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June 25, 2006 - July 1, 2006

June 30, 2006

Chrysler Invites People to "Ask Dr. Z"

Not content to let competitor Ford steal all the online limelight, Chrysler will tomorrow launch a Web site, askDrZ.com, aimed at improving the company's image by giving it a human face. On the site, users will be able to pose questions to DaimlerChrysler Chairman Dieter Zetsche.

Ads across all media -- interactive advertising includes AOL, MSN and Yahoo -- will include the AskDrZ.com URL. It's unlikely you'll miss this campaign, as it'll appear on network and cable TV; in mass-market magazines like People; in national and local newspapers; and on radio in the top 50 markets.

The effort launches in conjunction with an employee pricing summer sales program.

Posted by Pamela Parker at 4:15 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Ads a Go on BBC Int'l Site

The BBC's international site is officially going commercial, despite a recent petition against it signed by 150 BBC writers, editors, designers and TV correspondents. So far reports seem a bit confusing in terms of what types of ads will actually run on the site.

A Guardian report notes "The advertisements would be 'low key' and limited to 'still ads' that appear in the middle of online articles. There were no plans for pop-up or banner ads, the most common advertising formats for online publications."

A Brand Republic story, however, says "A number of potential designs had been prepared by the broadcaster to demonstrate how advertising banners and boxes could be added to the top, bottom and side of the sites."

The story adds that the BBC's commercial arm will also explore opportunities to maximize paid content revenue.

Posted by Kate Kaye at 1:56 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

ClickZ Takes a Holiday

You may find ClickZ to be a bit quiet the next few days. We will be taking Monday and Tuesday off to observe the holiday, and back to reporting on Wednesday July 5. The ClickZ staff would like to wish our U.S. readers a happy and safe Fourth of July.

I won't be completely unheard over the long weekend, I will be speaking on The American Entrepreneur radio show. The show airs from Pittsburgh's AM station Newstalk 1360 from 9AM until noon (Eastern), and I expect to be on somewhere in the 11:00 hour. You can listen on the Web if you click the "Listen Live Online Here" button on the site. The topic is teens, now called everything from superconnectors to millennials.

Posted by Enid Burns at 12:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

USA Today Airs Talking Tech

USA Today is taking its Personal Technology section to video. Tech columnists Ed Baig and Jefferson Graham will host "Talking Tech" with weekly segments becoming available on Thursdays. Video will be available at tech.usatoday.com or on iTunes.

The initial sponsor is AT&T with its branding campaign launched earlier this year. However preroll and synchronized banner units for Frontier Airlines, VisitFlorida and Microsoft's "The Greatest Asset" spot played before the video during repeated refreshes. Prior to running the preroll unit, the screen says, "Video is always free thanks to support from our sponsor." But at this point AT&T is not clearly visible as the advertiser.

Posted by Enid Burns at 11:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sheraton Make Room for CGM

Sheraton Hotels & Resorts is adding CGM to their Web site. The chain is patting themselves on the back for being "the first hotel industry website as to embrace social media and feature user generated content."

Not unlike sites like TripAdvisor, user posts will contain travel tips and user recommendations for local sightseeing, attractions, eateries, and the like. Stories and photos are accessible through an interface that's more than a little reminiscent of Google Maps.

Sheraton has launched a sweepstakes to encourage posting to the site.

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 10:18 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

June 29, 2006

Praise for the Print Version

When does a complaint about non-user-initiated (or not-intentionally-user-initiated) audio get interesting enough to make the virtual pages of Gawker? When the ad in question is for a certain Pfizer product much in the news of late, and the first few seconds of audio describe the problem the drug solves.

Posted by Pamela Parker at 7:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Sprint Promoting Exclusive Content, Which, In Turn, Promotes Movie

Sprint has wrangled comedian Will Ferrell, or at least the character he plays in an upcoming NASCAR-themed flick, to star in commercials promoting Sprint's exclusive mobile content from the movie. So Sprint is running commercials to promote exclusive content which is, sort of, promoting the new movie.

In the TV spots, Ricky Bobby, the main character in "Talladega Nights: The Ballad of Ricky Bobby," watches clips from the movie on a Sprint Phone. The commercials were produced by TBWA\Chiat\Day New York.

 

Posted by Pamela Parker at 7:23 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

If you're not sick of Google Checkout already...

A couple of sort-of noteable things that didn't make it into our story from earlier today.

• Neither a merchant's participation/non-participation or user ratings (enabled by the system) will impact the way their AdWords ads are ranked, Google told me. (But, as Chris Sherman notes, if users show a preference for clicking on ads with the little shopping cart icons, this may positively impact participating advertisers' rankings.)
  
• There are no plans, at this time, for integrating Checkout with AdWords in such a way to enable cost-per-action pricing for AdWords. This despite a much-buzzed-about CPA ad test. "We haven't been focused on CPA at this point in time," Benjamin Ling, Checkout's lead product manager, told me.
  

Posted by Pamela Parker at 5:54 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

"Cat" Hits Best Seller Lists

Congratulations to our own Bryan Eisenberg (and his brother Jeffrey).

Bryan just IM'd with the fantastic news that their new book, Waiting for Your Cat to Bark? hit the USA Today Top 150 best-sellers list for last week's sales. It's also #4 on the USA Today Money best-seller list.

But wait! There's more! Rumor has it "Cat" also made the top 5 Wall Street Journal Business best-seller list.

The Eisenbergs had similar success with their last title. This latest news means they've scored a best seller double header.

We're so proud of you guys!

(If you're attending Search Engine Strategies in San Jose, don't forget to attend their book signing.

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 5:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

A Bold Move from Ford

We haven't had time to weigh in on this earlier this week, but, wow, what Ford is doing with its FordBoldMoves.com site and video documentary is really bold. In the video, the company acknowledges losing touch with the consumer, being in mortal danger of "going down," and desperately needing to turn itself around. It's really energizing to see a company commit to opening the kimono (perhaps an unfortunate choice of language consider who Ford is competing with) and engaging in dialogue with its customers... or the customers it has lost.

They're doing a lot of things right. Comments are enabled. Though one has to register to comment, only an e-mail address and password are required. Users can paste Javascript code into their blogs (which I've done here) to distribute the video and comment upon it. There are feeds, both outgoing and incoming. The site has a feed from Yahoo News showing the latest news about Ford. At this writing it's about a credit downgrade and how the CEO is ruling out a bankruptcy filing. Someone's gotta be gritting their teeth.

That said, a number of details screw up the online execution:

1. You are supposed to register and confirm your e-mail address (by clicking on a link in an e-mail you've received) before you can access community features on the site. I tried it, and the confirmation e-mail just never came. Not good. I was able to log in anyway, though.
   
2. No autodiscovery of RSS feeds. I tried to use the "Subscribe with Bloglines" feature, but it told me the site had no feeds. (It worked the more manual way, though.)
   
3. I tried to watch the video full screen, after having watched a little bit, but it required that I start all over from the very beginning. Not a good user experience.
   
4. The comments feature is all screwed up. The interface tells me there are 75 comments on the video, but when I click on it, I can only get to three. In some cases, the comments are clearly cut off.
   

Will this be the online destination to watch Ford's spectacular flame-out, where you can see a 100-plus-year-old company die before your eyes? Could be, but the seeming candor and good intentions behind the site make me, at least, root for Ford.

(full disclosure: I own a Ford vehicle, but I swear it was my husband's decision.)

UPDATE: Forgot to say we first wrote about this documentary plan here.

UPDATE2: The e-mail confirmation finally arrived, and I've determined that inability to see comments is a Firefox issue, as it looks OK in IE.

Posted by Pamela Parker at 4:47 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

John Edwards to Sell Issues on Your Cell

One America, the anti-poverty group headed by Senator John Edwards, is going mobile. Supporters can sign up on the site to receive mobile updates, and they can also text the word HOPE to 56658 and get the following message from the ex-VP candidate himself:

"Thanks 4 joining our mobile team. Please text me your name and email. Visit us at http://oneamericacommittee.com/. I'll be in touch--John.

My contact over there says they'll be sending occasional messages, updates and calls-to-action.

Posted by Kate Kaye at 4:36 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Fox Expects $500M in Internet Revs in 2007

Reuters reports that News Corp. Chairman and CEO Rupert Murdoch is predicting Internet revenue at the company will rise to nearly $500 million in fiscal year 2007. The company, best known in the Internet space for last year's acquisition of MySpace for $580 million, is expected to bring in $350 million in Internet revenues in calendar year 2006. Not too shabby.

Posted by Pamela Parker at 4:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Spyware Is Getting Settled -- A Litigious List

The Center for Democracy and Technology has a thorough compendium of spyware lawsuits, both settled and pending. Here are some excerpts from the report and a quick list of that litigation below that. Note all the hefty fines, and yes, time in the slammer.

"[Since 2004]law enforcement officials have increasingly applied statutes - some long standing, some relatively new -- to spyware cases. Leading the charge has been the FTC, which to date has brought six cases under its unfair and deceptive practices authority. The Department of Justice has actively pursued spyware purveyors under the CFAA and the Wiretap Act, with 11 cases to date. And three attorneys general at the state level have filed spyware lawsuits under state fraud and consumer protection laws, with two more cases initiated under new state spyware statutes."

CDT encourages more states to join in by establishing consumer complaint sites about suspected spyware, establish or support computer forensic capabilities to investigate and verify spyware complaints, and train investigators and prosecutors to identify spyware attributes.

"Because spyware is a moving target, it requires attention from a multitude of sectors, from litigators to technologists and consumer advocates."

Cases:
1. FTC v. Seismic Entertainment Productions, Inc., SmartBot, Inc., and Sanford Wallace
Result: SmartBot and Wallace barred from spyware-related activity, pay $4 million, in settlement, Lansky and OptinTrade ordered to pay $227,000, barred from spyware-related activity

2. FTC v. MaxTheater Inc, Thomas Delanoy
Result: barred from spyware-related activity, pay $76K

3. FTC v. TrustSoft, Inc., Swanksoft and SpyKiller, Danilo Ladendorf
Result: barred from spyware-related activity, pay $1.9 million

4. In the matter of Advertising.com, Teknosurf.com, John Ferber
Result: must clearly and conspicuously disclose that privacy applications are adware

5. FTC v. Odysseus Marketing Inc. and Walter Rines
Status: Preliminary injunction barring from related spyware activity

6. FTC v. Enternet Media, Inc. Conspy and Co, Inc. Lida Rohbani, Nima Hakimi, Baback Hakimi and Nicholas C. Albert
Status: Temporary restraining order, litigation pending

7. State of New York v. Intermix Media, Inc.
Result: Settlement reached, defendant to pay $7.5 million, banned from adware distribution, Intermix founder to pay $750,000 in penalties, affiliate Azez Software to pay $35,000

8. State of Texas v. Sony BMG Music Entertainment
Status: Litigation pending

9. State of Washington v. Secure Computer LLC, Paul E. Burke, Gary T. Preston, Manoj Kumar, Zhigan Chen, Seth T. Traub
Defendant Chen to consult with attorney before advertising ANYTHING and must pay $84,000, Preston to pay $7,200, Traub to pay $2,000

10. State of New York v. Direct Revenue, LLC and Joshua Abram, Alan Murray, Daniel Kaufman, Rodney Hook
Status: Litigation pending

11. State of Washington v. Software Online.com and David W. Plummer
Result: Settled, defendants to pay $440,000

12. United States v. Jerome T. Heckenkamp
Result: Dismissed

13. United States v. Van T. Dinh
Result: sentenced to 13 months in prison, must pay nearly $50,000

14. United States v. Juju Jiang
Result: sentenced to 27 months in prison, must pay $201,620

15. United States v. Carlos Enrique Perez-Melara
Result: Warrant issued for arrest

16. United States v. John J. Gannitto
Result: Sentence to 3 years supervised probation with 30 days in halfway house, 5 years supervised probation, related defendant sentenced to 3 years unsupervised probation, both to pay $500

17. United States v. Cheryl Ann Young
Status: awaiting sentencing of defendant

United States v. Christopher Maxwell
18. Result: Defendant pleaded guilty to all charges, awaiting sentencing

19. United States v. Jeanson James Ancheta
Result: Defendant sentenced to 57 months in prison, to pay $15,000

20. United States v. Kenneth Kwak
Result: Defendant sentenced to 5 months in prison, 5 months subsequent house arrest and must pay $40,000

Posted by Kate Kaye at 3:55 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Priceline Beams Shatner Down to YouTube

Priceline's come up with a new William Shatner TV spot. Before they dump zillions into air time, they're previewing the clip on YouTube "for a limited time."

So far, all the user comments are favorable. Who knows? If this thing goes viral enough, Priceline may heed its own money saving mantra and eschew the broadcast buys.

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 3:42 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Comcast's Web Ambitions

The WSJ today has a big write-up (subscription) on Comcast and Time Warner's ambitions for Web video. The piece seemed sparked at least partly by Comcast's not-yet-announced (but confirmed by ClickZ) acquisition of thePlatform, a technology firm that helps media companies publish digital assets on multiple platforms. ThePlatform has already been running a channel, The Fan, for Comcast. That channel delivers nearly 2 million video streams a day to Comcast's customers. ThePlatform's system includes targeted advertising capabilities, according to the company. Details of the acquisition weren't disclosed.

It makes complete sense for cable players -- many of which have already invested big dollars into on-demand programming and technolgy -- to extend that model onto the Web. It's that media where ever and whenever philosophy that everyone's chasing (and trying to make profitable).

[via PaidContent.org]

Posted by Pamela Parker at 1:24 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Google Checkout: Check Out of Commercial E-Mail

"Control commercial spam" is a Google Checkout value proposition. "You can keep your email address confidential, and easily turn off unwanted emails from stores where you use Google Checkout," reads my account page.

Didn't work at Starbucks, where I couldn't even find a Google Checkout option. But check out the new Buy.com checkout page (left). Bypassing all that merchant registration tedium really will be advantageous for e-commerce players. I've seen this functionality on some, but only a very few, Yahoo Shopping merchants.

This is a concept we'll be seeing more of in the future. How will e-mail marketing programs adapt? Under CAN-SPAM, businesses can e-mail existing customers. What happens when businesses no longer have their customers' e-mail addresses? (Google is, after all, calling this "commercial spam").

Merchants are going to have to get very creative at developing incentives if they expect to build their e-mail lists in the future.

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 9:43 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

June 28, 2006

Google's Appeal Fails in France

Google's effort to appeal Louis Vuitton's trademark case against it in France has failed, according to the luxury goods maker. The search engine's fine has been upped to 300,000 euros for "trademark counterfeiting, unfair competition and advertising". The court has forbidden Google "from using any of Louis Vuitton's trademarks in the scope of its advertising activity on all of its Web sites accessible from France."

An International Herald Tribune story from earlier this week says similar lawsuits against Google in France now number more than 40.

Posted by Pamela Parker at 5:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Digital Hires and Business Wins: Dizzying Activity

The bloat lately in our thrice-weekly Execs & Accounts column is perhaps a better indicator than any ad spend estimate or executive survey of the sheer volume of activity in this space. Today's edition chronicles no fewer than 21 customer wins and executive moves at About.com, Organic, YellowPages.com, Coremetrics and others.

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 5:01 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Upfront Results: Network Gig is Up?

Stories in the Journal, Times and AdAge this morning all proclaim that the upfront is officially down this year, and online gets credit for the bite.

Reports variously describe ad commitments for the networks' fall lineups as being down in the range of $200 to $600 million. Fox and ABC will likely emerge as the only networks to experience increases over last year.

These pronouncements should be taken with a grain of salt, as I've said before. Advertisers reserve the right to increase their scatter buys later this year, and the overall TV spend for the year could still go up, as happened last year.

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 11:04 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

When Your Visual Field is Sixty Percent Ads

This isn't interactive advertising, but rather a uniquely interactive way of looking at advertising.

The "City Wipeout" project highlights the degree to which urban dwellers' visual fields are dominated by commercial messages of all kinds. Architect and researcher Pasi Kolhonen created the installation, which allows users to wipe a series of images clean of all visual material that is not an ad. The resulting images remain extremely cluttered. From the site:

"Kolhonen wants to reveal with his City Wipeout installation just how many images, texts and signs we find in our everyday environment. The installation consists of pictures which unveil an ordinary face of the city centre. The pictures are reflected one-by-one on the wall. The user interface allows the spectators to wipe the view clean of everything but the advertisements, signs or logos. All that remains is the blanket of advertising that covers the entire city. That blanket is not always noticed although it is constantly present in our daily life."

 

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 10:45 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

June 27, 2006

Afternoon of the YouTube "Killers"

Not to criticize the category, but video sites are a bit of a commodity these days. The popularity of YouTube is no small factor, and it's not shameful at all to pitch a company calling it a "YouTube Killer." But we didn't expect to ever have two companies show up at the same moment for meetings with two ClickZ editors. That happened this afternoon when Kate Kay and I each made appointments with two separate companies.

Let's just say both companies had a few minutes to introduce themselves and chat for a minute while we had a bit of a laugh at our desks and tried to figure out how best to greet the competitors waiting for us.

Posted by Enid Burns at 5:35 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Massive Heads East

Massive is heading east, way east. The in-game advertising network has joined forces with online entertainment and game tech company Webzen to provide in-game ads to two upcoming massively multiplayer online games, first-person shooter Huxley (out next year), and the urban action game All Points Bulletin, to be released in '08. This is the first time Massive will reach the Asian market.

MSN in Asia will act as the sales force for the games and clients in the region, a spokesperson told ClickZ News.

Massive was recently acquired by Microsoft.

Posted by Kate Kaye at 5:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Epic Promotes Jessica Simpson Record Via Handsets

Epic Records launched a mobile campaign for Jessica Simpson's fifth album, "A Public Affair." Ipsh! is behind the effort, which will see posters plastered up in multiple cities with copy inviting people to text "Jess" to the short code 33992. A reply SMS includes a phone number recipients can dial to hear the album's title track single, plus instructions for downloading the ringtone and getting Jessica Simpson alerts. (press release)

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 4:18 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

June 26, 2006

Comcast's CGM Nightmare

The newly-empowered consumer is, of course, taking every opportunity to cheer, and boo, the companies they deal with every day. The latest example: A Comcast Technician Sleeping on my Couch. The video posted on YouTube of, you guessed it -- a Comcast technician who fell asleep on a customer's couch during a service call -- has gotten 320,967 views as of this posting. Between footage of the sleeping technician, the customer interspersed text commentary complaining about Comcast's customer service. Reuters reports the technician has been fired.

Posted by Pamela Parker at 9:38 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

AdCenter Tool for Demographic Prediction

A marketer friend/source of mine just turned me on to a neat
tool on Microsoft's
adCenter that allows advertisers to predict consumer age and gender based on keywords and particular Web site URLs.

A couple of my own query results:

URL searches:
ClickZ.com: 64 percent male, ages 35~49
Maxim.com: 60 percent male, ages 35~49 (just 60 percent male? Hmmm…)
BabyCenter.com: 98 percent female, ages 25~34
MySpace.com: 50/50 split, ages 18-24

Keyword searches:
Baby Phat: 76 percent female, ages 25~34
AARP: 59 percent female, ages 50+
Star Trek: 64 percent male, ages 35~49
Pashmina: 70 percent female, ages 25~34
world cup: 63 percent male, ages 25~34
online marketing: 60 percent male, ages 25~34

This URL search seems way off:
NYTimes.com: 51 percent female, aged under 18

Posted by Kate Kaye at 5:05 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The Wrong Way to Grow An E-Mail List

After confirming a dinner reservation, the hostess requested my e-mail address "for our mailing list."

While complying would certainly qualify as an opt-in, telephone dictation is just too dangerous a tactic for building a list. Typos, misspellings and mis-hearing (was that 'b' as in "boy or 'v' as in "victory"?) will inevitably result in unhygenic lists. That, in turn, will negatively impact deliverability of the entire list.

They know I'm coming in for dinner anyway. Why not ask then, if they have to ask? Some restaurants are beginning to leave a card with the bill requesting an opt-in to e-newsletters. That has its risks, too (handwriting isn't always crystal clear). But it has to be better than a game of telephone.

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 2:20 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Cannes Grand Prix Goes to Guinness

Excellent brand advertising equals excellent entertainment, regardless of the medium, and I always get a kick out of seeing the top-anointed TV spots.

This year's Grand Prix at Cannes went to BBDO's noitulovE ("Evolution," spelled backward) spot for Guinness. An incredible one-minute walk down natural selection memory lane.

Just for kicks, I searched around to see where I could most easily discover the ad online. YouTube was the fastest, with at least five crappy versions readily available. The official gateway for Guinness spots gave a much better video quality but made me jump through some hoops.

Agencies ought to strike more deals with YouTube and the other video aggregators to get their best spots hosted and perhaps featured.

Runner-up: Carlton Draught

Posted by Zachary Rodgers at 10:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

MSN adCenter's Aggressive New Ad Campaign

The headline reads "She found your furniture ad on Google." The image is a little girl and her dollhouse.

MSN adCenter's full page color ad in today's New York Times business section promises a "+57% higher conversion rate than Google and 48% higher than Yahoo."

Here's the landing page (complete with a couple questionable security certificates): msftadcenter.com/nyt. Obviously, MSN is tracking conversions.

Posted by Rebecca Lieb at 7:21 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

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