18 August 2008

Erickson Retirement Communities Spot

I must still be young and mushy of mind, for I’m constantly surprised by the shenanigans of marketers when they try to target the 50+ Demo. By now nothing should surprise me.

je Erickson Retirement Communities is a major player in their industry. I have a lot of respect and admiration for John Erickson. He's done some incredible things. And I like the fact that Erickson builds communities for the middle-class - while not ‘going for the gold’ like so many AACs.

But their marketing/advertising is pretty pathetic. That might just do them in eventually – especially with Baby Boomers.

Take a look at this latest spot:

Now try this exercise:

Turn the sound off and watch the spot again. Pretend that the voice over is saying something like, “Your financial security is important to you. At Ajax Investments we want to make sure that you have the freedom to enjoy the prime of life and do the things that are important to you, with no financial worries … blah blah blah.”

Now pretend that this is a D2C for a heart medication. “Enjoying a healthy, involved life is what life is all about. If a heart condition inhibits your activities, Ajaxavin may help. Please ask your doctor if Ajaxivin is right for you, blah blah blah.”

How about a laxative? Depends? A vitamin supplement? Come up with other products/services and write and perform your own V.O.’s.

This isn’t a commercial about Erickson. It’s a generic template.

Back to the spot: The voice over is a what? A daughter with kids? There aren’t too many Baby Boomers with kids that young. The largest chunk of Boomers are grandparents. The average age of a new grandparent is forty-eight.

So who's this woman doing the voice over? How old is she (with kids that young)? The child of Baby Boomers? If so, then why are her parents in their seventies? The grandfather looks like he's in his late seventies.

It’s the Baby Boomers who are helping their parents make decisions about retirement communities. This commercial misses the ‘sandwich generation’ by decades.

14 August 2008

Don't Forget The Zwischen Kids und Senioren

I have no idea what I say in this article—but whatever it is, no doubt it's very profound and important:
Don't forget them! Zwischen Kids und Senioren gibt es noch eine Zielgruppe

Was sie für Werbetreibende außerdem so attraktiv macht, ist ihre unerwartete Flexibilität. "Zugegeben, ich habe eine Lieblingszahnpasta, aber sonst bin ich allem Neuen gegenüber aufgeschlossen", versichert Chuck Nyren, Autor von "Advertising to Baby Boomer", und fragt verwundert: "Wie kommen Werbeprofis bloß darauf, dass unser Geschmack bereits festgefahren ist?"
And as with Oprah - anytime I can help boost the careers of stragglers and wannabes like Susan and Julianne (and Paul) by simply having their names associated with mine - it's fine with me. I'm the beneficent type.

10 August 2008

Forgotten Consumers

jm A few weeks ago I was interviewed by Jennifer Mann of The Kansas City Star for an article about advertising and marketing to Baby Boomers.  It ran, and I linked to it in the left column of this blog under In The Media.

Now the piece has gone wide in many of the McClatchy Newspapers, including The Monterey County Herald, The Olympian (Washington), and The Fort Worth Star-Telegram

Here's the piece in The Bismarck Tribune:

bismark There are almost 100 million consumers in the United States who are age 50-plus. They control more than $8 trillion in assets, more than 70 percent of the disposable dollars in the United States. Yet they barely get passing notice from American advertisers.

09 August 2008

Creating A Monster

HST_thumb1Recently I put together a PowerPoint with narration for a Henry Stewart Talks series on Marketing to the Older Consumer. Dick Stroud is the ringleader. There are a handful of other folks from the U.K. and around the world contributing.

bk It was fun – but Dick and Henry (Is there a 'Henry'?) may have created a monster. 

I’d never recorded narration with PowerPoint. That may surprise people who know me, since I can be quite the blabbermouth when prodded.  I casually clicked the start button and without thinking about it thought I'd be creating one big wav file somewhere.  I just kept prattling and clicking without stopping. "One-Take Nyren” is my nick.

caHeadset But while playing it back the sound went in and out between slides. I thought my mic was malfunctioning. 

pilot-reading-directions Then I did something smart – which sounds impressive, but it’s not. Most people ‘do something smart’ by doing something smart before doing something – like reading the directions. I usually wait until I’m completely lost or something royally screws up before I bother with something silly like directions. That’s how smart I am.

PowerPoint handles narration by embedding individual sound files on each slide. This was why my voice was cut off between slides. 

And it's advisable to wait a second or so between slides – stop talking, wait, click, wait, talk. That’s so the wav file can finish up on a slide, and another can kick in for the next slide.

I had to rehearse a few times to get used to it all.

What's good about it: If you mess up the narration you can go back and re-record over that slide only - without losing the sound files on the other slides.  It also makes it easy to rearrange, add, or delete slides. 

What's bad about it: There's no way you can get on a roll.  What you're really creating are separate scenarios for each slide.  I imagine that, with practice, you'll be able to simulate a seamless  song an' dance. 

hlThe monster created: I had so much fun that I want to do more. And more.  Short ones. And publish them here.  

So sometime soon you might just find a few PPPPs (PowerPoint Presentation Podcasts) on these pages.  Dick Stroud, as usual, is way ahead of me.

06 August 2008

Mad Men

mm People are always asking me what I think of Mad Men. That’s because for the last three or four years I’ve included a section in my presentations about the history of advertising creatives, and a big chunk of it focuses on the era Mad Men inhabits.

Now everybody thinks I do it because of Mad Men.

Someone left a comment on an Ad Age article that sums up my take on the show.  It went something like this:

“Mad Men is as much about the advertising industry as The Godfather was about the mafia.”

Great movies, The Godfather I & II. Classic tragedy, genius movie making. And I enjoy Mad Men.

jh However, as a rule I’m not a big soap opera fan – and Mad Men is primetime soap. My guess is that only about a fifth or sixth or less of screen time has anything to do with the wonderful world of advertising. Mostly it’s steamy bubbles. 

And that's fine. Probably better. It's sumptuously produced dark froth, brilliantly performed.  At times it morphs into classic tragedy and very good theatre.  Just as often it sinks into cliché silliness. 

Partly to ride the crest of the show’s success and partly to defend the industry, The One Club (along with The New York Public Library) is sponsoring an exhibition titled The Real Men and Women of Madison Avenue and their Impact on American Culture. AdRants’ Angela Natividad was there for the opening and has a fascinating take on it all

admen While it wouldn’t make good soap – Leo Burnett, Rosser Reeves, David Ogilvy, Shirley Polykoff, Bernice Fitz-Gibbons, Mary Wells Lawrence, Bill Bernbach, George Lois, and others were infinitely more interesting than the stereotypical characters on Mad Men. A series inspired by the lives and work of these real life ad folks would entertain me a lot more. Drama?  Sure. Comedy? Oh, yes.     

However, Mad Men doesn't pretend to be about the greats of 1950s/60s advertising – but about  the others who worked in the industry.  Your normal neurotic types.  They also represent a dying breed. If the series plays out with any nod to reality, they'll be picked off one by one.     

ct So enjoy Mad Men. Sterling and Cooper are good godfathers. Dan Draper is a good Michael Corleone. Pete makes a good Fredo. Betty is the perfect Kay.

And those creative team hit men do scare the bejesus out of me.