the world's fastest edamame eater

Had sushi with Stefi today in Cambridge. Then wend CD shopping. Nice.
(tune: Quick Ate, Wynton Marsalis)

ATTENTION PLEASE, ATTENTION PLEASE!

"ATTENTION PLEASE, ATTENTION PLEASE! The fire alarm will be tested shortly. Do not evacuate. If this message or the subsequent fire alarm are not heard clearly, please report the situation to the help desk"

(AHAHA! this message is broadcasted, very loudly, every thursday at 11.40. I've heard it so many times already, but it still cracks me up)

Twickenham: one thing I love about this country

One of the things I enjoy the most about this country is rugby at Twickenham. It's my second time since I moved to England. I have to admit I don't yet appreciate all the subtleties of the game, but I love the experience. Twickenham is the temple of rugby, and there is something magic about going to an international sports event with an 80,000 crowd drinking and singing together, and even applauding the opponents when they manage a good play. Despite the appearances, Rugby is an incredibly civilized game and watching it live tells you a lot about this country. So far from the reality of live football in Europe!

consumer insight

I was trying to explain to someone at work today why spending money on market research to gather a consumer insight is something worth doing, but it's hard to explain in words. I guess this ad (a masterpiece, IMHO, although not exactly the latest) does a better job at it.

charities demand ban on baby milk ads - what's wrong with this country?

From BBC news:

"LONDON: Children's charities in the UK are demanding a ban on the advertising of all formula baby milk. They say such marketing is responsible for mothers giving up on breast feeding their infants before the recommended six months. " [...] "The NCT's Belinda Phipps compares the behaviour of baby milk manufacturers to that of tobacco companies in devising ways to circumnavigate restrictive advertising legislation"

I don't get it. why do people attribute so much importance to advertising? and why do they think that banning it will solve the problem?

(full article here)

Young idea about to take off. Quick!! shoot it down!

I have to admit I only discovered facebook a few weeks ago. Somewhat shameful for an alleged eMarketing expert, but I guess I never had time.

Anyways: one of the first things I thought when I first landed on the site was "what a great advertising platform this is". Advertising finally lands in the land of peer recommendation. A dream for advertisers (and for users too, IMHO).

Like always when you attempt something new however, there can be a few initial hiccups. You don't necessarily get it right the first time.

In this case, some unlucky media planner, having bought blind placements on facebook(*), ended up with their clients ads on a coulpe of undesirable pages displaying content from the BNP (an extreme right-wing political party). The media pore a few liters of petrol on the fire, and you end up with a ridiculous situation in which most major advertisers are pulling their ads from facebook tout-court, rather than addressign the problem more 'surgically'.

A new idea, which coudl have been really great if given time to develop, has probably been killed whilst still young. how sad!

--

(*) In simple terms, blind buy is pretty common in online advertising, although possibly not the most sophisticated buying models. You select a site or a network of sites that you deem are appropriate to place your ads on (because of affinity with your target audience, cost-effectiveness, etc) but you don't know exactly what the content of those sites will display at the moment your ads are live. By the way ... this doesn't happen only on facebook. A miriad of other sites sell ads based on the same principle, including the famous AdSense from big brother Google.

you have to love this

Now, perhaps this isn't the newest thing around, but I just downloaded the google maps application to my Nokia phone, and it is amazing! so easy to use, I guess I will never get lost again on my bike in the middle of the english countryside. Only I feel bad that my life is gradually being owned by big brother Google. Can someone please wake up and be as cool? (or maybe should I?)

schoolboy mistake!

Friday: I have a chat with eMarketing consultant about my internship project. Very smart guy. I take him trhough my (initial, draft, rough, early stage) strategy to get his input on what kind of marketing research he recommends we should undertake if we went in that direction. We have a plesant chat.

Monday: I arrive in the office. Consultant has recapped our conversation in a 2-pages-long email. He sent it to the whole brand team in 2 countries, agreeing on actions, next steps, the whole sheebang! One person in the group has then forwarded the 2 pager email to Big Lady at the international group (the guys with the money), with a further page of comments and further actions agreed.

My draft strategy is no longer draft!!!! BUGGER!

Saturday morning: All looking good

Came back last night from B to spend the weekend at home, after a busy exciting week spent battling for my internship project.
It's finally sunny in England too and we received great news last night from Stefi's side of things: after a few pretty rough months it looks like next year will be great!
Seems like all there is left to do, at least for a while, is lay in the sun and enjoy :)

This one is going to kill me

I just signed up to the Oxford to Cambridge bike ride on sept 30th. 89miles = 143.2km. AHAHAHAHA I will never make it! The ride is organised by the British Heart Fundation. If you want to sponsor them you can do it here https://www.bhf.org.uk/my_sponsorship_page.aspx?p=86513