Pleasure and Pain » Marketing

Photo of the day: Time To Buy Cut-Rite

whitney — Wed, 08 Jul 2009 19:15:14 +0000

I was baking at my parents’ apartment recently and pulled out their wax paper to line a cookie sheet. When I tore some off, I noticed a message pierced into the paper that read “TIME TO BUY CUT-RITE.” They use a different brand than I do so I had never seen this before. The paper was near the end of the roll.

This is a really simple but clever way of prompting the customer to go buy more of their product.

Typically it’s the empty cardboard box that triggers the need to replace it, at least for me. But this message, un-fancy and simply hole-punched, unavoidably right there on the paper itself, felt old-school and I smiled a bit.

But of course I didn’t go out and buy more. I just figured my folks would do it.

Photo of the day: Nine wrong ways to swipe

whitney — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 20:15:27 +0000

I don’t drink whiskey, but this ad almost made me want to. Jameson ran an ad campaign last year exclusively for NYC subways. This hyper-localized approach isn’t very common for a national (hell, international) brand, and it really impressed me. Why? Because they demonstrated “insider knowledge.”

MAYBE IT’S BECAUSE THERE ARE
NINE WRONG WAYS TO SWIPE YOUR CARD,

BUT NO WRONG WAY TO
ENJOY A JAMESON

If you don’t live in NYC or haven’t spent considerable time on our subways, you’re probably totally confused. And that’s the point. Anyone who rides the subway regularly has experienced the pain and humiliation of repeatedly swiping their MetroCard at the turnstile while it isn’t being read properly. Firstly, there’s a magnetic strip so the card has to be facing the right direction. Then there’s a matter of which direction you swipe and at what speed. Failing to swipe your card correctly is so common an occurrence that the MTA actually lists the various error messages on their website! (some but not all)

“Please swipe again”
“Swipe card again at this turnstile”
“See Agent”

I have also seen too fast and too slow.

I don’t know if there are actually nine wrong ways to swipe, but it really doesn’t matter (according to Gothamist, there are more). Jameson showed that they understand the plight of the New Yorker, and managed to find a way for their product to be the solution. Despite not being much of a hard liquor drinker, never again will I unsuccessfully swipe my MetroCard without thinking of them.

Spam that sells

whitney — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 06:11:26 +0000

I’ve received all sorts of crazy spam over the years, as I’m sure you all have. But this week I got a spam message that was targeted, personalized, and appealed to my deep desire for self-promotion:

I thought about telling you the company that sent this to me, but that would justify their unsolicited email. Suffice it to say that they sell “exclusive car advertising” at $65 for up to 20 chrome characters to affix on the back of your trunk. Ignore the fact that I don’t have a car to stick this to, but even if I did — is this a productive way to advertise a website? How can someone who’s driving a car remember a URL that they see on the back of the car in front of them? Take a photo, scribble it down while managing the wheel, text message it to themselves? I mean honestly, these people didn’t think it through.

Has anyone ever seen these out in the wild? If so, please send photos.