by Jonathan Marshall

I will carry your lip balm. I will listen to your opinion of my friends. I will listen to your friends’ opinions of my friends. I will watch your vampire TV shows with you. And because I do this, I will drive the car I want to drive.

Women don’t buy Dodge Chargers, and whether you knew that or not, after watching this commercial, you quickly realize that international advertising agency Wieden and Kennedy had that in mind when they were deciding who to target in this ad.

The spot opens with the narrator listing things that men all over the world are “putting-up with” in relationships, while simultaneously showing images of annoyed and even angered men. Most of the things they list are both comical and currently relevant – watching “Vampire TV shows.”

By listing several things that countless frustrated men are “putting-up with,” the creative agency attempts to point out a situation that the Dodge brand has in common with the viewer- like they understand what they are going through… and they wanna help them stand up for themselves… “As a man, you’ve sacrificed a lot, but surely there is a limit to your chivalry.”

Judging from the 1,000,000+ views on YouTube, and the 1000s of comments that go with those views, not surprisingly most men love the commercial, and most women HATE IT. So, after all of that- does this ad work? It was targeted to men, and as a viral video, it got great feedback from that targeted audience… But will it SELL CHARGERS? What do you think?

By Les Kollegian

When I visited the approximate 480 employee staff of Weiden & Kennedy in Portland Oregon last year, I was beyond amazed and in awe of my surroundings there. I mean… they have stadium seating for their meetings. Really?!?! I have 11 people in my small Web design firm. All I could do was think of what their monthly overhead is and I needed aspirin before I left the building.

This Super Bowl commercial written by two talented dudes over there deserves a hand shake and maybe a golf clap. This video below shows the making (it’s 20 min…but totally worth it if you’re into this stuff) and the Director and Actor just did an amazing job. What’s real and what’s CGI? I never would have guessed. See below.

Except for this ONE time. Okay…I’m 40 now and I have a 6 year old son (Jacob Tyler). Anyway…I am constantly astounded by my sons inability to not be occupied by some form of electronic game (portable or other). Okay… so I get this email and I realize how true it is and I decide to share it with my friends and clients on my blog. Mistake? Maybe. But it’s so true and frankly I could probably add some notes that make it even funnier. For example… when they mention car seats… I remember I used to love how my dad would drive because it was a great game for me. I would FLY from one side of the back seat to the other when he made a fast turn. I could go on…but this new politically correct and safe world sometimes makes me laugh. One day I will make my son read this and understand how different he had it than me. See the email I was sent below:

if you are 30, or older, you might think this is hilarious!

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking twenty-five miles to school every morning…. Uphill… Barefoot… BOTH ways… yadda, yadda, yadda

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they’ve got it!

But now that I’m over the ripe old age of thirty, I can’t help but look around and notice the youth of today. You’ve got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia!
And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don’t know how good you’ve got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn’t have the Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the damn library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalog!!

There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter – with a pen! Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox, and it would take like a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents!

Child Protective Services didn’t care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our ass! Nowhere was safe!

There were no MP3’s or Napsters or iTunes! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the record store and shoplift it yourself!

Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio, and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and @#*% it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We’d play our favorite tape and “eject” it when finished, and then the tape would come undone rendering it useless. Cause, hey, that’s how we rolled, Baby! Dig?

We didn’t have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called, they got a busy signal, that’s it!

There weren’t any freakin’ cell phones either. If you left the house, you just didn’t make a damn call or receive one. You actually had to be out of touch with your “friends”. OH MY GOD !!! Think of the horror… not being in touch with someone 24/7!!! And then there’s TEXTING. Yeah, right. Please! You kids have no idea how annoying you are.

And we didn’t have fancy Caller ID either! When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your parents, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, the collection agent… you just didn’t know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn’t have any fancy PlayStation or Xbox video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like ‘Space Invaders’ and ‘Asteroids’. Your screen guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen… Forever! And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel!!! NO REMOTES!!! Oh, no, what’s the world coming to?!?!

There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I’m saying? We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rat-finks!

And we didn’t have microwaves. If we wanted to heat something up, we had to use the stove! Imagine that!

And our parents told us to stay outside and play… all day long. Oh, no, no electronics to soothe and comfort. And if you came back inside… you were doing chores!

And car seats – oh, please! Mom threw you in the back seat and you hung on. If you were luckily, you got the “safety arm” across the chest at the last moment if she had to stop suddenly, and if your head hit the dashboard, well that was your fault for calling “shot gun” in the first place!

See! That’s exactly what I’m talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You’re spoiled rotten! You guys wouldn’t have lasted five minutes back in 1980 or any time before!

by Les Kollegian

Chris Crum reported for Web Pro News that Google is finally getting the biggest missing piece in real-time search. At Jacob Tyler, we are doing our best daily to make our clients aware of the importance of Social Networking (Social Media) as a part of their marketing mix. This is even more proof that developing “Fan Pages” in Facebook wil increase the possibility of first page placement for your Web site or business organic search results as explained below.

Google announced via Twitter this week, that public status updates from Facebook are now included in the search engine’s real-time search feature. That means the largest social network in the world is getting play in Google’s real-time search alongside Twitter, MySpace, and others, and these real-time results are often featured prominently on the first page of search results for the hottest queries.

Apparently only updates from Facebook PAGES are indexed. This includes links, status updates, photos, videos shared by page owners (not comments made by the fans). Any Facebook update (from regular user profiles) can be shared publicly, so I wonder why these aren’t being pulled. Results from Twitter and other places aren’t only from branded sources.

This seems to indicate that brands should be getting a good amount of play for Facebook appearances in Google’s real-time search results, and possibly in the real-time search results in general (due to Facebook’s huge user-base). Right now, Facebook isn’t dominating the results, but that is bound to change with it being the largest (by far) social network on the web.