Facebook is rolling out new changes in the next few months that will probably catch your eye. Seeing as “changes” in this case means much larger Sponsored Ads along the right-hand side of the page. But there will be fewer of them than before, the company says, so you can plan your celebrations of that fact accordingly. [More]
ADS
Up To 36% Of All Internet Ad Views Are Actually Bots
By 3.25.14
Websites sell a lot of ad space, but who’s looking at those advertisements? Well, the good news is that most of them are human. Most. A recent analysis shows that about 36% of Web pageviews are fake, generated by shady entities in Eastern Europe, not humans who might be interested in buying cars or makeup. The big companies that make the largest ad buys are not pleased. [More]
Chevrolet Commercial Makes Dog Lovers Sad, Doesn’t Sell Cars: Is It Real?
By 3.7.14
A new minute-and-a-half long commercial for Chevrolet grabs the viewer’s heart and stomps on it a few times with the story of a young woman and her childhood pet going through life together as best friends and making their final trip to the veterinarian. It’s a beautifully-made ad, currently going viral. But is it real? [More]
Old Spice Slips Phone Number Into Commercial…Where Callers Could Win Super Bowl Tickets
By 1.31.14
In a current ad for Old Spice shampoos, a man’s hair charms a female co-worker, and she writes down her phone number. One viewer of the ad noticed something strange about that number: it was toll-free. More importantly, why didn’t it use 555 for the first three digits like most fictional phone numbers do? There was only one thing to do: call the number and find out. [More]
New IKEA Online Ad Combines Redecorating With Epic War On Garden Gnomes
By 4.16.13
It’s spring in the Northern Hemisphere, which means that it’s time to rake your lawn and perhaps haul your grill and outdoor furniture out of storage. In a new IKEA ad airing in the United Kingdom, a family picks up some new furniture, and the local garden gnomes declare war. [More]
These Shoes Crush Hope For The Future Of Our Children Under Their Hidden, Bedazzled Heels
By 2.20.13
WARNING: If you want your hope for the future of our children to remain undimmed, you should probably stop reading this. Otherwise, the haunting jingle accompanying the commercial for “Daddy’s Money Secret Wedges” will stomp your vision of a world where everything isn’t focused on image, wealth and material goods into a dark, globby puddle of woe. [More]
What Is This “Football” You Speak Of? Survey Says 91% Of Consumers Excited For Super Bowl Ads
By 1.31.13
You’ve got your chicken wings ready, the remote has fresh batteries and the perfect spot is staked out on the couch. Does it even matter that there will be a football game airing during the Super Bowl, or are you just excited to see the ads? A new survey says 91% of consumers gearing up for the big day are also pumped about seeing the commercials. [More]
Ten Years Later, Maybe The ‘You’re Getting A Dell’ Dude Can Save Dell
By 1.24.13
Some of our younger readers may not recall the “Dude, you’re getting a Dell” television spots where an extremely knowledgeable college-aged guy intervenes during shopping trips to talk parents into buying Dell PCs for their kids. The spots ran from 2000 to 2003, and were pretty memorable. (Memorable enough that readers still refer to them, ten years on, when complaining to us about Dell.) As Dell’s sales and reputation have fallen, they’re considering going private, and even Microsoft might invest. But maybe there’s another solution to the company’s woe’s. Bring back the Dell Dude. [More]
How Many Poop-Like Objects Does This Toilet Commercial Need To Flush Before We Get The Idea Already?
By 12.11.12
How many different things can you flush down a toilet that sort of act and behave like feces in water, but are not, in fact, poop? That seemed to be the challenge set before the people in charge of creating this video to promote American Standard’s H2Option Siphonic Dual Flush Toilet. [More]
Facebook's New Mobile Ad Network Uses Your Data To Target You In Other Apps And Sites
By 9.19.12
Yesterday, Facebook announced that it’s new mobile ad network (the one that analysts are counting on to rescue the company’s stock price) would allow advertisers to pay to use your Facebook data to target you with ads outside the Facebook environment. So, for example, if you’ve authorized Facebook on an outside mobile website, you’ll begin to see ads targeted to your Facebook profile data. [More]
Man Who Drank Glass Of Fat Walks Off Can Of Soda
By 10.31.11
The same guy who drank a glass of fat to demonstrate the lard-inducing effects of soft drinks is back. This time he shows how long you have to walk to burn off the calories from a can of soda. It takes three miles! That’s the distance from Union Square to Brooklyn in New York. [More]
DirecTV DVR Makes Me Watch Ads… But Only For DirecTV
By 9.29.11
We always knew that the cable companies that rent us our DVRs would eventually find a way to let customers time-shift, but still us all to watch commercials. DirecTV subscriber Dan wonders whether he’s alone in being unable to use his 30-second skip button only on his satellite provider’s in-house ads. [More]
Skype Starts Running Ads, Says You Won't Notice
By 3.8.11
Looking to dial up another income stream, Skype plans to start running ads on its home tab, and promises they’ll be unobtrusive solicitations from the likes of Groupon, Visa and Universal Pictures. [More]
21 Super Bowl Ad Previews
By 2.4.11
For some (me), the best part of the show on Sunday will be the ads. But now I don’t even need to suffer through a sport that stole its name from an already established and much better game, which you know as soccer, because Adfreak has got the goods on the Super Bowl ad spots, with 21 teasers and full ads. Darth Volkswagen is already an early contender for best of the night, and first place in my heart: [More]
CBS Won't Air NFL Players Union Ad
By 2.3.11
The NFL Players Association tried to buy some airtime the day before the Super Bowl on CBS’s College Sports Network, but CBS is refusing to air their minute-long commercial. Intended to stir fans’ emotions before the impending owners’ lockout, the ad shows an empty stadium and asks the NFL to “let them play.” The union says CBS, which airs NFL games, is kowtowing to the will of the league. [More]
Nielsen Partners With Facebook, Other Websites To Measure Ad Views Online
By 9.28.10
If you don’t like the concept of having your online actions tracked for marketing purposes, you can add Nielsen to you list of sworn enemies. The audience measurement company is better known for its TV viewer ratings, but yesterday it announced a new partnership with websites like Facebook where it will access user info (age and gender only, it says) to collect aggregate data on ad views around the web. [More]
CAPTCHA Codes, Now With Ad Slogans
By 9.22.10
A company called Solve Media is rolling out a new CAPTCHA interface that requires you type in an ad slogan instead of a nonsense word, reports AdAge. Advertisers are looking for message comprehension,” says the company’s owner, “And you know what they say, ‘If you write something down, you remember it.'” And if you force a customer to repeat your slogan during an unrelated transaction, does he resent you for it? [More]
Summer's Eve To Ladies: If You Want A Raise, You'd Better Wash Your Hoo Hoo
By 8.30.10
Maybe you thought bizarre “fix your naughty bits!” ads for feminine hygiene only appeared back in your grandparents’ era, but no. This Summer’s Eve ad from Women’s Day magazine says that if you want a raise, one of the first things you can do is shower with “Summer’s Eve Feminine Wash,” although it might also be a good idea to bring some “cleansing cloths” with you “for a quick freshness pick-me-up” right before you ask the boss for more money. That’s all in tip #1; tip #7 says “Don’t let the conversation stray or get personal.” [More]
