Advertising F*** Up of the Year #6

I was originally going to do these once a month, until they came flooding in so thick and fast that they just demand being published. For today’s it’s All Hail the Mighty Target, (Australian branch), who, in an interesting wrinkle on recent controversies, (forgive the pun), are here found guilty of not air-brushing their models [...]

Advertising F*** Up of the Year #5 – and do you want fries with that?

OK, over here at Planet Wellthisiswhatithink we know how much you’re enjoying these occasional wading around in the deepest dankest end of the advertising gene pool moments – as they are consistently the most popular posts we, er, post* – so here’s another. (*Except for the story we ran about Adam and Eve not being [...]

Over-regulated America: long overdue a change

  I often argue with my American friends that their country shows just as many signs of being a nanny state as anywhere else, and that they should push back. But with forelock-tugging regularity they refuse to believe me. Well now this excellent article from the Economist says I’m right – following research, would you [...]

Good Things I Have Stolen, Number One

  As I roam around the internet on a daily basis, I am often finding little aphorisms or snippets of advice – or commentary on the state of the world – that I really find thought-provoking and even, sometimes, useful. Or people send them to me, obviously caring for my personal or business health. And [...]

4G or not 4G? That is the question for Apple’s new iPad

As previously flagged in this blog, the new Apple iPad does NOT – currently – hook up with Telstra’s 4G in Australia (or Europe, or Asia) – although it hooks up to 4G standards in the USA and Canada. This Age article and video interview does an excellent job of explaining the issue and why [...]

The importance of just a little sp ace

As I keep telling people, little matters like sentence construction, correct punctuation and carefully laid out type – or handwriting – really do make all the difference. Oh, dear. Oh dearie, dearie me. But you tell the young ‘uns nowadays, and they won’t believe you. *sighs heavily* (Thanks Reuben)  

This is great advertising – and this is how it’s done

So, dear reader, I was meandering through a very funny blog on vegetarianism – I recommend it, by the way – and I came across this ad for a restaurant. Ten seconds on Google and it turns out it’s in Minneapolis. Their website is here: jdhoyts.com. I have no idea if they’re any good, but [...]

New Apple iPad: everything you need to know, as far as we know now

Apple gave the new iPad a bunch of new features but no new name. When it goes on sale next week in the U.S. and several other countries, it will be “the iPad” or perhaps “the new iPad” but not “iPad 3″ or “iPad HD,” as some had speculated. The lack of a new name [...]

Useful article on saving smartphone battery life

No matter what smartphone you have, it can serve as your MP3 player, digital camera, gaming system, and even your TV while you’re out and about — as long as you have battery power! If it seems like smarter phones are getting less life out of their batteries – and it is the commonest complaint [...]

How to save eight million bucks by spending twenty

A toothpaste factory had a problem: they sometimes shipped empty boxes, without the tube inside. This was because of the way the production line was set up, and people with experience in designing production lines will tell you how difficultit is to have everything happen with timings so precise that every single unit coming out [...]

Kevin Rudd has his Lee Iacocca moment

Lido Anthony “Lee” Iacocca was famously head of both Ford and then Chrysler after he was fired by Henry Ford II – grandson of the founder of the company – despite being probably the most successful Ford executive of all time – with the simple words “I just don’t like you.” At the time, the [...]

New blog deserves our support

I was contacted by Mark Tipping to alert me to the arrival of his brand new blog (and related business) which is called, brilliantly, “The Tipping Point“. http://www.thetippingpoint.me. If the rest of the blog is as good as its name, we’re in for a treat! Having read his first couple of articles, it sounds to [...]

Great article on … er, cufflinks. (Yup, you read that right.)

Ok: admittedly it’s written by my wife, but I really do think this little article is fascinating, especially the way the word cuff has transmogrified itself as a word and spread into different phrases. http://imaketheglass.wordpress.com/2011/09/04/cufflinks-cuff-links-where-did-it-all-begin/ I can also heartily recommend Jenie’s cufflinks, as every pair is hand-made, unique and guaranteed to be passed down from [...]

Further comment superfluous

Onya, Sigmund.

The viral/social media trainwreck that is Qantas gathers pace

Loads of people enjoyed my blog on the lunatic Qantas twitter campaign that caused the benighted Australian airline so much public embarrassment. Now, as further evidence of the reach of social media, a New Zealander tells me via a University alumni website in the UK, about this genuinely brilliantly written and laugh out loud funny [...]

Online retailing continues to explode

Stick “Going Mobile” by The Who on (Who’s Next was the album, if I recall correctly) and read this very helpful and interesting review of the efforts major search engines and online shopping providers are making for the continuing explosion in online retailing. http://techcrunch.com/2011/11/13/how-google-ebay-and-paypal-are-gearing-up-for-a-very-mobile-holiday-shopping-season/ Now if I could just read what’s on my iPhone screen, [...]

Making a complete hash of social media

Hilarious story from the blind ivory tower that is Qantas, currently deeply mired in consumer scepticism and industrial relations issues following their recent grounding by Qantas management and lockout of their staff. Click below to see just how badly wrong a Twitter campaign can go when it is launched at the wrong time, dropped into [...]

The best car ad I’ve seen in years

Memo to all American and Australian car manufacturers and their ad agencies: THIS is how to advertise cars and be liked and remembered. Totally relevant to the Hyundai positioning “The Smarter Choice”, brave, hilarious, cute, likeable. Bravo.

Maximise your influence by crafting better headlines

Fellow blogger “Leadership Freak” (aka Dan Rockwell) lists the “Top 25 ways To Win Arguments”, here: http://leadershipfreak.wordpress.com/2011/06/30/the-top-25-ways-to-win-arguments/ But I must confess I got a bit lost immediately when #1 was listed as: Don’t focus on winning or losing; focus on achieving objectives. But haven’t you just told me in your headline that this is all [...]

I know what will happen with the housing market

And there we have it. One outrageous claim in the headline and suddenly my blog hits go up from a hundred or so a day to un-countable thousands or more. Only “New Paris Hilton Tape Surfaces” would get me more hits, I reckon. Or maybe not; she is 30 now, when all’s said and done. [...]