Blogs
Going Sloley
A blog from the Waterfront's Chris Sloley
"Foot on the Commercial Breaks"
- 04 May 2007 18:00
It's sunny outside, so being naturally anaemic I chose today to really get stuck into my dissertation. Properly stuck in - Wellington boot in mud stuck in - now that is proper stuck in. Then I read about this phenomenon: Word-of-Mouth advertising. Suddenly, disser-what?
Apparently, the latest craze (well, it's being going on for donkeys' days) is to have a seeming stranger accost you in a club/coffee/lavatory/adult book shop and attempt to name drop a certain product. Not happy with blitzing our eyes, ears and other senses with ads on buses, written in the sky, TV and for an eternity in between programmes before we return to the 'sponsored-by' tag of your favourite show they now want to get you when you're off guard. You know having fun. Avoiding adverts.
Advertising author Tom Himpe (which is anagram for 'Me Too Hip' if you ignore and change the letters), claims that kids are well up for it because of some bollocks about the young having a blurred line about selling-out. Try telling that to the army of people willing to shout it about any band that gets on Radio One. But then he did come across as your typical 'down-with-the-kids-probably-rides-a-scooter' sort of twat.
Fear of the costly affects of cynicism and neglected ads has called for this change. Apparently it is all above board, and the 'agents' (its not the fucking Matrix) have to announce what they are before they proceed - sort of like how you have to invite a vampire in before he can bite you. They will then proceed like a normal conversation while name dropping and hope that they leave you with the impression "well I was quite happy having a coffee but I could really use some Toilet Duck now". Or at least that's how I think it will work.
Bollocks, does that mean next time I'm sat minding my own - using a biro to add immature captions to pictures in 'The Sun' - and I think someone is trying to chat me up they'll actually be trying to sell me Daz? Doesn't bare thinking about. Back to the dissertation.
Chris Sloley