Finally, some honest advertising.

I am in love with this campaign.  Finally, a product is not trying to be the cure-all, godsend product that everyone has tried to be for years.  Miracle Whip knows that it's a somewhat weird, unorthodox product that not everyone likes, and they do an effective job of selling it by saying this.  Usually, no one would want to put a "celebrity" (if that's what they call Pauly D nowadays) who hates their product into their advertising, but this campaign does it flawlessly.  By saying that it's not for everyone, it really encourages the audience to think about it and be curious enough to try it.  But what I like most about it is that the people who like it and the people aren't entirely dissimilar, so there is really no target.  This becomes more relatable and encouraging to the audience because it sets no one apart from liking it or disliking it.  This campaign does a fantastic job of targeting anyone and everyone to TRY miracle whip, not to love it.  A much more realistic goal that every advertiser should adopt.

Updated Sealy Commercials.

Here are the revised sealy commercial I promised to post last week once I finished them.  The first one is my highly dialogue spot, while the second is my highly visual spot.  They're the same basic concept which is what I went for to make them part of the same campaign.  I'm pretty happy with how they're coming out.  The only thing I'm still not sold on is my tagline.  It sounds a little too typical and I think I can come up with something better if I give it time.  Anyway, I hope you like them.  Feedback would be much much appreciated.

Ugh.

PETA ads are almost as bad as American Apparel Ads and the two other brands I compared them to.  Sure, sex sells.  We get it.  You open up a magazine and see a page with woman's naked ass and you'll be attracted to look closer at it.  It's human nature.  But that does not mean that sex should replace creativity in advertising because at that point it just becomes alienation.  After all, let's face it, there is nothing sexy about not eating meat.  You can try to make your far fetched connections, but there's really not.  So, now the strategy here is basically just to sell out at any cost as long as it catches the eye of sex-starved America.  It's a real shame that this is what advertising is coming to.  Someone please give me a job so I can start making a difference.  Please?

I'm surprised I haven't posted this yet.

This is the front and back of a postcard I wrote for my Diamond Edge Communications account- The School of Communications and Theater's Study Away Program.  We passed these out to interested students during Temple's Spring Fling last week to promote our information session about the program this Wednesday.  It says the information session was last week (which was actually the date that Spring Fling got postponed to), but we had to postpone it because of this, and I had to print out 1000 labels and cut and stick them all onto 1000 postcards.  It was a much fun as you can imagine.  Anyway, the copy was an adventure to write.  Originally, I wrote something really generic and boring and presented it to my professor and immediately he dismissed it and told me to write it all over with a more conversational tone.  It was a challenge I was willing and able to accept though because I redrafted this and presented it to him an hour and a half later and he was very pleased.  Also, during that revision, I decided to take the Temple T logo out of the stamp spot and replace it with a QR code that directs you to the program website.  Again, a change that my professor and my account manager both loved.  Hope you like.

Really good spot.

Recently, as you may have read from my last post, a professor of mine assigned us to write a commercial that is strictly dialogue between two people.  I think he had the inspiration for the assignment after he saw this commercial because it is really the most effective dialogue commercial I think you can find right now.  Not only does it demonstrate the amazing capabilities of the iPhone, but it does it in a funny and highly humanized way.  For the most part, commercials with as much dialogue as this tend to not be as appealing to the common consumer because they sound so much like a gimmicky advertisement.  This spot, however,  did not.  It is simply a very well written, well thought out, and consumer-relatable way to show how powerful of a phone the iPhone can be.  (Even though it is technically an AT&T commercial).

Working copy of a new commercial script for Sealy's mattresses.

First off, I realize the people are different in almost every shot, but of course I was not able to find all these shots by the same two models.  Anyway, this is a commercial I recently wrote for a project we were just assigned in my Portfolio class.  I still have to rewrite it into two separate commercials because I misunderstood the assignment originally.  We needed two commercials- one that is all dialogue between two people and one that is all visual.  For some reason, I thought he wanted us to do both in one spot.  I love the concept though, so I am going to stick with it and the rewrite them into two separate, very similar commercials.  In any event, feedback is still much appreciated regarding this spot.  I'll be sure to post the rewrites sometime in the next week.

No respect for anyone who wears Old Navy.

Why would anyone want to be associated with THIS brand image?  Especially if you're a straight male.  This guy looks like a gay theater performer from New York, not someone that your male audience would like to emulate.  I understand, this particular spot is targeted to women, but at the same time that shouldn't detract from your male audience that will likely see this also.  Not only that, but I find this entire commercial to be pretty unappealing to the general public.  The song is not catchy.  Everything is way too childlike.  And the lyrics are simply horrible. (i.e. "You're gonna light that ATM line. That glitter make me twitter. You so fine).  I mean, honestly?  If I was sitting in on the meeting that this was pitched in, it would take all my willpower to hold back from hysterically laughing.  Ads like these make me want to break into the business even more.  Just so that I can write better ads and stop ones like these from being circulated.

Dear Red Tettemer: Hire me?

Last Friday, I went on an ad agency crawl and Red Tettemer was easily the best one of all.  Their agency is located on the 24th floor of 1 South Broad, and I can definitely say I've never seen a cooler looking agency and a more beautiful view of Philly.  Outside of the appearance though, the people at Red Tettemer do some really wonderful work.  During their presentation, they showed some of the best stuff they've done and this is the one I liked the most.  I love this spot and the entire campaign.  I can't think of a better way to market a men's soap to men than to make it in such a fun, masculine way.  Of course, you could always do this through hot girls with huge boobs, but we all know how I feel about the over usage of sex in advertising- it's almost always the least creative way to go about it.  This, on the other hand, is brilliant.  The filthocratic oath concept is such a fitting way to convey the message and feeling of the ads that it really completes them and makes it into a flawless campaign.  Well done.  If anyone for Red Tettemer is reading this, my email address is afiore@temple.edu and I am available at any time during the week for an interview. Thanks :)

I'm not entirely happy with it yet, but it's a work in progress.

I think the problem I have right now is the video transition between the Mastiff and the less fortunate dogs in the PAWS shelter.  Originally, I wrote a completely different concept in the beginning that I scrapped (and don't even want to mention because it was so dumb) and replaced with this concept of the world's most expensive dog.  I really like the beginning concept and I really like the ending, but I'm struggling a little bit with flowing them together I think.  Also, this was originally supposed to be a 30-second spot, but I think this might be turn out to be a 60-second spot.  Though, this could be cut down a bit by taking some of the voiceover dialogue out in the second half.  Anyway, I hope you like it.  I will be posting edits later on after I present this to my professor and see what he thinks.

It's pretty sad if your MLB team needs such a big budget advertising campaign, but I still enjoy this.

I wasn't necessarily blown away by this, but it's pretty well done to say the least.  I especially liked the last scene with the catcher pulling away the chair and crouching down to eat instead.  They definitely did a good job of translating the cliche of "eating, sleeping, and breathing" something into the mentality of their baseball players.  Not only they, but they made it pretty humorous too.  My only criticism is that the order of the events should have gone in the order of the phrases (the lunch scene, then sleeping scene, and then the other two).  Other than that, I really enjoy this spot and the entire campaign.  Maybe the Mets should do something like this so their fans aren't so ashamed (like myself).

Sorry, Ads of the World, but I think this is garbage.

In advertising, they teach you to write to the customers' emotions.  But when try to make the main benefit of the product look like it's something that you cannot live without, when in reality you clearly can, your emotional efforts become obvious and the integrity of the ad is not very respectable.  Okay, so the main benefit is how fuel efficient this larger-than-midsize vehicle is.  So, does that mean that your life will be this way if you don't own a Honda Jazz?  NO.  Not at all.  And I can't stand when advertisers try to make their products seem that way.

Another TAC agency poster.

This is a poster myself and my fellow Ad Club agency members made recently for the food drive we're hosting for PhilAbundance.  We decided on a Campbell's soup can concept and are planning on painting and making the tubs for the non-perishables into soup cans.  We also used the "can" idea in our head and subheadlines to make a connection between the word can as an auxiliary verb and as an actual object.  Also, I suggested changing the color of "that" and "can" to emphasize these words and kind of put them together to read the two words as "that can" again.  I'm pretty happy with it and so are the other students that helped work on it.  Hope you like it.

Dear the art director who created this... Be my best friend?

This campaign is almost perfect.  Not only is it designed and art directed beautifully, but the copy is pretty well done also.  I just really like the feel of this ad.  Since WD-40 is primarily used by mechanics, engineers,  and hands-on dirty workers, the gritty look and feel of this fits so well for the ad and the entire campaign.  Though, out of the whole campaign, I enjoyed the tone and context of this copy of this particular ad the most.  While the other ones are also lighthearted and informal in tone, this one is also a little humorous and fun.  Overall, it's a great campaign.  And the execution of the art direction is flawless.