http://sevell.com/blog observations into human nature, modern life and marketing Thu, 12 Aug 2010 15:20:42 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en This morning I had the honor of being a panelist along with two other folks I respect: David Peters from Net Point Marketing and Brian Hoyt, Gahanna's Public Information Officer.  The discussion initially had the subject line "Secrets to ensure success with social media." I suggested that was a dumb theme ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=330 The more you learn about what happens to bottled water before it reaches you, and even more so, what happens to so many bottles after we're done with them, it makes you want to swear off bottled water. To see what the "cost" of bottled water is before it reaches you, ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=325 A Facebook group, currently with over 1 million members is "praying" for the death of President Obama. It includes anti-Obama imagery (uploaded by the group's members) that show the president against a communist flag, juxtaposed with insulting and derisive captions, or even a cartoon associating Obama to Hitler. Lots ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=315 I recently saw this ad from Discover Card, one of the major advertisers in, let's say, the country. Now, one would think they hired a marketing firm or ad agency to design this ad. And the best they can come up with was a FORTUNE COOKIE? Maybe I'm mistaken... perhaps they ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=286 Recently, we were in Albuquerque, New Mexico visiting friends. Ater a night of Margaritas at Sadie's, we passed by these billboards. Now we don't know if they were funnier then than they are now, but somehow they captivated us. Turns out the yoga board is for a burger joint that was ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=269 Captivating captive audiences around the luggage carousels at airports At airports around the world, dozens of companies are putting their messages in front of captive audiences as they wait for their luggage to arrive. Some are on the conveyor belt like the image above, and some are marketing messages that actually ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=259 Unless you’ve been living under a rock (which, by the way, is a very environmentally-friendly thing to do!), you may have noticed your target markets have been changing: from people concentrating on material stuff, to humans concerned about the world around them. True, every prospect still wants to know “what’s in ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=224 In our very first blog post (way back in October of 2008) we wrote about the problems with the proposed electric street cars in Columbus (Ohio). We ranted, and listed half a dozen reasons why it was a bad idea. Our suggestion was: since increasing ridership was critical, why not do ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=239 We never cease to be amazed at the wierd/bad advertising being done, even by major companies. Take, for example, this ad by Micheloeb. Not sure if you've ever known anyone who has ever said "Y'know, this gravity thing just isn't working for me. I really wish someone made a bottle that ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=209 Nineteen million trees are cut down each year to publish both the White and Yellow Pages phone books. As if that isn't bad enough, there's also a lot of energy used: 7.2 million barrels of oil and 3 billion kilowatt hours of consumption, as well as 268,000 cubic yards of ... http://sevell.com/blog/?p=141