What do Betty White, Abe Vigoda and Jim McMahon have in common?
They're all at least 25 years past their prime? Yes.
My mom would love to meet all of them? Yes.
They're all eligible for the senior citizens discount at McDonald's? Yes.
They've still got it? Definitely.

Quick recap of my self-imposed rules for Hyper-Bole:
- Not gonna review movie trailers.
- Not gonna review CBS promos.
- Not gonna touch the Tebow spot.
I can't guarantee the rest of my fellow Hyper-Bole bloggers will adhere to this stipulations. Just putting you on notice there.

Now that we've got that unpleasantness out of the way...my section of Hyper-Bole is gonna be short because the 1st quarter wasn't much to behold.

There are only two ways advertising can move me: humor or tears. Tell me a story that elicits either response and I'll at least take a hard look at the product. That being said, only 4 of the 24 ads in the first quarter deserve recognition:

1. Snickers: You can't pick up a bat and beat a pick-up football game with Rose Nyland and Tessio. I'm allergic to peanuts and I almost sent my husband out for a Snickers for me.
2. Boost Mobile: As a child of the 70s and 80s, I assume this spot is targeted at me. Bullseye. Only one issue - didn't see Refrigerator Perry. Ditka and his 'stache compensated well.
3. Doritos: The majority of the Doritos ads (and there were plenty of them) didn't impress me. I get it - they're addictive. But, the spot with the kid and his mom's blind date hurt my side. Maybe it's a gall bladder or acid reflux problem, but I pretty much tasted Dorito's after that spot.
4. Bridgestone Tires: Humorous payoff - bachelor party. Tearful payoff - saving the whales. Consider that a touchdown and extra point, rolled into one.

Honorable Mentions: Simpsons Coca-Cola spot and Bud Light T-Pain Autotone spot (only because I love the autotone effect)

Honorable Let's-Not-Ever-Speak-Of-Them-Agains: GoDaddy (Note to GoDaddy - there ARE women who handle tech too), Monster.com's animatronic beavers and Doritos' funeral spot

The latter part of 2009 marked a time of massive growth for marketing within the social media space, so it should come as no surprise that advertisers are revving up their social skills when it comes to the grandaddy of all things advertising, 2010’s Super Bowl. Even the NFL has gotten in on the action with #SB44, the official NFL hashtag of Super Bowl 44.

Leading up to #SB44, there has been quite a lot of online buzz about the brands who are going the social media route this year - Pepsi, Budweiser, Coca-Cola, Monster etc. But to be quite honest, the people who are buzzing about this topic are the same social media nerds who buzz about social media all year long (myself included).

I’m anxious to see if the brands will make any significant impact in their social media spaces beyond the nerds. And since the Super Bowl is really about mass appeal and making an impression on such a large scale, I’m going to study the social media side of Super Bowl advertising from a casual user's perspective. This means that I’m not going to over analyze what the big brands are doing before Super Bowl Sunday - not for this case study, anyway.

I’m thinking about my cousin Tad in Tulsa who enjoys watching the Super Bowl for the game and, yeah, a little for the commercials too. He has a Facebook page and has fanned a few official pages, but he’s not out there hunting down his favorite brands. On a whim he set up a Twitter account but he’s only tweeted “Trying to figure this thing out” and “Haha, did you guys see that video?” Tad is definitely not sitting at home trying to see who’s doing what today in prep for their Super Bowl advertising.

So to understand the effect of any impact, I need to do a little Saturday digital sleuthing before #SB44. Consider it a social media nerd’s version of pre-gaming. I’m going to look at the heavy hitters and take note of Facebook Fan counts and Twitter followers and search results. And whatever else I might stumble or digg or delicious upon.

On #SB44 Sunday, in between making a roux for my gumbo and painting my face black & gold, I will casually monitor the social media shout-outs from television. I’m not going to seek out, rather I’ll see what comes my way. The goal will be to keep my head in the game from Tad’s perspective. I want to see if I feel compelled to seek out social media in addition to traditional advertising. I think that will be the best approach to determine if social media marketing will make an impression on the average American.

Then next week, once all of the turf has settled, we’ll meet again to hash over the hashtags and follow up on the followers. I’ll bring my numbers, you can bring your comments and together we’ll see if social media made any impact on #SB44’s advertising prowess.

Oh, and #WHODAT!

Psych!

It isn't. In fact a little time spent defining your company's brand will lead to big time (and money) savings down the road. How so? Well, by distilling and formalizing your company's key traits, value propositions, personality and values, you take much of the guesswork out of communicating. That means that every time you sit down to craft an email, a press release, an ad headline or a major campaign, the hard work of deciding how to present your company has already been done.

Because let's face it, marketers burn hours — days even — trying to decide whether this or that message is too serious, too silly, too creative, too sappy, too young or too stodgy to represent their company. Good branding works by establishing a set of rules by which all your communicators (staff, firms and vendors) play. The result is better, clearer, more consistent and more effective communications — and a lot of dollars saved in meeting and creative time.

So in summary: why brand? Simply to ensure that you don't have to reinvent the wheel every time you set out to speak to your customers, stakeholders or employees. Try it, you'll like it.

We delivered one heck of a result with an online buy-one-get-one-free promotion we did for a major casual dining client last quarter. In just a few weeks’ time we increased their customer email list by 230%, their Facebook fan page following by 62%, their Twitter followers by 56%, and their online loyal customer database by 41%. It was the strongest period of the year for the client, with nearly twice as many online coupons being redeemed as conventional coupons from newspaper.

Just goes to show the power of digital marketing in our brave new marketing world. And you know who your best friend is when it comes to digital marketing, don’t you? Well…don’t you?

I don’t know about you, but I go to an awful lot of vendor presentations (media representatives, research companies, online service providers, application developers). Sitting through as many presentations as I do, I’ve come to see some commonalities among them. Namely:

• The presenter often knows nothing about our business needs coming in the door.
• The presenter frequently doesn’t understand that we work under a billable hour structure — and that taking 1.5 hours of 3 people's time costs us a lot of money.
• The presenter generally doesn’t leave anything useful behind.
• The powerpoint/keynote is rarely interesting (mostly, way too many bullet points).

This is not necessarily to fault these vendors (though I am). However going through the exercise of cataloging these failings has made me realize the extent to which most people take presentations for granted. It’s helped me improve my own presentation skills, and has helped underscore for me one of the key truths about the presentation: that it’s a precious opportunity, but one that’s almost always, unfortunately, wasted.

By doing our prospects the courtesy of getting down to business rather than simply taking up their time, we increase our own chances of success while at the same time repaying them for a gift they’ve generously given.

Stay tuned for more on this important subject!

On the twelfth day of Christmas my ad firm sent to me
Twelve buyers buying
Eleven planners planning
Ten artists drawing
Nine geeks-a-coding
Eight reps-a-pitching
Seven writers typing
Six partners meeting
Five banner ads
Four e-blasts
Three web sites
Two Facebook posts
And a well-written Twitter tweet

On the eleventh day of Christmas my ad firm sent to me
Eleven planners planning
Ten artists drawing
Nine geeks-a-coding
Eight reps-a-pitching
Seven writers typing
Six partners meeting
Five banner ads
Four e-blasts
Three web sites
Two Facebook posts
And a well-written Twitter tweet

On the tenth day of Christmas my ad firm sent to me
Ten artists drawing
Nine geeks-a-coding
Eight reps-a-pitching
Seven writers typing
Six partners meeting
Five banner ads
Four e-blasts
Three web sites
Two Facebook posts
And a well-written Twitter tweet

On the ninth day of Christmas my ad firm sent to me
Nine geeks-a-coding
Eight reps-a-pitching
Seven writers typing
Six partners meeting
Five banner ads
Four e-blasts
Three web sites
Two Facebook posts
And a well-written Twitter tweet

On the eighth day of Christmas my ad firm sent to me
Eight reps-a-pitching
Seven writers typing
Six partners meeting
Five banner ads
Four e-blasts
Three web sites
Two Facebook posts
And a well-written Twitter tweet