I just finished refereeing the kids in our belated Father’s Day trip to see Finding Dory. Better than the first installment (Finding Nemo), the family movie was just the trick to soften stubbornness and unite the already close clan we are. Media bonds the family. All you have to do is put in the time. Yet, I am already digressing.

Better than the original.

I spent the last couple of week’s closely connected to Californian’s Bay Area. Both the NBA Finals and the NHL’s Stanley Cup Final were set in NoCal. Fans from both sports were ready to hoist the Larry O’Brien Championship Trophy and Stanley Cup in the same week. Can anyone say dueling parades?

Alas (and much to my glee) both Bay Area teams lost in their home arenas in the deciding games. The NBA Finals captivated America. Take a look at these numbers:

• Game Seven was was the most-watched NBA game this century, averaging 30.8 million viewers, and peaking at 44.5 million viewers with less than a minute left. 
• Locally, the game notched the second-highest rating ever for an NBA game, with a 39.4 rating in San Francisco and 46.3 rating in title-starved Cleveland.
• This year’s Finals rematch has been a boon for ABC television. The network had its two most-watched series since it began airing NBA games in the 2002-03 season. But with the series extending to a seventh game, ABC topped an average of 20 million viewers for the series (20.16 million), 

The strong ratings for the 2016 NBA Finals capped a healthy ad market for the entire playoffs. Kantar Media reports an estimated $570 million was spent on advertising for the playoffs (April 16-May 30) leading up to the NBA Finals.

The same kind of positive news, however, cannot be reported by the National Hockey League.

Lebron James lifted the NBA ratings to the best in a decade.

According to Nielsen live-plus-same-day data, the six-game series between the San Jose Sharks and the Pittsburgh Penguins averaged only just 4 million viewers and a 2.3 household rating. This was the third lowest-rated Final since 2006. Deliveries (viewers and household ratings) were down almost 30% when compared to last year’s average (5.53 million viewers, 3.2 household rating), while the demo declined 22% to a 1.4 among adults 18-to-49. What does all of this mumbo-jumbo mean? It means that the NHL is a trouble.

Don’t get me wrong, nothing broke right for this year’s Stanley Cup Final. Take a look at this recipe for rating’s disaster…

• Bad Matchups. The Sharks vs. the Penguins. The Bay Area is hardly a hockey bastion, while Pittsburgh is one of the most despised franchises east of the Mississippi.
• No US-Based Original Six Team. Ratings traditionally to soar when teams representing old-school, hockey-mad urban centers like Boston, Detroit, Chicago and New York are suited up in the final. In 2013, NBC posted its highest numbers in 2013, when the Chicago Blackhawks-Boston Bruins grudge match mustered up 5.76 million viewers, a 3.3 household rating and a 2.2 in the 18-to-49 demo.
• The Schedule. The series hit the ice on the Monday after Memorial Day weekend, when TV viewing is as low as it gets (save Christmas) and played against game seven of the ratings mad NBA Western Conference Finals. 
• Bad Network Choices. Games 2 and 3 aired on NBCSN, which reaches only 70% of all U.S. TV homes. Ratings dropped accordingly. 
• Game of Thrones. Game 6, which wound up being the deciding game of the Final, was scheduled for Sunday night. What’s the big deal? The game was forced to square off against Game of Thrones and the NHL was not ready to sit on the Iron Throne. The clinching game drew 5.41 million viewers and a 1.9 rating among adults 18-to-49, while the warring Westeros clans delivered a 7.6 million viewers and a 3.9 in the demo.

Ugh.

Tomorrow, I’ll post my open letter to NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman and the new owner of the expansion Las Vegas franchise on how to make hockey work in Vegas.

Of course, Gary Bettman got mercilessly booed as he presented the Stanley Cup. I’m sure NBC Sports was booing as well.

The post Playoff Ratings – The Tale of Two Bays appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

I can tell you that I’m not in federal court with one of those cantankerous Californians filing lawsuits against Starbucks, hell-bent on taking down the the java king over underfilling their lattes. I mean, geez, cozy up to the barista and get a little more milk poured in. Last time I complained, I got a free drink and a new coffee. What a deal!

There may be some truth that I am at the movies taking in Central Intelligence, starring Dwayne Johnson and Kevin Hart. I’m not used to standing on line for a movie, but I definitely wanted to smell what The Rock was cooking and I had a fresh, fully-filled Venti drip from the aforementioned Starbucks, so life was good. The movie didn’t disappoint, but honestly, the movie industry itself is starting to disappoint.

They seem to be in panic mode because of Netflix, spiraling costs and the rude, loud unwelcoming nature of the movie theatre experience itself. But as I sat through nine movie trailers (yes! nine! — shame on you Cinemark) totaling twenty-four minutes I realized something else: there’s no mysteries or surprise anymore.

Now there is so much information, so far in advance before a movie comes out that it’s anti-climatic. Everything about it is known. You feel like you’ve already seen it. What was intended to promote a film, now serves as buzzkill instead.

I loved the movies once. Still do. I went with my mom to see a movie almost every Tuesday when I was a kid. Top Gun was in theaters so long that I was able to take three different dates hoping to find that lost, loving feeling. (The same crash and burn scenario occurred all three times, yikes!) Now my son and I count the days down to the next Star Wars installment a year in advance.

My first theater experience I can remember was seeing the blockbuster Earthquake in 1974 when disaster movies were all the rage. I remember looking up in awe at the big screen and waiting for the Sensurround to kick in.

What’s Sensurround you ask? Only the greatest thing ever in 1974! Here’s the theater notice that appeared in newspapers all over the country:

“ATTENTION! This motion picture will be shown in the startling new multi-dimension of Sensurround. Please be aware that you will feel as well as see and hear realistic effects such as might be experienced in an actual earthquake. The management assumes no responsibility for the physical or emotional reactions of the individual viewer.”

Who wouldn’t want that?! Yet, I digress…

Anyway, as the opening credits rolled all I knew was this was an epic disaster movie set in my hometown of Los Angeles and you knew it starred Charlton Heston, Ava Gardner, Lorne Greene, and George Kennedy. Beyond that? Everything was onscreen, unfolding right before my wide eyes. Today? You would have seen a sneak peak trailer sponsored by Pepsi a year ago. You would have read reviews, seen a bunch of Internet bloggers dissecting it, along with IMDB and Rotten Tomatoes, reviewed that would have added to you skepticism to see the movie in the first place.

If Earthquake comes out today, I am already sick of it before I click on Fandango to order a movie ticket. I not only know what parts of Los Angeles are ruined, but also how many died and how many floors are left of the Capitol Records Building. Why? Because all of the details would have been reviewed over and over again.

Hey movie industry, SPOILER ALERT!: you’re spoiling the movie going experience by vomiting too much information about the movie before it’s released. It would be like George R.R. Martin revealing the end of the last Game of Thrones book in the Forward. Bring back the mystery and mystique.

There are no movie scenes anymore that make us gasp because they’ve all been rumored, teased, speculated, or openly discussed or seen. There can never be the surprise of a Psycho shower scene because we would have already seen it in the trailer and watch Alfred Hitchcock dissect it on Conan or Jimmy Kimmel Live.

Movies should be an escape from reality. And I mean the modern reality of knowing way too much about the movie before you plan your Friday night trek to the movieplex.

How about bringing back ignorance as bliss?

When I walk into a theater, I want to literally and figuratively be in the dark about what I want to see.

Give it a try yourself and you’ll find that you like your movie experience that much more.

The post Movies Have Lost That Loving Feeling appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

Prince is dead, long live the king.

So instead of drowning my sorrows in a few neat Crown Royal Canadian Whiskys, I’m trying to finish my application to become the social media manager for Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II (or at least the minion responsible for making these decisions, because I am most certain that she couldn’t care less).

And, why not? I haven’t seen the Queen since I snapped off a few hundred pictures of the royal family as a youngster in the eighties on a fellowship that I won back in the day. A return to Buckingham Palace seems in order now that they posted a position for the Head of Digital Engagement with the Royal Household.

A Media Guy Original

The Royal Household advertised the job of with a salary of up to £50,000 (that’s $71,000 USD for you and me) with the following enticement: “It’s knowing your content will be viewed by millions. It’s about never standing still and finding new ways to maintain The Queen’s presence in the public eye and on the world stage. This is what makes working for the Royal Household exceptional.”

The basic duties takes me back to the time I applied for that Ogilvy internship: “Whether you’re covering a state visit, award ceremony or royal engagement, you’ll make sure our digital channels consistently spark interest and reach a range of audiences. With an eye to the future, you’ll work to hone and shape our digital communications through sharing best practice, understanding new technologies and stimulating creativity.”

While 5.3 million followers across social media is not on the Taylor Swift or Kardashian scale, you can bet that competition will be still. Maybe I’ll stick to making commercials…

…while I was filling out my application, word came through that artist now known again as Prince had passed suddenly. There’s been too many great musicians that passed as of late. David Bowie, Glenn Frey and now Prince.

I liked Prince for many reasons. First and foremost, Prince was bad ass and ss I get older, I admire those who don’t give a damn about what I think. What we think. Maybe it’s the ad man in me, trying to reach that niche demographic and drive them to my product or service. He did whatever he wanted. On stage. In the recording studio. With his personal life. You name it, he did what he wanted, when he wanted. Bad ass!

I mean, Michael Jackson was coming off Thriller, only the best selling album of all time,  and Jackson asked Prince if he wanted to collaborate on a song or two. Prince’s reply “No, I’m good.” Bad ass!

That time during his 1990 concert tour where I got a press pass to take photos for the Associated Press. Seven hundred photos later, Prince’s people convinced my editor to turn them over to be reviewed. Prince liked then so much he cried copyright violation and kept them. I didn’t like it at the time, but honest, that was bad ass!

And then, all of that sex. Prince was all about sex. It’s the straight ahead, uncompromising sexual nature of his music. When you listen to Dirty Minds, it’s intentionally shocking and musically all over the place. He ruled the airwaves in spite of it all. He was a singular music talent whose impact resonated far beyond the radio. Here’s a few snippets of what people who actually know what they are talking about wrote of him:

The New York Times Obituary
Across a career of more than 35 years, Prince released 39 albums while being lauded not only for his songs, but their visual presentation both onstage and on camera. His 1984 film “Purple Rain” is widely considered one of the best and most influential music films ever, while its accompanying soundtrack spawned the No. 1 hits “Let’s Go Crazy” and “When Doves Cry.” He was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2004.

Rolling Stone (1983)
All cocky, teasing talk about sex, that’s Prince. Forget Mr. Look So Good; meet the original Mr. Big Stuff. He’s afraid of nothing onstage: ready to take on all the desires of a stadium full of his lusty fans, ready to marry funky black dance music and punky white rock music after their stormy separation through the Seventies, ready to sell his Sex Can Save Us message to anybody who’ll give his falsetto a listen.

GQ Spends Six Days In Paisley Park
Like his records, like his stage shows, Prince’s Paisley Park headquarters is a monument to this system of beliefs. It’s a strange place, even to visit. Something in the water, as Prince once so memorably put it, does not compute. It’s not anything physical, not the two doves in their cage or the purple galaxy painted on the boardroom ceiling or the obsessive cleanliness. It’s something more intangible, and you see it in the faces of the people who work there. They’re like students taking a long, perplexing exam, trying to work out what the question means before they can start writing.

Prince Guest Stars On ‘Muppets Tonight’

Time to drown myself with a royal cola…

RC Cola had some no-so-great sexist ads…more on that another day.

Not every underdog story ends well. In the case of Royal Crown Cola, every sign pointed towards an eventual victory over Coca-Cola. RC Cola started in the basement of a grocery store. They won a crucial lawsuit that kept Coca-Cola from having a monopoly on the word “cola.” They were the first to introduce the public taste-test, canned soda, and crucially, diet soda. But one study, largely funded by the sugar industry, cast a false pallor over RC’s artificial sweetener of choice: cyclamate. The controversy led to RC changing their formula, which fell flat with the public. RC then made a serious of bad business deals — buying furniture companies? — and now they’ve since become the proto-PBR of the soft drink industry. Read more on Mental Floss…

FAKE ROYALTY

Game of Thrones has a history of eliciting rather strong reactions from viewers. From its premiere in 2011 to last year’s season five finale, this show has been all about shock value. From its gratuitous rape scenes and brutal deaths to incestuous affairs and mind-blowing plot-twists, the HBO fantasy drama may have generated the most WTF moments of any show in the history of television.

So, in case you’ve forgotten, here are the 30 most WTF moments from Game of Thrones, and all the deaths from seasons one through five:

The post The Royal Wrap-up appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

If Esquire says you are, you can bet that it’s true.

While Playboy scraped the bottom of the marketing barrel to find a way to be even less relevant, Esquire magazine named Emilia Clarke the “Sexiest Woman Alive”, because, well, you know, the Internet is fueled by nudity and hints of nudity and fake nudity.

You know what has a whole lot of nudity?

Game of Thrones. 

It’s the entire point of the show. On that note, it’s probably worth noting that Khaleesi no longer does nude scenes, instead handing the reins over to her almost twenty year old body double.

Yet I digress and I’m only a paragraph into this thing and I haven’t had my 4p hash browns from the new all-day breakfast menu at McDonald’s.

Okay, so where am I?

Before I get to where I am, I have to tell you that I am pretty relieved that I am not a narcissist; this according to Joseph Burgo, Ph.D., a psychologist and the author of “The Narcissist You Know.” He reports that common traits of narcissism include constantly feeling under appreciated, thinking everyone else is stupid, and feeling justified in acting mean to people.

If they only still had a McDanish!

But there’s one key trait that distinguishes narcissists from everyone else: an absence of interest in other people and the inability to feel for them.

So if you’re already disinterested with my ramblings, perhaps you have a bunch of narcissism running through your veins.

OKAY, ENOUGH WITH THE DIGRESSIONS.

So, I was in Austin, Texas at the American Marketing Association where the highlight of the conference was the amazing presentation by Guy Kawasaki outlining his ten tips for innovative marketing and soon you’ll see why I brought up Playboy, Game of Thrones and McDonald’s.

Turn on the television, pick up a newspaper or visit the Internet and you will be inundated with messages about brand products.

Tide is a brand. Pepsi is a brand. Nike is a brand.

And so are you – or at least you should be.

Speak with Marsha Friedman, a public relations expert with 25 years’ experience developing publicity strategies for celebrities, corporations and media newcomers alike, and she will tell you, “If you open a dictionary, the word ‘brand’ is defined as a type of product manufactured by a particular company under a particular name. These days you need to be that product. Keeping your personal brand alive is a must for success in today’s marketplace.”

Personal branding has gotten a lot more buzz in recent times and has become an important tool for everyone who wants to improve their career or business opportunities. Touting the need for personal branding is the essence of her new book, Celebritize Yourself. (Fifteen smacks on Amazon.)

When you think about it, though, personal branding is not new. It’s just that more people have the means to do it today and, fortunately, the Internet has provided us with numerous ways to create and maintain a personal brand.

The former king of personal branding

But many entertainers and athletes thrived at it long ago. Many of us remember the song “Happy Trails” from our childhood.  Roy Rogers was the movie and TV cowboy who made this song popular and whose name and image appeared on toy holsters, lunch boxes, comic books, puzzles, coloring books and other merchandise in the 1940s and 1950s.

Roy is a great example of someone who was ahead of his time with personal branding although he stumbled into it unintentionally. The story goes, he wanted a raise from his movie studio, but the boss balked. Bummed out by the response, Roy asked for what he considered a consolation prize – all rights to his name and likeness.

As it turned out, that was no consolation prize. Roy soon figured out that he – not the studio – was the big winner in the negotiations. Any raise would have been paltry next to the money he raked in from Roy Rogers brand merchandise.

Here’s an additional lesson about personal branding that Roy Rogers provides us. Younger people don’t know who Roy Rogers is today. When you mention his name you typically get a puzzled expression. Even the best personal branding, you see, doesn’t last forever. It has to be nurtured continually. (Roy, of course, nurtured his brand his entire life, and it was only the passage of time after his death that caused it to fade, so we’ll give him a break.) I mean even the greatest Christmas movie of all time, Die Hard, had a special tribute to the great cowboy:

The rest of us get no break and the message is clear: Don’t rest on your laurels, or in your saddle, whichever is appropriate.

So what can you do to get your personal brand launched and keep it alive? Here are a few suggestions.

•  Make sure your website represents you exactly the way you want to be seen. This is one of the best places to control your image. That could mean you want to be viewed as witty, intellectual or physically fit. It could mean you want the world to see you as an expert in a particular field. Maybe you want to convey an image of trust. Roy Rogers was the clean-cut hero wearing a smile and a cowboy hat. What’s your image?

• •Maintain a strong social media presence. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and other social media sites are invaluable tools for networking or getting your message out quickly under your personal brand. Also, make sure you have a unified message that weaves through your website, your social media sites and anything else you use to promote yourself. Design elements should be consistent from one platform to the next as well.
• Keep your presence alive in traditional media, too, making yourself available for interviews. Media appearances act as a third-party endorsement, casting you as an authority in your field. This also needs constant cultivation. If you were quoted in a newspaper article last year, then you’re last year’s news. Even worse, if your competitor is quoted in an article today, they’ve become more relevant than you and are winning the personal-branding war.
• Branding yourself is not a one-shot deal. One of the biggest misconceptions about branding is that people expect to do one or two things to promote themselves and then figure they are done. Nothing could be further from the truth. Your branding effort never stops. It’s like trying to become physically fit. You don’t go to the gym for one week to get your dream body – nor would you expect that a good workout three years ago would leave you set for life. Your personal branding effort is the same way. It’s ongoing.

The bottom line is that creating a personal brand is one of the keys to success in today’s world. By branding yourself – making sure the world knows who you are and the expertise you have to offer – you not only set yourself apart from your competitors but you also open the door to new opportunities.

AD OF THE WEEK/MONTH/WHATEVER

Bonds Underwear

The new Bonds Underwear ad has balls! Talking ball where the family jewels banter about life down under. Their lives are improved dramatically with the arrival of a new pair of undies:

The post NSFW: Personal Brand appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

First, the big news…

The Media Guy strikes again. A double winner in the 2015 Telly Awards competition. What are the Tellys? Only one of the most prestigious honors in the the advertising industry. Sure, the Clios get all the glam, but the Telly Awards carry a lot of juice.

Yet I digress…


Okay, so where am I?

I still may or may not be negotiating with some nefarious figures in Azerbaijan on human rights issues for Amnesty International. Or maybe I’m wrapping up a book for a retired South Korean bad-ass turned ambassador. What I can tell you is that I just spent a lovely morning catching up with with my dear friend Gizelle Pierre.

Google her. You won’t find her. She’s a mercenary and a makeshift spy. Her undercover work is known by all the wrong people and only a few of the right ones. If she shows up at your home in the shadows of the night, don’t count on sipping your morning coffee at dawn. As a matter of fact, you’ll probably won’t wake up at all. She’s Mrs. Smith without all of the Mr. Smith-Brad Pitt nonsense. She’s also one of the greatest advertising muses in the world. She is the inspiration for the Creme d’Or Ice Cream spot (featured below in the Ad of the Week/Month/Whatever below), GQ’s How to date series (below as well), and my Clio-winning spots from the nineties.

Gizelle is everything you want and she’ll even tell you how to date her!

She calls herself simple, yet one look at her petite, curvy frame let’s you know she is so much more. A lifetime of adventures trapped in confidential silence. Her deep eyes tell you even more. With a deep, throaty laugh she proclaimed, “Holy silencer! It’s 2015, I’m recently single and I’m in my forties. The next year is is going to be a little crazy. I may need to get a few more passports!”

With that, we dived into her 2015 Dating Rules for guys who want a shot with her and her equally wacky girlfriends:

1. We’re all crazy.

It’s cool because guys are more than a little crazy too. But some of us women, holy sh*t. I have stories for days and I’ve only been dating for a short time again. But ask any guy you know in any situation and they’ll all agree: either jump on for the ride or get out of the way.

2. It’s about the aura not about anything else.

We all know this one too. What do we say we want? No seriously, ask one, ask a 100, ask me! We say things like “he’s gotta be smart…and nice…and funny!” Oh, definitely funny. I love funny guys, and he must be be respectful. But he has to be direct because I don’t play games. Guess what? I just lied to you like seven times right there and I am not even the craziest one. At the end of it all, but nice, funny, rich, etc., but really if you doing have that aura and energy that connects with me you are cooked. We should just do a coffee and see if we match. You’ll know if we should be together before your latte is dips to 120 degrees.

3. If I don’t act interested, I really am.

I’ll give you my number, but I won’t answer until the third time you call. I say I’m available but my schedule is always booked when you try to make a plan. Timing is everything you know?! After all, I am undercover 90% of the time.

4. Have a pickup line that actually works. 

Every girl needs a little protection and some contacts that change colors.

The pickup line that works is, like, when guys are just nice and giving you compliments with confidence. You know, “Hi, your hair looks good today.” “Hi, I like those shoes.” But then they also might be gay, but—it doesn’t matter. Ha! Really though, I don’t like lines, so just be you. Because when you try to hard, you end up looking like a fool, and we both feel awkward, and now I have to tell you to walk away and I’m keeping the $14 cocktail that you just bought me.

5. I mean I love poetry…

…but be manly. Manliness is the best thing. Who wouldn’t want to date a manly guy? A lumberjack…or an astronaut…a crocodile wrangler…smell like gasoline—gasoline in the woods. Seriously though, take control of the date and the activity and what we are doing. Make me feel safe. Don’t worry, I am happy to pay for half. But whatever you do, don’t be that rude guy. You know that guy who’s rude to people for no particular reason. If you’re rude to anybody that’s beneath you or you treat people like they’re beneath you, that’s a deal-breaker. It shows a lot about somebody’s integrity, personality, how they are as a person by the way they treat other people. Don’t let any failures affect your self-worth because that will show through and you’ll get into a snowball of self-loathing.

How to Date…

It’s a little known fact the Gizelle was the muse behind the How to Date Series from GQ. From True Detective star Alexandra Daddario recommending Tinder to Game of Thrones queen Natalie Dormer talking about where to pick people up,
one-liners, and more, these vignettes give you everything you need to charm your lady.

The post Gizelle: Model, Spy and World’s Greatest Muse appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.

“Advertising is what you do when you can’t go see
somebody.”– Fairfax Cone

The post Ponderings… appeared first on Media Guy Struggles.