When Your Unique Position Becomes Generic

Years ago, back when it was fun to sell cars, I put together a radio advertising campaign for an Oregon Mitsubishi dealer. The hook was “I’ll buy your gas for a year”. Basically, if you bought a new Mitsubishi, you got a $500 gas card included with the purchase. As I write these words now, […]

How to Handle a Bad Month

Ed Ridgway is a marketing consultant to the dental industry. Based in Pennsylvania, Ridgway consults with dental practices all over the country. He also publishes a blog called The Dental Marketer. June was a rough month for many dentists. Some reacted by scaling back their marketing, and others stuck with the plan they had in […]

Sarah Palin — Premature Product Launch?

Years ago I was involved in the Portland launch of a mobile phone company called VoiceStream Wireless (now T-Mobile). The company was determined to make a huge splash. They opened a bunch of stores… spent an enormous amount of money on radio, TV, print, and transit advertising… rented Pioneer Square in downtown Portland for a […]

Sarah Palin as Marketing Strategy

A reader of yesterday’s post about Sarah Palin criticized the choice as “a slimy, deliberate attempt to pander to Hillary supporters.” It’s a thought that deserves its own discussion — so here goes. I’m inclined to set aside “slimy” — this is politics, and unless money changed hands or sexual favors were granted, this doesn’t […]

Using Viral Video: What Do You Want to Accomplish?

My colleague Adam Orth recently handed me Ken Wheaton’s Advertising Age column about Extended Stay Hotels. The column concerns a video, allegedly authorized by the client, in which an attractive woman licks pretty much everything in a hotel room — including the toilet. This apparently is intended to demonstrate that Extended Stay Hotel rooms are […]