Marketing Failure... sorta?

Views: 1,152
Added: Thu. Oct 29, 2009 12:58am
Posted in: Other

• » print
• » report
• » email

I was on Facebook a short while ago, and one of the advertisements caught my eye. It wasn't the title, but a distorted figure that brought back memories of many laughs:

 

This ad bugged me: it is an imperfection. While the title read Inglorious Bastards, the image on the T-Shirt is 100% without a doubt Dark Helmet from the 1987 Mel Brooks movie Space Balls. 

So, as I laughed at the advertisement thinking about how the advertiser KosherHam developed a campaign neglecting the coloration between the text and image presented, I decided to click on the advertisement: Let's see what KosherHam has got.  I like both movies Spaceballs and Inglorious Bastards, let's take a peek.

Then a question hit me: Does KosherHam know I like both Spaceballs and Inglorious Bastards?  Technically: It is possible. Facebook is aware of my 'likes', including my favorite movies.

Think about it: You've provided Facebook plenty of information about yourself: the movies you like, how old you are, where you've gone to school... Every time you submit information or click 'like this/thumbs up', your feeding a knowledge base.  While that insignificant information may sit for a while, your information is valuable to someone. Such as someone wanting to sell ProductX to the Y age bracket whom like Z type of movies. The network you feed with information has the ability to create a marketing profile on you, and you can bet: will share or sell that information for the right dollar.

So now I'm semi-interested: What does this site have to offer me? I clicked on the multi-purpose ad expecting to see a Spaceball t-shirt, or a Inglorious Bastards t-shirt. When I landed on KosherHam.com, neither products nor anything I was directly interested in was immediately found.

Failure.

A note to the bacon master: If you're suggesting I buy ProductX and pay to have ProductX advertised and in my face: make sure ProductX if the FIRST thing I see when I click the advertisement.

I'm not suggesting you shouldn't display or suggest other products: Amazon was a pioneer in displaying other related items and purchased based around ProductX.  Nor am I neglecting the department store layout scheme: placing your sales items in the back of the store, requiring the purchaser to walk past all the other products before they get what they want. That doesn't work so well here, on the Internet.

I saw what I wanted: don't allow anything in my way between what I want and the finish line (the input of my credit card number).  However, if on the sidelines you have people cheering me on, extending their arms with water and Gatorade in their hands: I might grab it, picking up an additional item or two.

Also, I've already decided to leave the comfort zone of Facebook to check out ProductX: cheer me awn! Provide additional incentives such as "buy one, get one half off".

But back to my experience complaint: I expected to see Inglorious Bastards, Spaceballs or something related to Brooks and Tarantino. Nope, this was not the case.  What did I do? I got up from my computer, laughed and decided to make some food. While eating my food, I wrote this blog.


I leave you with a few resources.

1. The site I bashed has some cool t-shirts at good pricing. Check em out if you're in the mood for some unique isht: www.kosherham.com

2. This site is awesome: wefeelfine.org. Make sure to click "Open We Feel Fine", and when loaded dedicate at least three minutes exploring and learning this tool.  It scans blogs on the Internet and provides a graphical representation of human feelings, every two to three minutes. I like watching "Murmurs" (option available in the lower left corner after the app loads)