Printing Blog

The Perfect Mother’s Day Gift?

Newsweek has a discussion about a new book called “My Beautiful Mommy.”   Sounds like a wonderful gift for any mother.  It’s even being released on Mother’s Day.  Here’s the cutely drawn cover:

Too cute for words, huh?   There’s one small catch:  The book is all about the virtues of plastic surgery and is designed to help Mothers talk to their children about their cosmetic surgery and how the surgery is a good thing.

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Are Obnoxious Brand Names Good Marketing?

There is no such thing as bad publicity except your own obituary.
Brendan Behan

In the latest product name to cause me to question the wisdom of Mr. Behan’s quote, take a look at this article. The article concerns a product called Antipoleez, a picture of which is below:

According to the company website, the product “Eliminates Alcohol and Tobacco Breath.” The site even says that the product should be used when “You had a few drinks and don’t want others to know you did.”

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Does Your Slogan Help or Hurt Your Brand?

Since its inception, Google has used the corporate slogan “Don’t be Evil” as a representation of the company’s commitment to conduct itself in an ethical manner. As Google’s corporate investor site puts it:

Don’t be evil.” Googlers generally apply those words to how we serve our users. But “Don’t be evil” is much more than that. Yes, it’s about providing our users unbiased access to information, focusing on their needs and giving them the best products and services that we can. But it’s also about doing the right thing more generally – following the law, acting honorably and treating each other with respect.

As noble as the sentiment is, the problem with the slogan is that it makes it easy for detractors of Google to attack them.

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The Internet is a Passing Fad?

Found a funny link through Advertising Lab, a 1995 article from Newsweek wherein the author decided that the internet was nothing more than a passing fad. What’s very interesting about the article is this opening salvo:

But today, I’m uneasy about this most trendy and oversold community. Visionaries see a future of telecommuting workers, interactive libraries and multimedia classrooms. They speak of electronic town meetings and virtual communities. Commerce and business will shift from offices and malls to networks and modems. And the freedom of digital networks will make government more democratic.

Baloney.

The irony of this comment is that just over 10 years after this article, just about all of the things that the author of that article lists as “baloney” actually exist.

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Effective Postcard Marketing

We’ve discussed how to design postcards to create an impact on your potential customers. But once you’ve done that, what’s the next step? That answer is the subject of my latest article on Duct Tape Marketing covering how to conduct an effective postcard marketing campaign.

I think the most important point of the article is that the campaign is so much more than randomly mailing out postcards. You need to have not only well designed postcards, but you need to be ready to deal with what happens when the customers get those postcards.

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The Everywhere Girl and the Art of Stock Photographs

With the U-Printing International Poster Design Contest in full swing, I found myself thinking about exactly how omnipresent stock photographs have become. For those who do not know, a stock photograph is a photo taken and then licensed for advertisers to use in their advertisements. This line of thought was also prompted by stumbling across the story of Jennifer Anderson, the Everywhere Girl. For a point of reference, here is a picture of the Everywhere Girl:

So why is she the Everywhere Girl? Because pictures of Ms. Anderson from the same photo shoot for Gateway computers in 2004 have appeared hundreds of times for a wide variety of purposes.

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