Category: Bad Advertising

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Bad Advertising

Bad Advertising – Zappos

In my occasional Bad Advertising series here on TrafficAndConversion.com, I write about advertising and marketing that strikes me as misguided, wasteful, or just plain wrong.

In the past, I’ve railed against a local shopping mall store which totally mis-spent its advertising. That beauty shop, which had advertising posted in the men’s room at the mall, among other places, is now gone.

I’ve written about Ford’s "Drive One" campaign — not because of the slogan, but because they are committed to the campaign for 5 years because they wouldn’t be able to measure results any quicker. Ford, along with the other big US Automakers, is now begging Washington for a bailout.

Today’s message is not about a company that’s destined to fail…it’s about a company that is doing very well, but just missing a valuable opportunity to sell into a very active, and mostly affluent crowd.

I recently flew to Malaysia and Singapore to speak at Simon Leung and Stuart Tan’s "The Smart Seminar" events. Asia was an amazing experience — and a place I never thought I’d have occasion to visit.

At Los Angeles International Airport, I was in line at the security checkpoint when I saw the trays where you have to unload all of your personal belongings — wallet, keys, cell phone, laptop, coat, shoes…and once again saw something that I’ve always thought was a missed opportunity.

Take a look at the photo.

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Bad Advertising Traffic & Conversion

Offensive Marketing

I was at a Dan Kennedy seminar last week in Anaheim…and he talked about how you gotta polarize your audience…something I’ve known for a while and talk about frequently.

Your job as a marketer is to make your customers KNOW that you are talking to THEM….and make those you are NOT talking to know that too.

You’ll only know that your marketing is effective when your non-prospects begin to COMPLAIN … loudly. Dan said that he only knew that a client was on the right track when one of his prospects called the police. Great story.

And Dan was giddy to tell it.

This all came to life for me when — the day after that Dan Kennedy seminar

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Bad Advertising Traffic & Conversion

Bad Advertising – Ford Needs to “Learn One”

I think you might want to sell your Ford stock, if you have any, and if selling the stock results in anything more than pocket change (last trade was at $7.09).

Here's why.Ford - Drive One

One of the things I talk about is the general ineffectiveness of unmeasured, broad-market advertising as compared to the measured performance you can get from Direct Response.

Okay, not all ads have to be direct response.

Oh wait a minute…YES THEY DO!

Because when you give someone a very motivating reason to take a specific and identifiable action — RIGHT NOW — you know exactly how effective your advertising is.

And you know that if you spend a dollar, and you're making two (or ten), that you can continue to spend more dollars. But if you make only 50 cents, you stop.

Simple logic, right?

SO WHAT'S UP WITH FORD?

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Bad Advertising Traffic & Conversion

More Bad Advertising – Keyes Motors

Do you know what the single biggest problem is with almost all the marketing that I review, critique, and come across?

It’s that marketers often think that their prospects will connect the dots, or fill in the gaps at the places where their advertisements are not 100% clear.

It’s when marketers create their ads without their prospects in mind.

Here’s what I mean.

It’s an extremely self centered and egotistical approach to think that ANYONE will take even an extra millisecond to try and figure out what you’re trying to say in your ads.

Nobody cares about what YOU’VE got to say unless it benefits THEM.

If every word doesn’t appeal to your prospect’s innermost desires, if your copy doesn’t flow smoothly into the conversation already going on in your prospect’s mind, then

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Bad Advertising Traffic & Conversion

Bad Advertising – Ziba, What Were You Thinking? Part IV

Every day your mind is cluttered with thousands of marketing messages.

Unfortunately, most of these messages are garbled, confusing, and downright annoying.

And some of this advertising is SO bad that it becomes instructive to share with you… as an example of what NOT to do.

A few weeks ago I was at my local upscale mall when I witnessed a marketing campaign from a company called Ziba that simply had to be shared.

After seeing 3 examples of how off kilter their advertising was, I just had to check out the store to see

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Bad Advertising Traffic & Conversion

Bad Advertising – Ziba, What Were You Thinking? Part III

Have you ever been walking around, seen an advertisement or marketing piece, and thought, "Wow, what the heck were they thinking?"

Unfortunately this kind of thing happens to me all the time.

And sometimes, the advertising is SO bad that it becomes instructive to share the experience with you — as a model of how NOT to create your marketing campaigns.

This is the purpose of the Bad Advertising series. Let’s pick up where we left off.

If you remember, I was at my local upscale mall a few weeks ago when I was assaulted from all sides by the advertising of a company called Ziba.

(Read Parts I and II for the full story)

And just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse…

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Bad Advertising Traffic & Conversion

Bad Advertising – Ziba What Were You Thinking? Part II

Bad advertising is everywhere. And offline advertising is just as bad, if not worse, than online advertising. Luckily, both can be learned from.

And some advertising that I see is so bafflingly bad that it actually becomes instructive to show it to you —  as an example of what NOT to do.

This is the purpose of the Bad Advertising series. Let’s pick up where we left off.

If you remember I was eating lunch at my local, upscale mall a few weeks ago, when

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Bad Advertising Traffic & Conversion

Bad Advertising – Ziba, What Were You Thinking?

If you’re like me you look for marketing lessons — both good and bad — wherever you go.

Sometimes I see marketing that is so bad, that sharing them with you would be instructive… because you’ll clearly see how NOT to build your marketing campaigns, whether online or offline.

So I am introducing a new series that I will simply call Bad Advertising. And I already have our first case study.

And over the next few days we’re going to break down and reveal the pitfalls that this Bad Advertising case study has fallen into, and how you can avoid them.

That being said, let’s start with a brief re-introduction to our style of marketing.

As online direct response marketers we are

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