Why I want to be a Mad Man

It's the first question in every interview I've ever had:

"So, why do you want to work in advertising?"

I can see how people stumble over this if they've never heard it before. It could easily be one of those "Uhh...wow I never thought about it before" situations. I do know the answer, however.

I want to work in advertising because I believe in advertising.

That's the silly, long-story-short answer. What I mean by that:

You don't have to know me for more than 5 minutes to know I'm nuts about sports. A professor once told me, "I don't know how you have room in your brain for all that extra information," referring to my sports knowledge. I'm a rabid and oft disappointed fan of Buffalo and Syracuse sports.

Celebrating mediocrity at the Pro Football Hall of Fame

What you may not know is that my first love was basketball. Strange because I didn't grow up with a team - Buffalo hasn't had one since 1978. I adopted the Chicago Bulls partially because they were really, really good, but also because the only player I knew anything about was His Airness, Michael Jordan.

I first learned who MJ was through a certain commercial you may remember:



Sorry if it's stuck in your head now.

I was mesmerized. I wanted to be like Mike. And so I drank Gatorade, I asked mom for Nike sneakers and Hanes underwear, and yes, I watched Space Jam about 126 times.

It wasn't until later that I realized that this thing that I cared so deeply about was all because of advertising. Sure, I was affected in a very specific way, but it dawned on me that advertising can have a profound effect on anyone. When done correctly (and honestly), it really works.

The industry is absolutely fascinating. It's not because it's paid communication to convince consumers of blah blah blah, or whatever the textbook definition is. It's because advertising at its core is the perfect blend of art and science which can show any person a slightly better way of life. It manages to solve the problems of consumers and of companies and brands at the same time, often in a captivating way.

And it's the only thing I can imagine myself doing for a living.

And for the record: I got into advertising long before I got into watching Mad Men - that isn't the case for everyone. But since you asked, I see myself more as a Ken Cosgrove than a Pete Campbell.

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A day later: abbreviated thoughts on the Super Bowl ads

I wanted to wait a while to write my review of last night's ads. Last year I did a diatribe on the ten commandments of Super Bowl ads - this year I figured I'd try to boil it down a little bit. I only have one commandment this time around, actually. Following will be my personal list of winners and losers and the ad agencies responsible, based on a variety of factors but mostly on:


11. Thou shalt get thine money's worth.

These spots cost about $100,000 per second (considering there were some 15 seconds and some 60). Great creative is a must. The ads don't just cost so much because you get 111,000,000 sets of eyeballs (a CPM of just $27!) - you have the only audience of the entire year that is captivated by commercials and is waiting eagerly for each one.

That means that you can't screw it up. Do something people will remember beyond the water cooler the next day. A chuckle from a slapstick joke is great until you get one-upped by Pepsi Max in the same commercial break. Then, all you've done is helped the ad guys at your agency pay their mortgages (or student loans) off.

Memorable doesn't always mean funny. A lot of times it does for the 1 or 2 funniest spots, but it doesn't work for everyone. Do something culturally relevant, cute, or God forbid controversial.

My winners and losers are based on this new addition to my commandments:
(Instead of linking to all the videos, here's one link to all of them.)



WINNERS:
 
Chrysler (Wieden + Kennedy)
Questioned it when it happened, but looking back it was extremely memorable and managed to "turn Detroit into a product benefit," according to Ed Russell. And it made Eminem look kinda classy. Love to see the American automakers put their game faces on.

Volkswagen (Deutsch)
Also one I questioned. Releasing the spots before the game was very bold. What it did was make the 12 million people who say it before the game say "EVERYONE SHUT UP THIS IS THE CUTE ONE!" Great move, also didn't require slapstick comedy. I actually thought the Beetle spot was better than Vader since it had something to do with the product. And they didn't have to pay George Lucas piles of money for that one.

Bridgestone (The Richards Group)
Anyone that didn't think "Reply All" was the funniest ad of the night has never sent an email. Limited product relevance loses some points, but the funniest spot has to make this list.

NFL (GREY)

They had the best possible value the could have gotten. They are guaranteed a certain number of ads during every broadcast, meaning aside from being a huge cash cow the spot they ran with the television characters more than likely didn't cost them a penny. In my circle (one that enjoys TV and football both very much) the NFL's spot was the best of the night. Cartman running in the final scene is gold.


Groupon (Crispin Porter + Bogusky)

WHAT?!? BUT THEY MADE FUN OF TIBET! I'M SO ANGRY I'LL NEVER GO ON THEIR WEBSITE...THINGY. Offensive or not, you're not going to forget Groupon's ads. They're extremely tongue-in-cheek as is (see my post here for more thoughts), so it wasn't out of character creative. And immediately after, half of Twitter was running around screaming with their heads cut off. One of the least known companies is now the most talked about. I'd call that pretty good value.


The creative advertising industry
The most heavily crowdsourced Super Bowl ever produced some stinkers. Pepsi Max and Doritos were mostly slapstick and predictable. Consider that thousands of entries were sifted through to get to these and all of a sudden it looks like crowdsourcing isn't worth the trouble. Crash the Super Bowl failed to crash the party for ad execs and creatives alike.


LOSERS:
 
Motorola
I love the ad. An obvious jab at Apple's 1984 (the "clones" are totally different now. very clever). Except it wasn't obvious to most people. A scant percentage of those watching know advertising history and recognize Apple stereotypes. Based on empirical evidence, may people "just didn't get it"

Salesforce.com (no agency - CEO Marc Benioff talks about it here)
Filed under "why are you advertising here?"

Stella Artois (Mother)
Filed under "managed to be bizarre and yet also totally boring"

Go Daddy (no agency - thank God)
Yes, more people want to create websites now, so it makes more sense than them advertising 5 years ago. But we're also smart enough to know that there's isn't any sultry unrated content online. And if there was, Joan Rivers wouldn't make me want to check it out.


Living Social (The Martin Agency)
Groupon's primary rival. Did you remember they had a spot? It wasn't controversial, so that's why you don't. That flushing sound you hear is the first $3,000,000 Living Social ever made.