First there was the Super Bowl slam, where drivers of Chevy Silverado trucks lament the loss of their buddy Dave, who doesn't survive an apocalypse because he drove a Ford. Now Chrysler runs a national spot from Doner that poses the question: What if you were to take away horsepower, torque and warranty coverage from a Ram? "Well," says the grizzled voice-over, "you'd end up with a Ford F-150." A dogfight has raged for decades in the truck category, where sniping at the competition has been a puerile pastime. But the jabs seem to be coming faster and harder of late, as rivals
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It's the winter that never came. Across most of the country, a lack of snow and frigid air has left marketers in the lurch. Winter boots and snow shovels are languishing on store shelves while a brisk business is done in live plants and lightweight jackets. It was the fourth-warmest December-through-January period on record, with snowfall 91% below normal last month. "It's been an amazing winter, with virtually no snow," said Paul Walsh, VP-weather analytics at The Weather Channel. "That follows last year's winter, when we had some areas that had the coldest winter in 100 years. There are big implications from
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Most marketers would love to be McDonald's. It's the world's largest fast feeder by sales. Global same-store sales rose 5.6% last year over 2010 -- its eighth consecutive year of positive same-store sales. It's rated the world's No. 6 brand by Interbrand, with a value of $35.6 billion. It's the 26th-largest advertiser in the country, with a budget of nearly $888 million for U.S. measured media, according to Kantar Media. Indeed, the GoldenArches are a global beacon of success, and the company's 33,000-plus locations in 119 countries serve 68 million people a day. But something strange is happening on McDonald's soaring arches: Its
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Twitter is expanding its self-service advertising platform to include more U.S. small businesses through an exclusive deal with American Express. The new ad program, set to launch at the end of March, will be the latest step by the San Francisco micro-blogging service to broaden its base of advertising revenue. Twitter has set up this website inviting American Express card holders and merchants to register for the program. Companies that jump on it early could get a bonus. The site invites small businesses "to try our new advertising solution for small businesses. American Express will give $100 in free Twitter advertising to the
Read More(Reuters) - Living in the world of social networking and mobile smartphones means trading away some of your personal information. But assessing the price of admission to join the super-networked, digital class is not so simple; even experts on the issue admit that they don't have a full picture of the way personal information is collected and used on the Internet. But here are some basic guidelines to keep in mind. Q. What information do you have to give up to participate in social media? A. Social networks such as Facebook and Google+ require at a minimum that you provide them with your
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In poll after poll, Americans say they don't like negative campaigning. Yet in the final week of the Florida primary, more than 90% of the ads broadcast were attack ads. That's not likely to change in the run-up to Super Tuesday. So why do candidates rely so heavily on a kind of advertising voters say they abhor? Because it works. To understand why, you have to consider what we know about how emotions work — and the different ways our conscious and unconscious minds and brains process "negativity" during elections. In 2008, my colleague Joel Weinberger and I tested voters' conscious and unconscious
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(CBS News) Jury selection is underway in the trial of Dharun Ravi, a Rutgers University freshman accused of bullying his college roommate, Tyler Clementi, who committed suicide in September 2010. Erin Moriarty of "48 Hours Mystery" has been following the case. Clementi's death became an international symbol of the consequences of bullying and homophobia. The trial of the young man accused of bullying him is unique because much of the evidence that will be used against him was found online in social media. Nineteen-year old Dharun Ravi faces 15 counts of invasion of privacy, evidence and witness tampering, and bias intimidation --
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Say the words "Windows 8" to a typical computer enthusiast and they'll likely find something to complain about. Criticisms of the latest incarnation of Microsoft's Windows operating system seem never-ending – so much so, that Microsoft itself has taken to the airwaves to ensure future Windows users that, no, the company has not gone crazy with some of its design decisions. Even the Windows logo itself hasn't escaped Microsoft's need for change. As expected, critics have weighed in onMicrosoft's decision to adopt a more Metro-themed design for the Windows 8 logo instead of the traditional four-color, curvy boxes found in previous Windows logos. Here's
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In response to the uproar over how mobile iOS applications have had access to address-book data without having to inform the user, Google (NSDQ: GOOG) was all too happy to confirm Wednesday that its development model for Android applications makes it impossible to share personal data with an app developer unless you agree to do so before installing the app. Tim Bray, Google’s head of Android developer relations, addressed Android’s take on the Path-inspired mess that forced Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) to acknowledge that it should have done a better job policing apps that uploaded address-book data from users without explicit permission. “Reading
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Comcast may be debunking some of the cord-cutting hype. The cable giant said it lost just 17,000 video subscribers in the fourth quarter, the fewest number in five years. Comcast lost about eight times as many customers in the year-earlier period. It averaged about 175,000 customer defections in each of the previous 10 quarters, according to Morningstar analyst Michael Hodel. Comcast CEO Brian Roberts said today that he believed video-subscriber growth will also return eventually. "We may not get back to full growth on video for a while, because we don't see housing growth at the moment, but someday that's going to happen,"
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