Hey, Nuveen Investments. You’re running ads on NPR (sorry, “sponsoring programming”), so your audience can be presumed to be fairly smart and well-educated – but seriously, what the fuck is (an) ETF? Apparently, etfconnect.com is my “one-stop source for ETF information”. Woo fucking hoo. If I don’t know what an ETF is, why would I go to the one-stop source for it?
Do you employ anyone in your advertising department who bothers to think? Perhaps someone who might timidly raise a hand in the meeting and say “Perhaps we should say ‘your one-stop source for Exchange-Traded Funds* information’, as we’ve already used the term ETF in the URL, and defining it might be helpful for potential customers.”? No? I thought not.
*
*I finally gave in and stopped yelling at the radio and just Googled ETF. Turns out I’m a potential customer, but not of the Nobel Prize Laureates at Nuveen Investments. Dumbasses. *
On a similar vein … the new McDonalds coffee commercials - what bright wit authorized them?
What is the catch phrase now - “It’s good now” …
What, it was total crap before? Well, actually as coffee went, it was dependably mediochre. Not great, not undrinkable [with cream and splenda] just sort of coffee. Had a cup. Didnt taste all that different, still generic and more or less the same cup of coffee as before. I guess I was supposed to get a warm fuzzy about the farmers in Costa Rica or wherever getting paid more. :rolleyes:
You aren’t ever allowed to abuse another cup of coffee ever. Why people insist on drinking coffee and dumping crap in it so it doesn’t taste like coffee makes my ass twitch. (Sorry, had to be a coffee snob for a moment.)
Anyway, I like McD’s coffe. Not as good as Dunkin’ Donuts, but better than Burger King. (The 78 Starbucks in my city are too inconvenient to go to.)
You have to keep in mind, ads are to remind you of the product. Not to really tell you how much better it is now. I have a pit thread forming based on McD’s process of foisting version after version of software on stores that we’re supposed to t/s. Often we don’t even know the version has been sent to stores until we get a call about a problem. Don’t be shocked they often fuck up the choice in as agencies.
For a brief moment the first time I heard it, I made the same connection. My brain was searching for some kind of referent and landed on our own dear ETF. Then I lost the connection in my blind rage over the stupidity of it.
I think part of my problem is the plummy tones of the announcer, intoning “your single source for ETF information” as though that actually MEANS something.
Actually, the coffee at the local McD’s here is really, really good. I was pleasantly surprised, and find it to be as enjoyable as a cuppa from one of the local coffee shops.
Please shoot me if you ever find me buying a McMocha McLatte, though.
In there defense sponsorship messages on NPR stations function under some fairly tight guidelines. If you listen for a period of time you’ll notice there are no ‘call to action’ lines in NPR sponsorship messages…there’s no ‘go out and buy’ language. I’m sure there are other restrictions as well.
I know there are restrictions, and I appreciate them. It keeps the advertising level fairly low. But I have a hard time believing that the root cause here is NPR restrictions and not copywriter/client incompetence. And I say that as an 8-year veteran of the marketing/advertising business, mostly as a writer.
My pet peeve NPR ad is the one for Allianz Life. It’s pronounced “Ollie-onz”. How the hell anyone listening to the radio is supposed to know what the hell they’re talking about is beyond me. They did have the motto “The Best At Next” (another really meaningful bit of info, that :rolleyes: ) , so out of curiosity, I had to google that phrase to find out what the actual name of the company was. Lessee… A-L-L-I-A-N-Z… ::looks at watch:: OK, that took about 3 seconds. Seems like it would be worth 3 seconds of ad time for people to know what the fucking hell is the name of your goddamn company!.
My favorite, and I may have done this rant before, was a billboard up in the Twin Cities for a hospital. The tag line…“We treat heart attacks 33% faster.”
Faster that what?
So what? Does faster mean better outcome? Maybe faster is sloppier.
When I am having a heart attack, is that a good time to choose my hospital, or is the ambulance time the really critical thing - i.e. the closest hospital might take three more minutes to treat me, but the EMTs can get me there five minutes faster - doesn’t that net out good?
For events where I should choose my hospital (elective and non-emergency surgery or treatment), what does your heart attack treatment speed have to do with anything - does that make your hospital a better place to deliver a baby?
For events where I could choose my hospital, don’t most people start by choosing their doctor and then use whatever hospital that doctor has privledges at? Who really chooses hospitals?
Combine that with websites people don’t spell out, and you’ll know how often I have to buy a new car radio. “So just go to www.bouillionaise.com today!” Come on, even the Speedy Pest guy on the Top40 station spells it out for us.
InkBlot
If you’re going to kneel behind their knees like that, Brainiac, I’ll give them the shove: anyone advertising a website should know that nobody’s website is the “one-stop source” for any information. Okay, amazon.com is my one-stop source for “finding out what Amazon charges for X” but that’s about it. The only websites that can claim to be a “one-stop source” for information are search engines; everyone else is living in a dream world where everyone will choose to make the latest “portal” their “home page”. Maybe these ETFs will be able to keep up with those hot internet stocks, too! How rad!
Hey, ETFConnect Jackasses: 1995 called. They want their paradigm back.
Is McD’s doing that “Fair Price” deal for coffee? If so, good for them. I really like the idea of the farmers actually getting money for their goods. Though I think the program will have to be watched carefully or the middleman will steal every penny of that 79 cents. (The way things tend to work in the Third World).
For those old folk like myself, one of the most memorable radio adverts came from Horace Batchelor. He devised a method of winning the football pools, and used to advertise on Radio Luxembourg (no UK based commercial radio in those days).
The secret of his success and ensuring no orders went astray was to spell out the name of the little known village where his office was located. Practically every one in the land could spell K-a-y-n-s-h-a-m in those days.
Even 50 years later I’ve never forgotten it and I’m sure I’m not alone. Very effective advertising.
Here in New England, they’ve started offering Green Mountain Coffee, which does participate in fair trade arrangements. I don’t know what brand is the new one in the rest of the country.
Of course, they’ve also started preparing it for you, with a handy chart of what the different orders mean (light, regular, etc.)
Well sure. If I were in the UK and heard someone say “CANE-shum” I’d figure it was spelled “Keynestershiresfordham” and bugger my chances for ever getting an envelope there.
You don’t know how i like my coffee at home, just how I drink it out.
And as an aside … sugar does not cover the taste of anything. It is still cofffee flavored. Dumping cinnamon, hazlenut and blueberry [ :smack: blueberry flavored coffee?] flavoring into coffee changes and masks the flavors of coffee.
Likewise cream doesnt cover the taste of coffee, cream is actually an almost null taste, but it is a texturizer that can buffer acids.
FWIW I detest the generic starbucks coffee, always tastes burned and like it has been sitting in the pot all morning even from a fresh pot.
Maybe they just want people to view the page. So, though it is a stupid advert for those who want to know what the hell ETF stands for, to them, they just have to wait for the prey - when you give in and go to their website, BAM! Made ya look!
Of course, they won’t get the Googlers, but it still increases their chances of getting more hits.
