A couple of bad ideas

I wonder if there is a direct relationship between the amount of press a "new advertising idea" gets and how bad it is. Two bad ideas seem to be getting a lot of press this week:

ABC pilot with Geico's cavemen - I love the caveman commercials and all the ways the Martin agency has extended the campaign like playing golf with Phil Sims on Super bowl Sunday, interviewing celebs after the Oscar party. But a TV series? These guys are funny in small amounts. If movies like My Big Fat Greek Wedding couldn't make it as a TV series, what makes you think a 30 second spot could do it? Making a 30-second spot into a TV series is lower on the creativity scale than coming up with a new reality series.

Mobile marketing explodes -  What bugs me here is that there is lot's of hype and lot's of solutions that seem to be just an extension of what's done on-line. In quite a few sites I visit I get Sprint's banner ad promoting "The power of reach and relevance" with a picture of a text ad at the top of a mobile phone display. When you click through there's no explanation of how their text links and banner ads are 'relevant'. What bothers me even more is that they're not even thinking about the differences in how someone uses the Internet on a cell phone as opposed to a personal computer. Seems like they're thinking "just slap a banner ad, hell, it seems to work on my laptop". I think mobile advertising is going to need a lot more maturity before it becomes a legitimate advertising model.

- Paul Herring

Comments

[Matt Dickman]

Paul,

You make the key point on the mobile area. Mobile devices are used differently than a web browser. Making something work smoothly with a 150pixel wide screen navigated with a scroll wheel takes new planning and thought.

[Will]

I don't understand how a tv show based off an ad campaign is worse than reality shows based on the Pussycat Dolls (or Grease? or white rappers?)!?!?

I understand that people instinctively roll their eyes at an announcment like this but quite frankly, there is some pretty impressive talent behind this sitcom and that's enough to make me want to watch. Speck/Gordon (the directing/exec producing team on the show) are almost too big to be working on a sitcom and yet they're on board. That has to be because they believe in this project because, at this point in their career, they can do whatever project they want.

[Paul Herring]

Hey, I am in no way going to defend the mad dash at reality TV but let's face it, both the Pussy Cat dolls and Grease are light years ahead of either of these campaigns in terms of affinity or engagement. There leveraging an content model that has worked in the past (reality TV), although I'm not convinced it would work in the future. Taking a commerical to the small screen? Never been done, and I'm not convinved that they can give it enough life to make it survive. I'll apoligize publically if it makes it past the pilot.