Irony
Isn’t it great when you try to prove that a situation is terrible and it suddenly starts to become wonderful? I’ve gotten 4 responses to jobs in the past two days. Two rejection emails and … (drum roll) … two interviews!! The rejection emails are sort of a bummer but it means that people actually looked at my resume. Usually I don’t get a response at all. With two rejections I feel like I’m moving up in the world. Maybe thats a little sad but I don’t care. I guess I’m an optimist in the darkest times.
The two interviews are such a surprise. I know I’ll do great! One is a phone interview and one is in NYC. Both are in NYC. I love NYC! And I love the companies I’m interviewing with.
Wish me luck!
Job Application Count:
Applications: 28
Responses: 4
Interviews: 2
Jobs: 0
The Best & Worst of Advertising
‘Tis the season for Christmas advertising! Its a wonderful time! Not as good as Superbowl commercials are but its still great because companies up their creativity a bit and produce some gems here and there.
Best – Target Super Fan
I haven’t seen too many great ones yet. Ones that I’ve enjoyed and I know my mother and aunt love are the new Target commercials with the crazy shopper woman.
Target 2-Day Sale: She’s Baaack!
Target Christmas Card Chorus
There are several others on Target’s YouTube channel but I’ve seen these two on TV recently.
The crazy shopper lady seems to be a theme with several Christmas commercials this year. Walmart has one out with a crazy woman excited about sales as well. I guess advertisers are trying to relate to people feeling like the Christmas shopping season is hectic. They are trying to convey the message that the Christmas shopping season can be fun and exciting as well as hectic. The first commercial is definitely specifically made to hype up Black Friday and the second one is a very clever and humorous way to get people into the Christmas spirit.
I like this commercial because it gives me a good laugh but I also have to admit the woman is rather creepy and unsettling to me as well. It actually makes me a little scared to go into a Target if there was one near me (which there isn’t). But I doubt many people think the same way as me so I still think this is a good and effective commercial.
Best – Amazon Kindle Fire
Kindle Fire – Placing the things you love at your fingertips
After I got over my initially disgust at the woman wearing the most ugly blazer or sports jacket or whatever that ugly thing is from her mother’s wardrobe from the 80′s I really like this commercial. (I’ll never understand fashion.) Every time I see this commercial I’m instantly reminded of how excited and joyous I am whenever something I ordered arrives at my house.
Its an amazing phenomenon. Time, or more specifically, anticipation, makes everything more thrilling. If I walk into Gamestop and buy a game I get the regular feel good feeling of purchasing a new thing. If I order something online and then have to wait 5 days to get it, its the most amazing purchase in the world when it arrives! Momentarily of course. I guess I should factor in the depressed feeling when I initially order something online and feel guilty for spending the money. I need the purchase in my hand to validate the need for spending the money. Without it I just feel guilty.
I digress … often.
This commercial is effective because it just makes me want to purchase something online whenever I see it. I guess it doesn’t really make me focus on buying the Kindle specifically but maybe that doesn’t matter. It makes me want to go to Amazon.com and there will inevitably be a hundred more Kindle Advertisements plastered all over their website. Those will complete the advertisement for potential buyers. Multi-part marketing strategies are a compelling idea. I’d like to learn more about them. Is there a more specific name than “multi-part”?
On a side note, is anyone else bothered by the fact that the post man irresponsibly left her $200 Kindle package in plain sight on the doorstep of her house that is on a heavily foot trafficked street?
I can’t find the other Amazon commercial I just saw this morning during Good Morning America. It was of a little girl coming home and opening a package from Amazon with her father. I don’t remember if it was a commercial for the Amazon Kindle or if it was just a commercial for Amazon.com or if it was a commercial for something completely different with an odd Amazon product placement in it. Regardless, it was really cute.
Worst – Crown Royal Personalized Bag or Label Interactive Commercial
via – a screenshot I took of the advertisement on Hulu.com
This commercial has gotten on my nerves. The first couple times it played while I was watching shows on Hulu I was intrigued because I like any advertisers that create interactive ads. I think they are the way of the future. But this ad also has several major flaws. First, the number of times it was shown; second, its music; and third; it’s a silent & still commercial.
I watched about five shows while I was on Hulu the day that this commercial harassed me to no end. Each show has about 6 commercial breaks and this commercial ran during every commercial break I had during that viewing session. Six times five is 30! I saw this horrible nightmare of a commercial at least 30 times in the span of about 3 hours!! Now I know repeat impressions are important but 30 times? I think this is a clear example of how over impressing an audience has a negative effect. I would love to know Hulu viewership statistics. How many episodes does a person watch in one sitting? If it is an average of one or two then running the same commercial during every commercial break doesn’t seem too bad. But I just have a feeling that people probably watch more like three or four episodes at one time. This makes repetition of the same commercial really bad. I’ll give Crown Royal the benefit of the doubt and acknowledge that this may have been Hulu’s fault. I’ve only know worked with TV commercial spot sales, not internet ads.
The music is just terrible. The commercial runs for 30 seconds with this awful tune that sounds like a combination of the jeopardy theme, elevator music, and Christmas music and it sounds like the whole thing was mixed in the sound studio of the seventh level of hell. Why oh why would you put 30 seconds of music that sounds like the jeopardy theme in a commercial?
Lastly, this ad is a silent & still commercial which is my biggest pet peeve in advertising. By “silent & still commercial” I mean that there is only text and/or still photos with nobody speaking, no voice overs, and no video. Usually there’s music. I believe this type of marketing is very ineffective. I think advertisers have to realize what viewers actually do during commercial breaks. They get up to get a drink, grab their phone and start checking emails, continue the AIM conversation they are having on their laptop, converse with the people they are sitting with, and other things that take their eyes away from the TV. People do not continue to watch the TV when commercials come on. Unless they catch our attention. The music has to be really really catchy and the images have to be bright and colorful to catch our attention. An absolutely perfect example are the early ipod commercials. (I know the ipod commercials weren’t still images but it wasn’t a traditional video either. An the ending call to action was text.) Anything less than amazing becomes white noise or ambiance music for whatever we are doing during commercial breaks. If the music doesn’t draw viewers’ eyes to the TV then they won’t see the text on the commercial and the message will be completely lost on the viewer. Wasted advertising! I believe that people are simply programmed to easily tune out music but it is much much harder to ignore words and sound effects from a video. (I would love to read about a study of this.) Figuratively, we need someone shouting at us, “Buy Buy, Watch Watch, Spend Spend!” I believe that the Call-to-Action of any commercial needs to be spoken. I think very few commercials actually succeed without the call to action.
So, to improve this terror of a commercial I would change a few simple things. Make sure the commercial is not over impressed on the audience, get rid of the horrible music that makes a person want to puncture their eardrums, and add a commercial. This commercial should give the audience ideas about who you could give a gift of an excellent bottle of whiskey. (I’m a whiskey girl through and through and my criticisms are of this advertisement not Crown Royal. I like Crown Royal.) This is definitely a gift that a man would give to another man so I think a perfect video commercial that could go along with this would be a scene of a nervous man giving this gift to his future father-in-law whom he is meeting for the first time. I think this would definitely hit home for many potential buyers.
My Corrections to the Original Advertisement:
Please forgive my limited photoshop skills.
What I think should absolutely remain is the interactivity. I love anything that is made at least a little interactive. Currently the interactivity is just text bubbles that come up when you click on a bottle that describe the product. Maybe this could be jazzed up a bit with maybe some close up pictures perhaps? I’m not sure how much could be added without slowing down the advertisement and potentially making the ad difficult to view on certain computers and with certain internet connections. I should brush up on my web design skills.
Now I’m going to snuggle up with a blanket and a cup of cocoa and wait for this year’s Coca Cola Polar Bear commercials.
Job Application Count:
Applications: 28
Responses: 0
Interviews: 0
Jobs: 0
Oh Rockstar, why must you tease me so?
I got so excited today. Stupidly excited. Huge smile across my face excited. Jumping up and down excited. Absolutely giddy with excitement excited.(Don’t you hate when a word starts to look strange and misspelled if you write it too many times?)
I found a job posting for a marketing coordinator position at Rockstar Games!! I was so excited I applied to it right away. Usually my cover letters are professional and calm but this time I think I wrote the most gushy cover letter I have ever written. I flat out said that a job at Rockstar would be a dream come true. I talked about how I’ve been playing video games forever and how Rockstar makes some of my favorite games and on and on and on and then I took a huge breath and I pressed submit …. and then I noticed that the job was posted back in July of this year. Major letdown!
In fact, every job listed for that location had been posted back in July except for a couple. Obviously they aren’t using their company’s career site to recruit employees. Where is this secret portal into your world? Where are you are hiding Rockstar? I want to work at Rockstar so bad. Oh well, I guess I’ll have to just keep searching.
I also thought I share a couple of amusing and also slightly frustrating things I found on job post while applying to jobs today. First is a quite a silly mistake:
None of these cities are in New York state
The second one is just frustrating:
How am I ever supposed to get an entry-level job when even trainees need to be experienced now?
Job Application Count:
Applications: 26
Responses: 0
Interviews: 0
Jobs: 0
Perseverance
“Perseverance is a great element of success. If you knock long enough and loud enough at the gate, you are sure to wake up somebody.”
~ Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Aha! I found the perfect quote to begin the first post of my first blog. I’ve been looking for a job for over a year now. I graduated in June 2011. I’ve sent out hundreds of applications and tweaked my resume and cover letters countless of times. I feel like I’m not getting anywhere. I’ve considered giving up over and over again. I don’t get any responses. I don’t even get rejections messages. Its come to the point where I would prefer to get a rejection notice rather than nothing at all.
I’ve been looking for so long and applied to so many jobs that I don’t even know what to say when people ask me what I want to do. At this point, why should I limit myself? I’ve found so many incredibly diverse jobs that I would love to get that I can’t even honestly say exactly what I want to do anymore. I used to know, but I think I’ve found other careers I might enjoy more. All I know is that I want to work in the entertainment industry. Even if that means I’m in the accounting department of a record label, or the marketing department of a production studio, or the I.T. department of a television station, or a receptionist for a recording studio, or the programming department of a radio station. I just want to get my foot in the door.
I’m going to start keeping track of the resumes I send out. I’ve kept loose lists before but I’m going to keep actual numbers starting now. I’ll keep a more detailed excel spreadsheet but I’m going to just post numbers here. (I’m basically doing this so that I have solid proof for my mom since all she can say is I’m not doing enough or I’m not doing it right)
So, starting today, the count is:
Applications: 13
Responses: 0
Interviews: 0
Jobs: 0
