Now granted I’m not a rodeo fan, but how is it that I don’t ever know about this event, save for the lone person asking me if I’m going? Is anybody even advertising this thing?

Ok, so I may not be the average consumer. I don’t watch commercials (thank you, TiVO!); I listen to commercial-free satellite radio or my ipod exclusively (thank you, XM and apple); I get all my news from the internet (thank you, Al Gore), rarely hitting local news sites; and I don’t get out much (thank you, blu-ray.) So it got me thinking….

What’s a local company to do — to reach someone local like me?

I had to think about this for a bit and realize that the one single form of advertising I see a lot of is Billboards. I always know what concerts are going on locally because all the casinos advertise on billboards. I’ve seen exactly zero billboards for the Reno Rodeo.

I’m about as commercial-free as one can get. While I may not currently be the “average” adult male, I don’t think it’s too much of a stretch to say that I’m the future “average” adult male.

This means finding ways to reach an audience is going to become more and more difficult. Especially when it comes to building awareness. SEO and PPC only work for those who are looking for something. I’m not looking for a rodeo, but might find it fun to take the kids. If I knew about it, that is.

What are you doing to reach your audience?

I think it’s getting more and more difficult for local companies to reach their audience. Not only as we become more nationalized and globalized, but because we are finding new ways to avoid traditional marketing and advertising. When it comes to local advertising, it seems that billboards and word of mouth are about the only way I can be reached.

What about you? How do you reach your audience?

I would be interested to hear if any local companies are finding marketing to their audience more or less difficult, and if more difficult, what they are doing about it.

Pretty much every comment noted that the guy with the cigarette was a problem, but only Chris of Westward Strategy explained why.

…they associated the sleazy car dealer with Fallon Auto Mall and not Kietzke or “Big City Motors” as their TV ads say. If I wasn’t a local and hadn’t seen their TV spots I would think that all the guys at Fallon Auto Mall look like him.

He’s dead right.

I haven’t seen the TV spots (TiVo, baby!) so I have only the billboard to go by. I’m sure there are others that also might have missed the commercials too. That being the case, the billboard needs to stand alone as a marketing piece.

The problem then is what information motorists will typically process as they drive by:

But by placing the sleazy looking car salesman in close proximity to the Fallon Auto Mall logo they’ve created a guilt by association. Not for the Kietzke Lane car dealerships they wish to malign, but for themselves.

How could this billboard been done better? Here’s our take:

Notice that the only new element here is the words “visit the”. The rest is just a rearrangement of the existing elements to get rid of the negative association with the Fallon image.

What do you think? Any better?

Want to take a whack at it? Post a link to it in the comments below.

Five was the limit here, not sure what others are seeing.

You can read Google’s announcement here.

I’m not sure what to think of this. Will this increase the likelihood of ads getting clicked? Will this increase interaction with my site? Or does this distract even more from the content. What do you think?

Seth Godin who has written 11 books to date including Purple Cow as well as being an entrepreneur and highly respected speaker has another great book for us to read, Meatball Sundae. I truly enjoyed yet again his getting to the point writing merged with real-life business examples. Godin doesn’t focus on the negative instead he illustrates through words what a company did and what they could have done better and on the flip side what they did and what he thought was amazing about it. He also includes many websites that should be looked over as examples or used in your new marketing strategy. Godin gets into old marketing and new marketing how they differ and why old marketing is not the future or the present. He touches on, The Long Tail theory coined by Chris Anderson which is also one of SEOmoz’s must read books. Godin explains why direct communication with your customers is more important then ever and how one person can effect your business by using direct communication. It’s up to you to make it a positive comment or a negative one.

Quote from Meatball Sundae:

“If the New Marketing can be characterized by just one idea, it’s this: Ideas that spread through groups of people are far more powerful then ideas delivered at an individual.”

This book is written for the busy bee it has an executive summary and gets to the point in only 232 pages.

Seth’s Blog is another good resource to look over and see what point he’s making today or even in the past. I signed up for it about a month ago and have found it to be refreshingly informative and useful. He also has free ebooks which touch on subjects such as website design, blogs and the new web.

In my opinion Godin’s success thus far has come by doing exactly as he preaches and not being knowledge greedy. He focuses on the success of others and doesn’t hold back knowledge because of insecurities; which you’ll find in the business world a lot. People who are so focused on keeping all the best knowledge to themselves in fear of their jobs, let it go. Once you build others up you’ll find they are thankful and want to help you succeed as well. Try it, you’ll be surprised how much more of an asset to your company you’ll become.

I’m not afraid of occasional political references. In fact I’ve been known to make my political and even religious views known here on this blog, but I never go so far as to preach those views to my audience. I think it’s silly and bad for business. If you’re looking for controversy, I don’t think that’s the smartest way to drum it up.

When businesses mix politics with their advertising campaigns, you have to start wondering about how much benefit they get from it. Especially when dealing with hotly debated and deeply personal issues.

The ad to the right is for a storage company based in Manhattan. Manhattan is liberal territory, but I can’t help but think that this type of ad is just bad overall. Not only will it alienate a fraction of their audience (the political right) but it is probably even turning off many others that are not entirely leaning to the political far-left. Did you catch the dual use of the coat hanger? Closets? Back alley abortions? This is pretty sick imagery.

But that’s just the opinion of someone who leans to the political far right. What do you think? Should a business’ politics bleed over into their ads. Is there an level where it’s acceptable and a line that should not be crossed? What do you think?

Want to waste the next couple hours?

If you’re interested in Viral Marketing and understanding how it works, you may want to head over to the Ultimate Meme Database [link no longer available] (before they called it viral marketing they were called “memes”). What does or doesn’t go viral is a subject that can leave your mind pretty boggled- especially for someone trying to spread the word about a product or service, rather than just fishing for attention on the internet.

The best way to learn has always been just diving in, though, so why not go check these out for a bit.

Consider yourself warned though:

You can’t watch just one

Star Wars Kid (wikipedia entry)

These videos spread for a reason. Take the above video: The Star Wars Kid. This video damn near sparked a religion. Not only did it spread, but it spawned at least 20 different remix videos and has been parodied on half a dozen TV shows.

You may not understand them

The Numa Numa video (wikipedia entry)

One thing I love about most viral content is that most of the people I show them to don’t get them. That’s the thing- many of them aren’t universally loved- BUT to the computer savvy niche who made them and consumed them they are slices of fried gold.

The above video, “numa numa” is a fat kid lip-syncing. That’s it. And I laughed so hard I cried blood the first time I watched it. My grandparents, on the other hand, wouldn’t understand it at all. In their defense though, they’re dead.

You never know what’s next

We’re In Business (wikipedia entry for artist)

This video, “We’re in Business” is by and singer named Andrew Thompson, and it’s hilarious. On paper it has all the qualities a viral video needs. It’s jam-packed with nerd-friendly references, it’s massively funny, it stars a nerd and a robot, plus it’s a catchy song. So why has it only gotten 24k views in 8 months when so many others have millions of views? Why doesn’t the video have a lengthy wikipedia article like the others? I’d say on the one hand it’s luck. On the other hand, viral marketing it getting more crowded every day and it may need some help (hey Andrew, I’ve got some ideas for your site – call me!)

Can you market your product with robots and fat kids? Probably not. But if you can figure out what need these viral videos meet, you’re one step closer to figuring out how to harness the power of word of mouth.

What do you do when you have key phrases that are personal in nature i.e. “make my writing better” as a core term? You could use it as a headline to spark your readers curiosity, but at times that may be an awkward act to follow. The most simple way to do this is to use customer quotes or testimonials.

“I took the course hoping to make my writing better and now I’ve published four short stories this month!”

Make it a little more believable than this, but you get my drift. This method can also be read like an aside, commonly used in Shakespeare’s plays to inform the crowd. The quote should read as if the visitor is talking out loud or overhearing someone else’s conversation. However, if you are using the key phrase in a testimonial, get permission to make your changes from the original author of the testimonial.

Another clever way to incorporate those tricky, personal key phrases is to point out that the visitor probably never thought they would be looking for that specific key phrase.

Now that you’ve finished grad school, you never thought you’d enter “make my writing better” in the search field of Google.

A secondary gain to this structure is that you are now speaking directly to the visitor. You’ve made direct contact and can keep your visitors attention by speaking in the present tense and second person.

You don’t have to ignore high-traffic, personal keyphrases because you can’t work them into the copy. You just have to be a little creative.

What do you think? Did you find this as compelling as I did?

Recently I inherited a ‘66 Dodge charger. I spent some money rebuilding the engine and getting it cleaned up both inside and out. And now it, too, was ready to become a driving advertisement. This time I wanted something a bit more “obvious”.

We developed a graphic based on some other ads we had created, and the result was… well, take a look.

I’m not sold on it, which I was really hoping to be. The thing is, it looked really good on paper. I can’t figure out if it was a good idea poorly implemented, or just a bad idea to put this kind of ad on this car in particular.

There is a lesson here, but first I want to know what you think?

1. Good idea poorly executed
2. Bad idea, period
3. It’s freakin’ fantastic

Be in control of your copy, but let the reader think they are in control at all times. Never make them feel like you are pushing them in a direction they don’t already want to go. Lead them in that direction and they will go willingly. If you do this successfully, they won’t even know you are leading them anywhere. Here’s a few tips to help you refrain from being a control freak:

• Trust people
• Let the customer do the driving
• The visitor is the center of attention
• Remember, you can’t do this by yourself
• If the customer is always right, you could be wrong
• Don’t be insulted if others don’t take your advice
• Listen to others with enthusiasm, not boredom
• You don’t know what’s best for everyone
• Get used to different styles
• Nothing is perfect, even you
• Learn to like surprises
• People can disagree
• Be patient

Leave room for interpretation

Most importantly, let the customer position your product or service. Don’t tell them a set use for your service or product. Make suggestions, but don’t discount a use they may come up with on their own. So what if they want to use the spatula as a pooper scooper. You’re sure as hell not going to suggest this, but if they do, go with it. Tell them how its patented design enables scooping with ease and let them run with it. Always leave room for creativity.

After That?

Well, after you get over the initial “damn” and smack yourself on the forehead, you’re left a skeptic. It’s happened to every one of the potential clients you deal with on a daily basis. You may say things, sometimes without realizing it, that give off the wrong impression. Your copy may be saying something you didn’t want it to. Then you lead a bunch of followers to a cliff and watch them dive off into the ice-watery land of consumer hate as they tell you and your mama to piss off. Consumer trust is where your company needs to focus their efforts when considering possible sale pitches.

Be brutally honest from the get go.

I know it’s hard people, but it is not as hard as you may think. And actually it feels really good. How often in your life have you been able to say exactly how you felt about a person, place, or thing, good or bad. Mother-in-law visiting for the weekend, bite your tongue. A one legged guy says you’re gorgeous, what can you say, but a weary thank you (run after this, he can’t catch up). Your kids ask you why Grandma Patsy is sleeping on the bathroom floor at the family reunion, don’t even go there.

Ok, so in the real world a lie here and there might be inevitable, but in the marketing world the truth is a simply necessity. Here are a few tips to help you prevent putting off the wrong impression and getting a bad reputation:

No need to exaggerate, they’ll smell a rat.

State simple facts. Don’t make claims that aren’t grounded in factual cement. You don’t have to over do it. People respect realistic statements, they distrust exaggerations. Which sounds better to you?

“Over a million snowboarders ride our boards!”

“In a survey at Tahoe’s hottest resort, 153 snowboarders were riding our boards out of the 250 boarders surveyed.”

Whatever, these examples leave much to be desired, but you get the point. If you don’t, you shouldn’t be allowed within 150 yards of a consumer.

If anything seems overrated, back it up with a fact.

In some cases you might have to include statements in your copy that seem too good to be true. You want to include these great selling points in your copy, you have to right? You don’t, but when you do, provide the information you need to gain trust from your readers. For example if you say that firefighters prefer your fire alarms, add a testimonial from a real firefighter, or several if you’re lucky enough to hang with the fire crew. If not, don’t fret. There’s more fish in the sea. Just get a survey going or ditch the claim if it doesn’t work out and go solo.

Oh, hell no! She’s didn’t just get new flooring.

Another oddity of human nature is that everyone wants to keep up with the Joneses. Use those testimonials. If they don’t believe you, they’ll believe their brother. Use this to your advantage, it’s ok. If sister’s happy with her new Berber carpet, they’ll be happy too. They’ll have to have it and you wouldn’t want to neglect your consumers of the satisfaction your product provides.

No good deed goes unpunished.

Remember, if you give your friends special treatment, you better be prepared to give the same treatment to their friends, and their friends friends, and so on. Trust me, they’ll find out if you don’t and you’ll have Aunt Jude on your door wondering why she didn’t get the set of steak knives free with her purchase of the Ginsu.

Most importantly, keep it real and be there when the customer wants you!

Use bullet points or a numbered system to:

• Break up your copy into consumable pieces
• Aid in the clean design of your page
• Make it easy for the reader to reference previous points
• Save time when reading through dense copy

Just like clothing styles that rotate in and out of fashion with the occasional new concept joining the cycle, the words used to describe the trends move in cycles as well. What was “cool” yesterday is “hot” today. Or maybe it’s “wicked” or “awesome”, “boss” or “sweet”. You most likely won’t find accurate definitions for these terms in Webster’s Dictionary. But, if you’re going to be in the marketing game you better know today’s definition of the word.
Having an understanding of your target’s demographics current linguistic nuisances not only establishes your credibility with your audience, but its helps them better understand your message. It also makes them feel like your message is for them, not aimed at them.
So how do you acquire such rapidly changing language skills?

You PARTICIPATE in conversation with your audience and when they are speaking you LISTEN.

These can’t bet forced conversations in marketing studies that would feel like some sort of discover channel study either. Real conversation and interaction with your target group is the only way to be sure you are speaking the same language. This interaction should take place in the normal surroundings of your audience. You can’t drag two teenagers into an office building and expect to get a feel for how they speak and interact with each other in the outside world. It must be real, not simulated interaction. Only then will you be able to convey your message properly, using words that feel right to your audience.

When these terms have incorporated themselves effortlessly in your various forms of communication and they feel natural to you, then you are ready to market to the group. But be warned, as soon as you think you’ve got it, you can be sure that the lingo is already changing. If you can’t keep up your better off having a translator then to even try.

Although it is presented as an unbiased update of current events, the nightly news has become the worst form of reality TV. The difference between House or Survivor and the news is that we aren’t duped into thinking that the shows are anything other than entertainment. We don’t make decisions about our daily lives, nor have our views and thoughts influenced nearly as much based on who gets voted of the island or who the new cast member is. These shows know this and do not attempt to tell us otherwise.

On the other hand, the news portrays itself as the absolute truth. Bringing the light of knowledge to the ignorant darkness of the masses, the news reports on all the new information of the day. From Anna Nicole’s baby, to Brad and Angelina, and maybe even something about that thing going on in Iraq, the news prioritizes and discloses its juicy tidbits over the course of its allotted time slot. The ratings depend on the importance of the days issues. If the stations get really lucky they have a day like yesterday.

Thirty-two people were killed yesterday in Virginia in the worst college campus shooting incident in the nation’s history. A tragedy of epic proportions, this will be the lead story for the news for few days. The flocks of reporters will descend upon Blacksburg, Virginia and try to get the most compelling (entertaining) story they can. These emotional vampires have no true personal connection to the people or the incident itself and their feigned sympathy is ridiculous. The media will mourn in solidarity with the friends and families affected by this event until the next story takes the headline. Those affected will be forgotten and left to carry the burden of their grief alone. I am not suggesting the news has an obligation to support those affected by tragedy, I am in fact suggesting the opposite. The news should be obligated to deliver the news devoid of emotion. Let the viewers hear the information without the addition of editorial content so they can form their own opinions. We have enough celebrities from other areas of entertainment espousing their views as if it is the indisputable truth. We don’t need to create them on our news programs.

How do we address this situation? I suggest remove the advertising allotment for news programs. It should be part of the responsibility for the station to provide the news to maintain their license to broadcast. I don’t know if this action would solve the problem but I do think it would be a positive step towards removing the sensationalistic aspect out of the information being imparted to the audience.

I place very high value on the principal of freedom of the press in this country. I feel that it is an important part of a complex system of checks and balances that help prevent the country from wrong doing and in theory attempt to educate the populace.

I would just like to see the content delivered with a little more dignity and a little less drama. Unfortunately, it seems drama is more marketable than dignity these days.

Pros – Dr. Clotaire Rapaille is a genius. His innovative approach to understanding the unconscious associations all people make to their world and everything in it is ground breaking. By applying his knowledge of human psychology and anthropology, he shows us how he cracks the “culture code” for a variety of topics. The hypothesis is that we are all subject to imprinting during our formative years. These imprints have a permanent affect on our perception of everything in our lives. The key to accessing these imprints is The Culture Code. The system goes on to explain why different cultures are drawn to or repulsed by the same product. Why was Chrysler’s PT Cruiser such as success in the American market? Why did Chrysler’s German executives think the project was going to be a disaster? The answer to those questions is: The Culture Code. When applied to the marketing goals of his clients, Rapaille is a force to be reckoned with. His system allows the advertiser to directly access the public’s subconscious perception of their brand and tap into those primal urges. His proven methods are behind many of the marketing campaigns of the Fortune 500. The reptilian brain, as Rapaille calls it, always wins.

Cons – Dr. Clotaire Rapaille is a genius, and he makes sure to tell you that. His ideas are great, but allowing the reader to make that deduction on their own would have made for a better read. The results speak for themselves and I am convinced of the merit behind the concept and the methodology of The Culture Code. I do not need to be told, repeatedly, about the brilliance of the culture code. I can draw my own conclusions.

Overbearing ego aside, The Culture Code is the first marketing book I have read that didn’t tell me how to think, but instead offers a convincing reason to explain the way I already think.

The aura of non-conformity which is aggressively cultivated by Macintosh through a slew of anti-PC advertising campaigns designed to establish the Mac brand as a sort of hip anti-hero, cleverly positioned against the clunky and counter-intuitive PC which symbolizes a robotic established norm that is out-of-touch with today’s ultra-cool, carefree, “down-with-the-man” computer user.

The problem is that the Mac campaign has been too successful and now every gutless-yuppie-thrill-seeker type is filing into the Macintosh March where they too can join the ranks of the tech-rebellious and “Stick it to the man” in a very controlled and safe way. So much so that the Mac is in fact the very antithesis of true non-conformity: It has degenerated into a “non-conformity fad” (uber-oxymoron). A predictable outlet for the masses to be “hip” and different, while marching alongside a million other mindless idiots who purchased their Macintosh not because it was the logical solution for their unique computing requirements, but because “it’s a freakin Mac”.

Ok I’m done.

If you’re tired of my yabbering recounts and “lessons” learned from each apprentice episode, have no worries. On Thursdays, March 22, 29, and April 19 you can learn from a real apprentice!

Trump university is sponsoring a series of call-in seminars featuring Sean Yazbeck (The Apprentice Season 5 winner), Kendra Todd (Season 3 winner) and Randal Pinkett (Season 4 winner).

You need to sign up for each session, which is limited to 200 callers each.

I’d agree that Shakespeare, Dostoevsky, and Tolstoy may not have shown their stripes in ad copy and the novel writers do possess well-defined talents, but all writers can not be clumped into one category. Hemingway wrote novels, but he authored several short stories and is credited with writing an advertisement. He spent four years writing news for the Toronto Star Weekly and was a contributor to Esquire, Colliers, and Look. He was a reporter, war correspondent, and seasoned journalist. Hemingway was a multi talented writer, as writers should be.

His style is ideal for writing ad copy. He uses short sentences, short paragraphs, and active English. Hemingway adhered to a minimalist style that allowed him to get his point across in the least amount of relevant terms possible. He shows the reader rather than tells them. Isn’t that what we want to do as copywriters?

We want to show the reader why a product and service can benefit them. We want to show them how it can solve their problem, give them options, let them create their own solution, or at least let them believe they have that ingenuity to find their own solution or create their own unique use for a service. We don’t want to tell them what to do with the product; we want them to see what they can do with it.

What surprised me was that the seminar on “how to make money on the internet” that was really nothing more than a sales pitch for an all day seminar they would be holding several weeks later. And boy, did they have that pitch down!

I left after the first 30 minutes. It felt like we were still in the introduction stage of the presentation. Kind of like they kept making promises of all the things they’ll be covering but never really covering them. I think that was just the point. This presentation wasn’t about providing information on how to make money from the internet, it was about how you can learn everything you need to know about how to make money from the internet by coming to the NEXT seminar.

The presenter was professional and he didn’t come off as a hack. He was actually very engaging. And interestingly they covered the “get rich quick schemes are a scheme” ground too. It was a very effective 30 minutes. I almost wanted to sign up for the next seminar. Maybe I would had if I had not left!

Pre-Selling Is A Legitimate (And Effective) Sales Technique

While I don’t care for this type of pre-sales schtick, it got me thinking about how we go about selling those things that we sell. In fact, any good website uses some kind of pre-selling technique regularly. Think about it, rarely does our home page actually sell the products or service we offer. That page is just an overview, an introduction, a flowery summary of what we or our products are all about.

As we click further into the site we get closer and closer to the actual selling, but depending on the breadth and depth of the site, we are often just pre-selling as visitors click deeper and deeper in. This pre-selling, regardless of what page it is on, does the job of routing each visitor closer to the destination which is the sales page while continuing to build expectations as they move through the site.

And how does all this pre-selling happen? Text. Content. Words.

The Product Should Not Have To Sell Itself

Many sites, especially e-commerce sites, feel that words are unnecessary and that the product should sell it self. They’ll throw the specifications onto the product page and believe that tells the visitor all they’ll ever want or need to know. Okay, fine, lets say the product does sell itself. But what about the pages that lead to the product? Surely you have pages that lead to the product pages, no? If your site has any kind of depth visitors generally hit the home page first (provided they didn’t enter via a search that dropped them right on the product page). From there they have to (want) to click to a category of their choosing, and then they can click on individual products. That’s two whole pages before the “sales” page, at best. For some sites there are more.

So let’s analyze those pages. What makes a visitor want to click past the home page? Is it pictures? Maybe. But I’d bet there is (or should be) some text on that page that gives comfort to the visitor and assures them that they came to the right place to find what they are looking for. Pictures are pretty and all, but you got to make them want to click through.

If you’ve done your job on the home page then the user will click into a category that suits their needs. What does this page tell them? Is it just a list of products or have you taken the time to fill the visitor with more information specific to the products in this category? Surely you can say something compelling about your battery chargers that is different from your batteries or have content describing your snowboards in a way that doesn’t sound like you’re selling ski gloves!

That’s the pre-sell process. They are on their way to the sales page, but don’t let them get distracted… keep feeding them the content that gives them the desire to keep moving through the site.

Help Yourself Sell That Thing You Sell

You may think that you do not need sales content on each page, but let me tell you, it helps! The people who ran that seminar probably didn’t need the pre-seminar in order to get people to come to the longer one. But they knew that a free 90-minute seminar is an easier sell than a $20 all-day seminar. Once they get them in the door then they have 90 minutes to make the case for the all-day seminar to follow.

In the same way, you may be able to sell your products on specifications alone, but you have your audience on your site, why not use every opportunity to. You can to give them information that fills them with the desire to purchase your products… long before they ever find the product they are looking for. That’s a much easier sell!

The Cartoon Network and Dr. Pepper have both recently come under fire for their choice of marketing tactics. The Cartoon network hung several blinking signs in various locations about town. The desired effect was to create awareness for “Aqua Teen Hunger force”, a program on the network.

The result was Boston shutting down sections of the city when the devices were mistakenly thought to be explosive devices. The men who hung the signs were arrested and 2 million dollars ($2,000,000) had to be paid to cover the cost of police activity related to the incidents.

Obviously not learning any lessons here Dr. Pepper left clues for its latest promotion leading treasure seekers to a famous Boston cemetery. The desired effect was to engage the public with a fun scavenger hunt to promote the Dr. Pepper brand.

The result was public outcry against the company for desecrating a historic cemetery. The site was closed down for fear that people would be disturbing the graves and police where called to control the situation. The company offered to pay the cemetery ten thousand dollars ($10,000) for its “time and trouble” as well as an additional $500 dollars to cover the expense of extra police brought to guard the location.

I think marketing folk should remember to look before they leap. While I agree with many that Boston over reacted to the “Cartoon Network” campaign, the “Dr. Pepper” campaign should have recognized the sensitive nature of using a cemetery as part of a promotional campaign. They also should have been aware as to how sensitive the city of Boston might be to another guerilla marketing tactic in their city. If they had the forethought to have discussed their intentions with the city, they may have avoided the negative press.

Even though these marketing campaigns had their issues, I want to go on the record here as being a fan of both “The Cartoon Network” and “Dr. Pepper” – though I still have no idea what flavor the soda actually is. Just because a campaign fails, it doesn’t mean the product is bad. I look forward to seeing what both camps come up with for their next foray into the “Buzz” game.

I’m fascinated by Burger King’s marketing campaigns. First they came out with the little blurbs found on their burger wrappers, fry containers and soda cups. Now they got some of those cool blurbs in the store (I read a clever one on the garbage bin last week.) And then Burger King came out with some XBOX video games. The pictures to the right were taken from my very weak camera phone. I did my best to clean them up.

I’m not a gamer, but I can imagine that this is a pretty significant branding platform for the ‘King’. Who’s most likely to go to BK? Pre-teens, teens and college students, most of which take in a healthy dose of video gaming. The games were cheap, $5.99, I think, so any kid needing a new game for their box could easily score one.

Of course, the best part is, they take it home and get to be the King. Pure branding magic!

All this talk of Burger King has gotten me hungry. Yep, that’s the point. Play the game, get hungry, ask mom and dad to take you to Burger King for lunch. Eat, go home, play the game some more, etc. etc.

Now we’re talking about developing a Pole Position game.

Aw, crap! That’s been done.