Well Done Book Club: Then We Came to the End
We wanted to read a novel for once, so we chose this one, by Joshua Ferris, about employees at a big Chicago ad agency during the dot-com bust of the late 1990s. The novel was critically well-received...
View ArticleHow Do These Puppets Make You Feel? Lending Tree’s “Boxers” Ad
“It’s so amusing to keep well hidden and make someone come to life; to create that little doll that goes in at the eyes of every spectator to strut and posture in his mind! In all those rows of...
View ArticleThree Reasons Subway Survives Post Jared (But at What Cost?)
Our kids beg us to take them to Subway. Yeah, that’s right. I’m going to start the post with that sentence. Even though the minute I wrote it (heck, the minute I thought it), I wondered: Is that going...
View ArticleWatch: Holiday Inn Gives Clean Towels to Couple Adopting Baby
In this week’s “All-Nighter” Robin Beery looks at a heart-stirring, new ad from Holiday Inn and gets a bit hungry for lemon sandwich cookies. First of all, the guy’s not even looking at the...
View ArticleDear Facebook, You’re Like a Crappy Donut Shop. What Happened?
Facebook: What’s happened to you? You used to be fun. You even used to be cool. I mean, we knew the “cool” phase was over when you started forwarding those friend requests from our parents, but even...
View ArticleOscar Mayer’s P3 Ads: Processing, Packaging, and Parody
Meet Davy Crockett. According to the ballad that accompanied the 1950s Disney television specials, he was born on a mountaintop in Tennessee, raised in the woods so’s he knew every tree, and killed him...
View ArticleGo Ahead: Get Carried Away by The Public Collection
Don't ask me to imagine a world without books. I'm not sure what, in my imagining, would be left. The post Go Ahead: Get Carried Away by The Public Collection appeared first on Well Done Marketing.
View ArticleDowny and the Cure for Your Worn-Out Soul
What images of waste and destruction this Downy commercial conjures over its cheerful pizzicato strings and glockenspiel. “Laundry,” says the matter-of-fact announcer, “can wreak havoc on our clothes,...
View ArticleBlueIndy: Cool Electric Pills for an Overheated City
What’s white, has four wheels, two doors, and is shaped like the pills I took for that really bad sinus infection? If you said “a BlueIndy car,” congratulations! You win a free one-day membership to...
View ArticleWhen a Girl Plays with Barbie (But Thinks for Herself)
In December of 2009, when my older daughter was four years old, the children’s museum near my home in Indianapolis opened a new exhibit developed in conjunction with Mattel, Inc., called Barbie: The...
View ArticleWhy is this Michelob Ultra commercial so painful to watch?
Our writer tries to figure it out. When you brew a beer that attracts such laurels as “pretty good for what it is” and “far better than most cheap, American piss water,” you had better have a pretty...
View ArticleInfocom: In the beginning there was Zork.
In the 1980s, Infocom's "interactive fiction" marketing made the most out of having no graphics whatsoever. What threw them off their game was starting to worry about it. The post Infocom: In the...
View ArticleTriumph of the Übermunch
"You’ve got an insatiable appetite for Doritos brand tortilla chips, and would do almost anything to get some. But does that mean you’re a bad person? The answer is yes." The post Triumph of the...
View ArticleChase Freedom Unlimited and the Delight of the Endless Sell
Is freedom just another word for cash back on stuff you can't afford? The post Chase Freedom Unlimited and the Delight of the Endless Sell appeared first on Well Done Marketing.
View ArticleGetting the Story Just Right for GLPTN, Healthcare Change Experts
We believe in the value of good storytelling. Much of what we do as an agency is based around getting our clients’ stories just right. So it’s nice now and then to be reminded just how effective a...
View ArticleOld Spice “Five Year Plan” and the Scent of Magritte
The Belgian surrealist René Magritte, who painted many pictures of men in suits, was thirteen years old in March of 1912 when his mother drowned herself in the River Sambre. Legend says that young René...
View ArticleReturn from Content Marketing World
Lesson from Content Marketing World: Don't let the phrase "content marketing" scare you. It's really just the most generous advertising out there. The post Return from Content Marketing World appeared...
View ArticleWhat if You Couldn’t Vote?
Voters with disabilities have a right to have their voice heard. We helped Indiana Disability Rights raise awareness by writing videos to let the voters themselves get out the message: Hoosiers Vote....
View ArticleAre You Listening?
The portable listening business is booming, and wireless headphones promise even more freedom. But do we risk tuning out the voices we need to hear the most? The post Are You Listening? appeared first...
View Article#GivingTuesday is a Drop in the Kettle
One big thing to keep in mind on this and future #GivingTuesdays—you're up against the ghost of Christmas shopping seasons long past. The post #GivingTuesday is a Drop in the Kettle appeared first on...
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