Almostgotit.com

Subscribe

Archive for the ‘marketing’

Tasers and Flogos and Cats: Oh My!

May 12, 2008 By: almostgotit Category: Uncategorized, humor, parenting, marketing 2 Comments →

flogos.jpg

Flogos: image in wide syndication

Hat tip to that fabulous Canadian worthy, Duckworth Peslar, who notified me today that Taser International is marketing a personal taser with a built in MP3 player — one that doesn’t skip a beat when you taser someone or something.

Amazing.

Also making international news over the weekend: FLOGOS are here! The latest in crazy advertising gimmicks, Flogos look — and float in the air — like clouds, but are literally floating logos made of soap bubbles filled with helium.  Re-purposed snow blowers pump the shapes through a computer-shaped stencil to form any 2-D logo one wishes, e.g the Nike swish or the Apple Computer apple. 

Great Britain’s Gavin Pretor-Pinney, however, doesn’t like them.  The leader of the Cloud Appreciation Society was quoted in the Sunday Herald in a bit of a lather:

I find the concept of someone sending up clouds in the shape of a Coca-Cola logo, or something like that, absolutely abhorrent. If you live in the city you are constantly bombarded by corporate messages. Clouds, with their formlessness, are the last wilderness you have to gaze upon. It would be a sad day if you gaze up and find that you had a company logo in the clouds.”

Upon hearing that there may soon also be multicoloured variations, Pretor-Pinney practically popped:

The colour of clouds when a low sun strikes them is one of the most beautiful colour schemes there is. You don’t need to start introducing multicoloured, tutti-frutti clouds. I say leave our clouds alone. This matters to me, I tell you.”

And finally:  my 11-year old, one of the funniest creatures on the planet earth, shook her own head over some political news today. 

That [she concluded] is why the government should be run by cats.
 

Friday Favorite: My Insulated French-Press Coffee Pot

April 25, 2008 By: almostgotit Category: Uncategorized, blogging, humor, feminism, marketing 2 Comments →

While this particular model that I own, by BonJour, seems no longer to be available,  there are dozens of other insulated French press pots now on the market.  And no wonder!   They are easy to use, easy to clean, and make to-die-for-coffee.  As a comes-from-Seattle-girl, I know.

Many coffee connoisseurs recommend press pots for the best coffee flavor, but the glass ones don’t keep coffee hot for more than a few minutes.  Problem solved with this insulated version,  which I can set right next to my computer, where it provides me with hours of refills! 

I’d buy this pot over and over again, too, except that the one we have will never wear out. We’ve used it daily for years now. 

I would like to add that not a single company or person is paying me to write about insulated French-Press Coffee Pots,  though I certainly think it is an excellent idea to send nice things to bloggers and ask them for endorsements (money is always a nice thing to send to bloggers, too.) 

After all.  If the Johnson & Johnson marketing people  learned anything from their recent Camp Baby experience, they may now realize they’d have been much better off showering their target mom bloggers with products (to keep and to use as blog give-aways) instead of paying their way to a conference where all the neuroscientists, nurses and marketing professionals who dominate the momosphere  were treated to scintillating sessions about hair-braiding.

I’m just saying.  And for the record, my contact information is right up there, at the top of this screen.

Humor in the Momosphere: Johnson & Johnson’s Blog Marketing Debacle

April 15, 2008 By: almostgotit Category: Uncategorized, blogging, humor, feminism, networking, marketing 2 Comments →

The story, in brief:  Johnson & Johnson co. marketers decide to be hip, and so they invite 50 of the biggest names in mom-blogging to an all-expenses-paid “Camp Baby” event   in early April.   They handle the invitations very badly.  Then they start disinviting people.   J&J has received lots of blog time in the aftermath, all right!  Don’t miss Susan Getgood’s hilarious “Camp Baby” post mortem!

Friday Favorite: In the Motherhood

April 04, 2008 By: almostgotit Category: Uncategorized, technology, humor, feminism, parenting, marketing 1 Comment →

Written especially for the web, the (very) short-form comedy series, “In the Motherhood,” is just begining its second season. Scripted by Hollywood professionals and with an all star cast featuring Leah Remini (”The King of Queens”), Jenny McCarthy and Chelsea Handler, the hilarious and edgy story ideas for each episode are submitted by real-life mothers from across the country. It’s a terrific concept.

And the episodes are FUNNY.

In the Motherhood hopes to become a major destination site, and so far it seems to be succeeding. I love the boldness of pairing the collaborative nature of the web with the professional production values already used by the television and movie industry. And all of this effort is aimed not at the still-highly-male-IT-industry, but at mothers. Hurray!

Oh sure — it’s still a marketing ploy. Nevertheless, it is also truly entertaining while managing to avoid the condescension and banality that still plagues so many “mommy” websites.

So hats off to ‘em, is what I say.