Tag Archives: New York Times

Does ‘Handrew’ Cuomo Really Think His Ad Will Convince Us He’s Not a Creep?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, minding my own business and reading yesterday’s New York Times when I came across this story by Nicholas Fandos and Katie Glueck.

Cut off from power, longtime friends and a political platform, former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo has struggled for months to salvage a reputation that was all but destroyed when he resigned amid a slew of sexual harassment allegations.

On Monday, Mr. Cuomo tried a new approach: spending his way out of the political wilderness.

According to AdImpact, an ad tracking firm, Mr. Cuomo’s still-active campaign account began spending $369,000 to air a television advertisement across the state — a media blitz designed not to support or attack a political candidate or even to apologize to New Yorkers, but to brazenly recast himself as the victim of politically motivated “attacks.”

Really? He’s the victim? Whaddaya think, Doc – is this guy delusional or what?

– Litigious James

Dear Litigious,

Yeah, I’d put delusional pretty much at the top of my bingo card.

The Times piece says the 30-second spot “splices together recent news snippets in an attempt to misleadingly convince New Yorkers that the entire misconduct case assembled by the state attorney general, Letitia James, against Mr. Cuomo had crumbled since he left office in August.”

See for yourself.

Not surprisingly, Cuomo’s rehab effort has gone over like the metric system. A big  part of the backlash can be traced to one simple fact: The ad’s argument is dismissible out of hand, as multiple news organizations have noted.

Point #1: Far from clearing him, several prosecutors, while declining to bring criminal charges, found the allegations of Cuomo’s harassment and groping “credible.”

Point #2: The New York State Assembly, which conducted its own investigation, reported that “Former Governor Cuomo engaged in multiple instances of sexual harassment, including by creating a hostile work environment and engaging in sexual misconduct.” In fact,  the lawmakers were on the verge of impeaching Cuomo when he resigned.

As for the other parties involved in bringing the pain to Cuomo, we’ll let this statement by a spokeswoman for Attorney General Letitia James, who investigated the charges against Cuomo at his request, speak for them all.

“The only thing Andrew Cuomo has proven himself to be is a serial sexual harasser and a threat to women in the workplace — no TV ad can change that. “It’s shameful that after multiple investigations found Cuomo’s victims to be credible, he continues to attack their accounts rather than take responsibility for his own actions.”

Cuomo still has $16.4 million in his campaign war chest, but even that might not be enough to renovate his image, given a recent public opinion poll cited in the Times piece.

A Siena College poll released last week showed that 80 percent of registered voters think Mr. Cuomo was right to resign, and 58 percent believe the allegations that he sexually harassed multiple aides. Only 25 percent of voters said that he had been vindicated by the disclosures that Mr. Cuomo’s lawyers have used to try to undermine several of his accusers.

Eight in ten voters say “good riddance”? The Doc’s prescription is, find another line of work.

Are Peleton’s Wildly Expensive Newspaper Ads an Exercise in Futility?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, minding my own business and slogging through the Sunday New York Times (there really should be a federal subsidy for that, don’t you think?) when I came across this half-page ad.

That was followed by two more half-page Peloton ads and a full-page one – all in the Times A section, which on Sunday is the Ritz Carlton of advertising venues.

Here’s the thing, Doc: A woman I know – smart, well-read, beautiful – saw one of Peleton’s ads in the Times and this is all that registered with her.

Do Peloton’s ad people have any idea how real people see advertisements? I have my doubts.

– Peletone-Deaf?

Dear Peletone-Deaf,

For those of you keeping score at home, here are the other Peleton ads in Sunday’s Times.

A similar quartet of ads ran in Saturday’s Times and the Weekend Wall Street Journal.

As Phoebe Bain wrote in Marketing Brew earlier this month, “Between high supply and low customer acquisition, the brand’s marketing department is ‘under pressure to deliver,’ per Ad Age. Experts told the pub that fewer pricey campaigns and more investment in brand loyalists could be the company’s best plan of attack.”

Coincidentally, Monday’s Times featured an interview with new Peleton CEO Barry McCarthy – conducted by the paper’s DealBook macher Andrew Ross Sorkin and reporter Lauren Hirsch – in which McCarthy, the former chief financial officer of Spotify and Netflix, predictably came across as ten pounds of bravado in a five-pound bag.

As for the Peleton print ads, Peter Adams at Marketing Dive reported that “Peloton is pushing a new advertising campaign that includes testimonials from customers who were initially skeptical of the connected fitness brand but have since become loyal converts.”

Peloton’s latest ad campaign isn’t subtle. The marketer is throwing a spotlight on customers who have doubted it in the past but are now devoted to fitness regimens run through its connected bike and treadmill products. The implication is that Peloton will be able to weather its current headwinds based on its ability to foster long-term loyalty. Its services now wield about 6.6 million subscribers.

“This campaign is leading with the unvarnished voices of our members at a time of heightened skepticism because nothing is sharper than the truth,” said Dara Treseder, chief marketing officer of Peloton, in a press statement.

Those unvarnished voices, however, are not unanimous, as the Marketing Dive piece noted.

Posts on social media go deeper in profiling individual users who improved their lives thanks to Peloton. But digging into the comments reveals plenty of frustrated customers as well. Several Instagram users took the campaign as an opportunity to complain about no-show deliveries, issues with scheduling repairs on bikes and other technical issues — potential signs of the marketer’s broader operational issues.

Sounds like Peleton’s print campaign might turn out to be an overpriced coat rack.

Ride on . . .

How Many Full-Page Cartier Ads Does It Take to Buy the New York Times?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads.

There I was, minding my own business and working my way through the Sunday New York Times (there really should be a federal subsidy for that, don’t you think?) when I realized that the paper contained an inordinate number of full-page ads for Cartier, the posh jewelry store in the Big Town.

Not only was there a four-page Cartier wrapper around yesterday’s edition of the Times, there were also full-page Cartier ads on the back page of every section of the paper.

What’s going on here, Doc?

– Diamond Errings?

Dear Diamond,

You’re right – it was Cartier Blanche in yesterday’s Times. In addition to that four-page wrapper, the Grey Lady was bejeweled with at least, by the Doc’s count, nine full-page Cartier ads, not to mention this footer ad on Page One.

 

 

There was also this ad in the A section.

 

 

And this ad in the Sports section.

 

 

And this ad in the Business section.

 

 

And etc.

Cartier also annexed the Times website yesterday.

 

 

And don’t forget: A Cartier native ad is your most important accessory.

But wait – there’s more, via Andrew Salomon’s Twitter feed.

 

 

As our kissin’ cousins at Sneak Attack noted a few years ago, New York Times executive editor Dean Baquet is unconcerned about advertisers coopting editorial content.

[Baquet] said that nothing has changed with regard to the advertising division’s relations with the editorial operation, which has always made its own decisions about coverage.

The difference today, he said, is that questions about the appropriate line between business and editorial come up more often. “In the print era, you created something. It worked or didn’t work,” he said. “Now, we’re in an era where those conversations happen more frequently and we have to move faster.”

Translation: The traditional Chinese Wall that separated advertising and editorial has turned into the Berlin Wall – knocked down and sold off brick by brick.

What’s With All Those Trombones in the New York Times Full-Page Ads?

by doctorads

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

So there I was minding my own business and working my way through the Sunday New York Times (for which there should be some sort of federal subsidy, don’t you think?) when I came across this two-page ad in the A section.

 

As far as I can tell, that double-truck had to cost at least $300,000. So why would the Winter Garden Theatre spend that much money to advertise, kind of, nothing?

– Womp Womp

Dear Womp Womp,

The Doc gets it – who has time to chase down teaser ads in this day and age, amirite?

Actually, the Doc does, given the slow pace of letters pouring into the old mailbag.

So we checked with that bastion of Broadway, Playbill:

Two-time Tony, Grammy, and Emmy winner Hugh Jackman will make his highly anticipated return to Broadway as Professor Harold Hill in Meredith Willson’s beloved classic, The Music Man. Two-time Tony-winning superstar Sutton Foster will star as Marian Paroo. The production, directed by four-time Tony winner Jerry Zaks, with choreography by Tony winner Warren Carlyle, will begin performances on Dec. 20, 2021, and officially open on Feb. 10, 2022.

Wear a mask, yeah?

P.S. There are 76 trombones in the ad, for those of you keeping score at home.

Seriously, Is Tom Steyer Crazy? (Part 2)

by Campaign Outsider

[Dr. Aditor’s note: It  is beyond dispute that no one – including myself – has noticed my five-year absence from this space. Then again, I was supposed to do seven, so I’m actually back early. Anyway, I figured I’d just pick up where I left off. Yo.]

Well the Doc opened up the old mailbag upon his return to the dispensary and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, just minding my own business and reading the New York Times the other day when I came across this story.

A Billionaire Makes His Case: ‘I Don’t See Myself as Rich’

SAN FRANCISCO — Tom Steyer is a former hedge fund investor and a billionaire. Those things could be a liability for a man running for president as a progressive. But Mr. Steyer, who this month joined a field of — what is it now? — 24 people, argued this was a selling point.

“Now you know, I know everybody always describes me as being rich. That is not how I see myself,” he told an audience at a bookstore here Wednesday night. “But I can tell you this, the one thing it does give me is the right to say nobody owns me. I mean I will do exactly what I think is right.”

And all this time I thought a billion was real money. I must be wrong.

– Steymied

Dear Steymied,

Tommy-Come-Lately, who represents the ATM wing of the Democratic Party, is a leading figure in the All Those Dollars and No Sense set.

First he spends two years and $50 million on his money-pit Need to Impeach fantasy.

Now he’s saying he’ll spend $100 million on a vanity run for president and is already up on broadcast networks with spots like this one.

 

 

He doesn’t see himself as rich? He’ll be a lot less once this election cycle is over.

Yo.

Truth in Advertising? Really? What Are We, Oxymorons?

by Campaign Outsider

DrAdsforProfileWell the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

So there I was, minding my own business and reading the Sunday New York Times, when I came across this full-page ad from an outfit called – honest! – Truth in Advertising.

 

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Seriously? Truth in advertising? This has to be, like, Jimmy Fallon, right?

– David L

Dear DL,

First off, here’s the ad’s body copy for the body-copy impaired.

 

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Second off, here’s the Truth in Advertising website.

 

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And third off, here’s the Truth in Advertising Mission Statement.

 

Truth in Advertising, Inc. (TINA.org) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization based in Madison, CT, whose mission is to be the go-to online resource dedicated to empowering consumers to protect themselves and one another against false advertising and deceptive marketing. We aim to achieve our mission through investigative journalism, education, advocacy, and the promotion of truth in advertising.

 

Thus the name, the old Doc is guessing. Anyway, the group says it’s independently funded, accepts no advertising money, and got its grubstake from “Seedlings Foundation” (actually, Seedling Foundation, established by billionaire Karen Pritzker and her billionaire-by-attraction husband Michael Vlock), which “supports programs that nourish the physical and mental health of children and families, and fosters an educated and engaged citizenship.”

Got that? Now on to the good stuff, which, of course, always involves video.

 

 

Well, maybe not exactly good. But not exactly bad either.

The TINA campaign features that web video, along with print and digital ads in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, and etc.

According to Advertising Age, “[t]he group claims that in its first full year it sparked four legal actions, more than 200 ad alerts, more than 200 news articles and blog posts, reports on 232 false-advertising class actions and three petitions.”

Presumably, they’re telling the truth.

Yo.

 

Here’s Why Fr. Roy Bourgeois Ran That Boston Globe Ad

by Campaign Outsider

DrAdsforProfileSo the Doc asked the other day, Who Is Fr. Roy Bourgeois and Why Did He Run an Ad in the Boston Globe?

The ad (in part):

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And etc. (including a call for people to contact Pope Francis to “request that our Catholic Church ordain women, accept LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender) people as equals, and recognize gay marriage”).

As for our question, we answered the who in our original post.

And we can now answer the why, having just talked to Fr. Bourgeois on the phone. (Tip o’ the pixel to his editor, Margaret Knapke, who made the phone call happen.)

Why the Boston Globe?

“I just wanted to poke the beehive,” Fr. Bourgeois told the Doc, “and I have some friends there who wanted to contribute to a good cause.”

He has friends here because he attended seminary in Hingham and has given talks in this area numerous times.

The response has been good, Fr. Bourgeois says, and he has no intention of recanting his support for women’s ordination, even though it could return him to the priesthood.

“Asking me to do that would violate my conscience,” he says.

Fr. Bourgeois has himself contacted Pope Francis, but has yet to receive a reply. Meanwhile, he says, it’s “just a matter of time” until women (and other disenfranchised groups) are justified by the Catholic Church.

God bless him.

Yo.

 

Who Is Fr. Roy Bourgeois and Why Did He Run an Ad in the Boston Globe?

by Campaign Outsider

DrAdsforProfileWell the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

So I’m minding my own business reading the Boston Sunday Globe when I come across this ad on page A6. (Blurry visuals compliments of the Globe.)

 

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Really? Some Catholic priest in Columbus, GA has enough dough to buy a quarter-page ad in the Sunday (week’s most expensive) Globe? What’s the deal here, Doc?

– Cathaholic

Dear Cathaholic,

Excellent question.

First, some background.

From November, 2012 via Tom Roberts of the National Catholic Reporter:

Roy Bourgeois: They finally got him

Ah, they finally got him, as we all knew they probably would. Eventually. And with a press release it was done: Fr. Roy Bourgeois, a Maryknoll priest for 45 years, was told that the Vatican “dispenses” him “from his sacred bonds.”

And the Maryknoll Fathers and Brothers, caught in the culture that finds advocating for women’s ordination such a grievous and unpardonable offense, “warmly thanks” Roy “for his service to mission and all members wish him well in his personal life.”

And so it goes, as Vonnegut would say. So it goes.

Bourgeois’ case is a prime illustration of what, today, the institution can and can’t tolerate. Bourgeois’ major offense, the sin that is unforgiveable in the eyes of the church, for which penalty is removal from the order which he has served for nearly half a century and dismissal from the community, was advocating for women’s ordination.

And from a year ago, here’s the padre himself in a New York Times op-ed:

My Prayer: Let Women Be Priests

AFTER serving as a Roman Catholic priest for 40 years, I was expelled from the priesthood last November because of my public support for the ordination of women.

Catholic priests say that the call to be a priest comes from God. As a young priest, I began to ask myself and my fellow priests: “Who are we, as men, to say that our call from God is authentic, but God’s call to women is not?” Isn’t our all-powerful God, who created the cosmos, capable of empowering a woman to be a priest?

Let’s face it. The problem is not with God, but with an all-male clerical culture that views women as lesser than men. Though I am not optimistic, I pray that the newly elected Pope Francis will rethink this antiquated and unholy doctrine.

He’s also decided to pay, in the form of the Globe ad.

Why here? Why now?

The old Doc will try to find out. We didn’t find a way to contact him at his website, but we’ll track him down eventually and get back to you.

Yo.

 

What the-? National Enquirer Runs Full-Page Ad in New York Times!

by Campaign Outsider

DrAdsforProfileWell the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

There I was, minding my own business and reading Wednesday’s New York Times, when I came across this.

 

Screen Shot 2014-02-26 at 11.36.49 PM

 

So, wait a second: The National Enquirer has set up a foundation because they got a story wrong? Don’t they get all their stories wrong?

Whiskey tango foxtrot, yeah Doc?

– Elvis

Dear Elvis,

Hard to believe, isn’t it?

First off, let’s highlight the text for the tiny-type impaired.

 

Screen Shot 2014-02-26 at 11.37.40 PM

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Now the back story, compliments of Reuters media critic Jack Shafer.

Supermarket tabloid gets hoodwinked by imposter!!!

The National Enquirer got its nosey-parker proboscis bloodied this month after its big Philip Seymour Hoffman “scoop” was enquirer13-260x300promptly revealed to be a hoax.

Only three days after Hoffman died, the tabloid reported that playwright David Bar Katz — the friend who discovered Hoffman’s dead body — and Hoffman were lovers. It also alleged that Katz watched Hoffman freebase cocaine the evening before his death and had repeatedly witnessed his friend’s use of heroin.

The source for the Enquirer‘s piece? Katz himself, according to the tabloid. But when Katz immediately stepped forward, denied any such interview took place, denied being Hoffman’s lover, denied having watched him do cocaine or heroin, and sued the Enquirer for $50 million, the newspaper retracted the story and apologized. It has now settled with Katz and will fund a foundation that will make annual grants of $45,000 to unproduced playwrights to honor Hoffman. The Enquirer also took out a full-page ad in today’s New York Times to state that it had been fooled by an imposter who “falsely and convincingly claimed to be Mr. Katz.”

But that’s not all.

The Times not only ran the ad on Wednesday, it also ran this front-page piece:

Truth and a Prize Emerge From Lies About Hoffman

Herding his three younger sons out the door to school on Feb. 5, David Bar Katz was stopped for a moment by his eldest, who was browsing the Internet.26about-alt-tmagSF-v2

“My 14-year-old said, ‘Dad, there’s something online about you and Phil being lovers,’ ” Mr. Katz said. “I said, ‘Phil would get a kick out of that.’ ”

Phil was Philip Seymour Hoffman, the actor and Mr. Katz’s good friend, who had been found dead three days earlier, apparently from an overdose of heroin. Mr. Katz, a playwright, was one of two people who had gone to his apartment and discovered his body.

“Things had already achieved the maximum level of surreality, and I thought this thing online was a big nothing,” Mr. Katz said.

In fact, the article, published by The National Enquirer, was the first pebble of a landslide of malignant fiction that sprawled across the web.

And came to rest in a full-page Times ad.

Yo.

 

If Barbie Is So #Unapologetic, What’s with the NYT Ad?

by Campaign Outsider

DrAdsforProfileWell the Doc opened up the old mailbag today and here’s what poured out.

Dear Dr. Ads,

I’m a big fan of the annual Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition (hey – I read it for the articles), so imagine my surprise when Barbie® turned up as one of the Barbies featured in this year’s model.

Then I saw this full-page ad in the New York Times.

 

Screen Shot 2014-02-19 at 1.17.37 AM

 

What is this, Doc – some sorta Hall of Vanity Mirrors?

– Ken

Dear Ken,

That doesn’t capture the half of it.

This put-another-swimsuit-on-the-Barbie campaign is a masterstroke of marketing, generating media coverage from Trenton to Taipei.

Representative sample (via Yahoo! Shine):

Barbie Graces Cover of “Sports Illustrated,” Mom Wants Apology

In what can only be described as a bizarre marketing move, a bikini-clad Barbie is being featured on the wrap cover of the 2014 Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition, debuting this week. That’s right, unrealistic curves and all. For 50 years, the sports 470_2759313magazine has dedicated one cover a year to scantily clad ladies like Kate Upton and Brooklyn Decker, and for their 50th anniversary, they are paying tribute to a doll.

Really? Barbie on the wrap cover of what has become the “sexiest” magazine cover of the year? The unveiling of which is surrounded by as much pomp and circumstance as People’s“Sexiest Man of the Year” or Time’s “Person of the Year?” This is not only sexualizing a child’s doll, but making the ultimate unattainable body (that’s not even human) the epitome of female perfection. (Yes, I know it is the promotional wrap and not the actual cover but STILL!)

 

Seriously – angry Moms are gold to any marketer chasing the 18-49 demo, the population most coveted by advertisers.

Meanwhile, here’s what #Unapologetic gets you.

 

Screen Shot 2014-02-19 at 1.49.46 AM

 

And etc.

Yo.