Sleazy, Stupid Advertising!

[abliviax]

I've seen some really rotten advertising.  I'll just start with a few awful recent examples.

"Your house is not a home until it has Xfinity" - Comcast


Wow.  Never owned a TV, and very glad.  This is so wrong on a couple of levels ...

[Local Autoshop:] Spend freely on your most improtant investment: you car.  (Mis-spelling is real).

Uh yeah.


Any marketers in the MMM crowd?

[PGH]

Oh yes. I'm a marketer by trade (for the last, oh, 25 years or so), but an anti-consumerist by habit. Trust me, the discordance is getting worse by the day!

Truly, that's one of the worst examples of local marketing I've seen. Is there not a single person at that business who knows how to spell?

[abliviax]

Sorry PGH.  I love to hate on you guys :) 

Would love to hear some others.

[Bakari]

I initially shared these here on the forum, before deciding to make it its own blog post (which includes pictures):

http://biodieselhauling.blogspot.com/2012/09/advertisements-that-only-work-due-to.html

[MgoSam]

To be fair to the automechanics, they didn't necessarily need to go to high school or college, but instead a trade school. So while their spelling isn't acceptable, their work may be.

[exranger06]

The worst one I've seen recently was one of those "Truth" (anti-smoking) commercials. The one where....well, instead of trying to explain it, I'll just link to it. It's this one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jcyBkylYnqU

It's the most non-sensical, stupid commerical I've seen (recently). Hey, stupid Truth people: Just because urea is in cat pee, it doesn't mean that urea IS cat pee! Likewise, methane is found in many other things, not just dog poop. Hey, you know what else is found in both cat pee AND dog poop? Water! Eeewwww! So, if I follow Truth's logic, since water is found in cat pee and dog poop.....then water IS cat pee! And water is also dog poop! So gross, I'm never drinking water again!

[brewer12345]

So gross, I'm never drinking water again!

Good choice: bourbon is so much better.

[brighteye]

Print campagne from a bank for personal credits/loans. It says "Can I afford a new handbag?"
The line in yellow says "There is always a solution." Credit-now

Yeah, right. You should definitely get a loan to buy that $2000 Louis Vuitton or whatever It-Bag...
Highly questionable advertising, to say the least.

[Bakari]

That ad reminds me of something else I've been noticing recently.

What is up with EVERY SINGLE PRODUCT being advertised with a picture of some random person's face, and nothing else?

If its for a face cleanser, sure.  A car rental ad?  A bank?  A supermarket?  Computer software?  It makes no sense!
Yeah, we know - customers and employees are people, not robots or plants.  Why would looking at some random person make me any more or less likely to want to buy your product?

[Jamesqf]

The line in yellow says "There is always a solution." Credit-now

And why would a Swiss bank/credit company name its web site in English, while doing an ad in German?

[Undecided]

The line in yellow says "There is always a solution." Credit-now

And why would a Swiss bank/credit company name its web site in English, while doing an ad in German?

If I wanted to put up one domain name for an audience in a country with four official languages, I might pick English, too.

[Kamikaze Emu]

I love how everything is pitched as an investment, and it is the dream you've always wanted.

It might be a new to market product in existence for 3 months but it is 'what you've always wanted', so you might as well 'make an investment' and pick one up. 

I am so glad I don't have television so I skip out on a ton of this kind of thing. 

[Christof]

And why would a Swiss bank/credit company name its web site in English, while doing an ad in German?

You would be surprised by the amount of English and pseudo-English in German speaking countries...

[ozzage]

The line in yellow says "There is always a solution." Credit-now

And why would a Swiss bank/credit company name its web site in English, while doing an ad in German?

Because English is international and "cool"

[stevesteve]

I'm a hard hard worker everyday
I'm a hard hard worker and I'm workin' everyday
I'm a hard hard worker and I'm savin' all my pay
If I ever get some money for the wait
I'm going to take it all out and celebrate
I'm a hard hard worker everyday

I was at my parent's house when I saw an American Express commercial 'celebrating small business'.  The song in the background had those great lyrics above.  I didn't really know if it was subliminal marketing by American Express or what but I was a bit amused... and a bit disgusted.