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Free Ads Can Be Really Expensive
An anonymous reader writes "Companies are finding that this 'Web 2.0' user participation thing sometimes isn't all its cracked up to be. The New York Times reports on the efforts of big companies to harness consumer enthusiasm for assistance with advertising. Heinz, for example, is running a campaign asking users to submit videos using their product in inventive ways. The problem, of course, is that most of the submissions are utterly terrible. The result is a headache in terms of quality control and making use of the turned in submissions. 'Heinz hopes to show more than five of them, if there are enough that convey a positive, appealing message about Heinz ketchup, he said. But advertising executives who have seen some of the entries say that Heinz may be hard pressed to find any that it is proud to run on television in September. "These are just so bad," said Linda Kaplan Thaler, chief executive of the Kaplan Thaler Group, an advertising agency in New York that is not involved with Heinz's contest. One of the most viewed Heinz videos -- seen, at last count, more than 12,800 times -- ends with a close-up of a mouth with crooked, yellowed teeth. When Ms. Kaplan Thaler saw it, she wondered, "Were his teeth the result of, maybe, too much Heinz?"'"
They could run it in Britain.
I invoke Godwin's Grammar Law.
Yes, But will it blend?
Yeah, this web 2.0 thing is just crap. I mean, you have a multimillion dollar company, and you try to get a bunch of people on the internet excited about your stupid sauce product, and no-one seems to have any enthusiasm for your boring corporate image whatsoever.
All eight people on the internet that ARE excited about your stupid sauce product are just mediocre media creators without the creative vision required to make your stupid sauce product look hip and cool.
Obviously we should just move directly on to web 3.0, where everyone is fucking stoked about sauce products. The top DJs of the world will do entire sets themed on ketchup, mayonnaise, and mustard. Beautiful runway models will gyrate and make kissing faces at your stupid sauce product.
Hells yeh, babies. No more of this web 2.0 BS. It just wasn't all it was cracked up to be.
fifth sigma, inc.
When I was in 5th grade, I waited untill the last minute to do my science project.
:)
My mom & her friend decided I was going to see which brand of ketchup dripped the slowest.
I'm proud to say, Heinz ketchup dripped the slowest & thus was the thickest ketchup.
Mark me whatever you want, but this is proof that my shitty last minute science project was truely ahead of its' time & I should have got a fucking A++.
Wanna fight ? Bend over, stick your head up your ass, and fight for air.
You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!
hognoxious: 90% of web 2.0 stuff isn't all it's cracked up to be.
WrongSizeGlass: And the other half is p0rn.
You mean there's so much Web 2.0 stuff out there that it adds up to 180% ?!
Most of them are complete crap, too. They send the wrong message,
I'm amazed how little advertisers think about the message their musical choices send. A PILL commercial with a bit of "We're not Gonna take it" in the background? Well, if they're not gonna take those pills, I sure won't! Then a commercial for "clean" coal with "Sixteen Tons" playing in the background? Why would I want to support exploitation of workers?
In that vein, did you know that 69% of people have dirty minds?
(btw, if you had to re-read that, then you're not one of them.)
Is this a rhetorical question?
Boston (as a hole) didn't know what the hell those little LED signs were
Oh, such accidental truth!