advertising

We’re rapidly heading towards 29 March 2015, when those of us in the UK have to set our clocks forward one hour for British Summer Time.

I don’t know about you, but I always have to look up how to do it. I’m not the only one, as shown by this quote from Simple: Conquering the Crisis of Complexity by Alan Siegel and Irene Etzhorn:

“The more luxurious your car, the more likely its owner’s manual will fill your entire glove compartment, and you still won’t be able to reset the clock.”

The world’s most famous copywriter is probably David Ogilvy. And his most famous ad is probably the one he wrote for the Rolls-Royce Silver Cloud in 1958.

The headline read: (more…)

On arrival at Beckenham Junction station, visitors see this sign. There’s so much wrong with it, I hardly know where to begin. Let’s unpick it, piece by painful piece.

At the top it’s headed ‘Infopoint’ and ‘Welcome to Beckenham’. So let’s assume its objective is to provide people with useful local information.

Below the heading is a giant ad for a Chinese Restaurant. In Bromley. Which is the neighbouring town. If the ad does its job and persuades you to go there, you will leave Beckenham immediately. I’m sure that’s not the intention. It is slightly worrying that they were unable to sell that ad space to a restaurant that’s actually in Beckenham.

Below that ad is a map of Beckenham. This might actually be useful, except it’s at knee-level and the road names are so tiny you would have to crawl on the ground to read it. It’s not fit for purpose.

Both sides of the sign are given over to advertising, which presumably funds it.

However, most of the ads are badly thought out too. For example: (more…)

I’ve recently had a nightmare with Microsoft. I pay a monthly subscription to use their cloud-based Office for Mac software, but the system suddenly withdrew my access, claiming that my username and password were wrong. They weren’t. I Googled for solutions. Microsoft websites are horrible to navigate but eventually I Read more…

Well done, West Jet. If I’m ever in Canada, I’ll fly with you.