have $200 in your account.

Now you could spend that $200 for one ad in the Podunk Shopping Mall Weekly Advertiser. That would make you feel all professional and grown up and stuff. It would also blow your advertising budget in one shot and be seen only by a few dozen middle-aged women sitting in a food court eating Arby’s and telling the kids to shut up. And it wouldn’t always be their own kids.

Not that I’m stereotyping.

On the other hand, with $200 you could get two batches of stickers printed out. So what you do is take about a dozen of those rusted bicycle frames and leave them around the city with a sticker on each one reading: “I don’t feel so well — call Bill.” If you were any good at drawing, or had an artistic friend, you might even have a picture of a sad-looking bike on the sticker.

Pathos sells.

And then, a week or two later, you go back, pick up the rusted hulks, and put up the second lot of stickers on the walls and posts where the bikes were. And these new stickers read: “Hi, I’m Bill. Have there been any messages for me? Bill’s Bicycle Repair — 555-1234.”

Of course, you’d use a real phone number.

Now that is guerrilla advertising. It’s possible you might get into a bit of trouble with the city, but not likely. And if you did, you might be lucky enough to have it written up in the newspaper and then people would see it, and a lot of them would think it was a clever idea and remember your name. Most of them wouldn’t be mad because (a) you’d cleaned up the bikes after a week or so yourself, and (b) you’re just a small business.

But now suppose that your business takes off. You become the number one bicycle repair shop in your city, and in a few years branch out to other cities. You’re even lucky enough to have Hollywood celebrities patronising your shop. Before you know it, you’ve got millions of dollars to spend on advertising.

So do you continue to use guerrilla tactics?

That depends on the answer to one question: are you an idiot?