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You want to see the world’s most well-practiced and ridiculous eye roll? Play me a sappy country music song. I see right through that charade – disingenuous, insipid and frankly offensive. Cue. That. Eye. Roll. To me, there are two kinds of emotional appeals in advertising and media. First, the kind I’ve just mentioned — intended to make you cry. I imagine the room of country music executives in sharkskin suits and cowboy hats (stay true to those roots!) in some Nashville high rise, sitting around a rich mahogany table coming up with the next sappy ballad. It’s sole purpose is tears. And the reason they do it? It works. It works really well. It’s why Christmas Shoes became a made-for-tv movie. But to me, I feel exploited. Toyed with. I lose trust in brands who take advantage of my tender heart. (Think Sarah McLachlan Arms of the Angel ASPCA ad.) The second is a different kind of emotional appeal. … Continue reading
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Elliance held its annual employee holiday bash last night. It was tons of fun. And we had a lot to celebrate — It’s been a great year! We are so thankful for our awesome clients and freelance talent! Happy Holidays from all of us!
For an ad lover and athlete like myself, the olympics are like super bowl, but better — I get to experience great ads for two weeks straight. (The only difference is the advertisement restrictions that the International Olympic Committee for non-sponsors but this isn’t a blog about those rules. This is a blog about the awesomeness that has unfolded in the last few weeks.) I’ve shared my top three from the 2016 Rio Olympics: Bronze: Samsung Samsung took a bit of several national anthems — the parts that talk about unity — and mixed them into one song. Stuff like this gets me every time. Silver: Google Photos #relatable. #toorelatable. Gold: Nike – The Iron Nun Nike’s UNLIMITED ads knock it out of the park, and this one is my favorite. Their ability to combine together professional athletes with 9-minute-mile schmoes like me has forever earned my brand loyalty. I love the concept of breaking the fourth wall. And how the narrator and athletes interact. Also watch … Continue reading
Posted in: digital communication
“Everything you quote — every movie, every TV show, every lyric — has been endlessly rewritten… Fall in love with rewriting!” My uncle, who is a great writer, recently said these words. And I love them. It’s a process I know well. Every brand. Every headline. Every script. Every sitemap. Every webpage. All of it. They’ve all been nipped and tucked and scrapped and scratched out and added back in and shifted and shaken not stirred and screamed at and forgiven and rinsed and repeated. A bucket brigade of project managers, clients, writers, editors and SEO strategists passed the words back and forth. Commas were nixed and then added again. A passionate battle in grammar rules that frankly are meant to be broken likely made its way in. And I’ve fallen in love with this process. As you’re reading this, I’ve probably already changed this post and these words — probably this word — ten times. Make that eleven. In … Continue reading
A friend and I were finishing up a late dinner Tuesday night when we realized the New Hampshire primary was just about finished up. Curious for the results, I pulled out my phone to check. But I surprised myself with the first place I looked. Not Google. Not CNN. Or Twitter. Or The Times. But Snapchat. I suppose that’s no surprise if you recognize the distinct ghost above (who actually has a name! It’s Ghostface Chillah). Here’s why: Snapchat’s live coverage of significant events is unlike anything that has ever existed. It is revolutionary in the world of storytelling. Imagine a story told from the eyes of 100 different people. That’s 100 different perspectives. 100 different angles. 100 different emotions. All in real time. Here’s how Snapchat’s live story feature works: The Snapchat story event is the sum of 10-second bits all put together in real-time by people — normal people — who are actually there experiencing the events. They’re in chronological … Continue reading
Posted in: snapchat, social media campaigns
A gift. A donation. A lunch. A trip. Volunteering. An interview. They’re all grounds for a handwritten thank you note. To me, it’s a big priority. It’s an appreciation I got from my father. Looming is the memory of my brother and I sitting at the dining room table, pens in our aching hands, scribbling thank you’s for everything you could think of, as he watched over our shoulders like a drill sergeant. “That one doesn’t show enough appreciation! Did you appreciate that Highlights subscription from Aunt Maude?” “Sir, yes sir!” My memory tends to exaggerate. And my dad was nothing like a drill sergeant. And I don’t actually have an Aunt Maude. But I’m thankful for his caring. Because now, I really do think to send notes out, even for small things. And the one positive side of the handwritten note heading toward extinction is that people seem to appreciate it more when you write one. With Thanksgiving a … Continue reading
The Greeks called it their Muse. The Romans called it the Ingenium (the genius). I call it whatever that magic is that gets some meaningful words onto the page. Inspiration. I recently heard a great re-air of a RadioLab interview with Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat Pray Love. In it, she tells the story of poet Robert Frost working on a particularly lengthy and draining piece for weeks and weeks and weeks. He finally finished the thing, completely dissatisfied, even though he’d put so much effort into it. Sigh. After all that. Nevertheless, Frost woke up the next morning, and sat down to write… “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood…” (Arguably one of the most well-known poems of the 20th century… No joke, it was last night’s Final Jeopardy! question.) It was as if Frost was being rewarded for his hard work, Gilbert says. Sometimes that’s how the creative process works. Sometimes it really does feel like 99 percent … Continue reading
In light of my yellow Elliance copywriter’s desk making its first journey around the shy Pittsburgh sun, I got to thinking about what I’d learned about higher education marketing in the last year, and if there was anything the handful of schools I’ve worked with had in common. It seems to all boil down to one thing: There are awesome people doing awesome things everywhere. Pardon my vagueness. There are about 2,000 four-year institutions in the United States, and each is known for different things — some more than others. But the one thing that I’ve found, no matter where U.S. News and World Report ranks them, is that 100 percent of these schools have staff, faculty and students putting their hearts into their work. I truly believe that there is magic that happens when passionate people work together. From the hundreds of thousands of service hours completed every year by a small liberal arts college in Massachusetts that has … Continue reading