Posted by truecreek on June 22, 2010 under Opinions. Everyone has them., research | 
There is so much research on this topic already and more seems to come out every day. There needs to be a greater focus on advertising to combat this horrible trend. It will have to be powerful stuff, like Marsteller’s “Crying Indian” that featured Native American actor, Iron Eyes Cody. It was one of the most successful campaigns of its kind, with some suggesting it reduced litter by almost 90% in 300 communities.
Now that’s how you do it.
By Mary Madden and Lee Rainie.
Adults are just as likely as teens to have texted while driving and are substantially more likely to have talked on the phone while driving.
In addition, 49% of adults say they have been passengers in a car when the driver was sending or reading text messages on their cell phone. Overall, 44% of adults say they have been passengers of drivers who used the cell phone in a way that put themselves or others in danger.
Beyond driving, some cell-toting pedestrians get so distracted while talking or texting that they have physically bumped into another person or an object.
These are some of the key findings from a new survey by The Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project:
- Nearly half (47%) of all texting adults say they have sent or read a text message while driving.
- Looking at the general population, this means that 27% of all American adults say they have sent or read text messages while driving. That compares with 26% of all American teens ages 16-17 who reported texting at the wheel in 2009.
- Three in four (75%) cell-owning adults say they have talked on a cell phone while driving. Half (52%) of cell-owning teens ages 16-17 reported talking on a cell phone while driving in the 2009 survey.
- Beyond driving, one in six (17%) cell-owning adults say they have physically bumped into another person or an object because they were distracted by talking or texting on their phone. That amounts to 14% of all American adults who have been so engrossed in talking, texting or otherwise using their cell phones that they bumped into something or someone.
More about Adults Text While Driving Too here.
Posted by truecreek on May 20, 2010 under Opinions. Everyone has them. |
By Joseph Young
They have been all over television over the past few years. You’ve seen them before. The beautifully art directed HD spots from BP. All those bright green and yellows flying around to that perfect music. It’s easy to find outstanding animated spots in just a few minutes on the web. And from what I have heard within the business, there were some spots produced recently that were in the $3 million per range. All of that backed up by a substantial national media buy.
All concepted and produced with one thought in mind: to position BP as a friendly, “we’re here with you” company that is working hard to make the world a much better place.
What a crock.
How long do you think it will be before the millions of dollars spent by BP to position themselves as the savior of our collective energy future just melts away?
When a brand screws us all like this, they become lepers. We cringe at the very thought of doing business with them. We now look at their brand as a ‘taker’, not a ‘giver.’ And in the case of BP, I suspect you will see a growing disdain for the company as the days wear on.
So I wonder when the first round of new TV spots will start up? It must suck for the agency that is responsible for producing what comes next from the company. If it were my shop, I would really have to do some soul searching before anyone spent another minute behind the lens on behalf of BP.
Posted by truecreek on January 12, 2010 under More Dam News |
By Julia Boorstin, CNBC Correspondent
The Super Bowl is now less than a month away, and it’s not just football fans who are getting geared up. Advertisers and media giants are carefully watching this year’s super bowl as a barometer of the health of the advertising economy.
First the bad news: the carefully watched cost of a 30-second spot is down this year. Advertisers are paying $2.5 million to $2.8 million, down from $3 million a year ago, according to a TNS Media Intelligence report issued today. This is only the second time in Super Bowl history that ad pricing has dropped from one year to the next.
Pepsi , the number two Super Bowl advertiser over the past two decades, will not buy a spot in the broadcast for the first time in 23 years. General Motors, which was a major advertiser for the event until it dropped out last year, will not advertise again this year. Ditto for Fed Ex, which last year sat out the event for the first time in 12 years.
The good news: CBS reports that it’s sold out nearly every one of its 62 available ads, which puts it in a stronger position than NBC was in at this point last year. Even though the price for a 30-second commercial is lower, the price of an ad has still more than quadrupled in the past 20 years. And while advertisers always drop out, newcomers always join, accounting for 20 to 25% of the advertisers.
The fact that nearly all of CBS’ ad inventory is sold a month before the event indicates that demand is coming back.
While the lower ad rate isn’t great, many of last year’s ads were sold before the financial crisis really took hold, so last year’s rates may not take into account the full decline before the 2009 Super Bowl. We’ll see how long it takes to sell the final few ads, and we’ll see if some new mega brands emerge to replace stalwarts like GM and Pepsi.
Posted by truecreek on December 30, 2009 under More Dam News |
By John Eggerton
For more than 60 years, TV stations have broadcast news, sports and entertainment for free and made their money by showing commercials. That might not work much longer.
The business model is unraveling at ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox and the local stations that carry the networks’ programming. Cable TV and the Web have fractured the audience for free TV and siphoned its ad dollars. The recession has squeezed advertising further, forcing broadcasters to accelerate their push for new revenue to pay for programming.
That will play out in living rooms across the country. The changes could mean higher cable or satellite TV bills, as the networks and local stations squeeze more fees from pay-TV providers such as Comcast and DirecTV for the right to show broadcast TV channels in their lineups.
The networks might even ditch free broadcast signals in the next few years. Instead, they could operate as cable channels — a move that could spell the end of free TV as Americans have known it since the 1940s.
“Good programming is expensive,” Rupert Murdoch, whose News Corp. owns Fox, told a shareholder meeting this fall. “It can no longer be supported solely by advertising revenues.”
More of ‘Business Model Unraveling for TV Networks’ here.
