Razor Thin Connection Part #2

Front Page

Reminder to Tune In...Mark Your Calendar

Did you look at the Sunday coupon insert (FSI--Free Standing Insert in the business)? Remeber the old joke about advertising, "I know, I am wasting half of my advertising money. I just do not know which half."

All the great P&G product ready for getting your young adult ready to head back to campus (more on that below). Among the promotions are the fine products from Gillette and given the heavy male use of the product a tie in with college football is logical. That said there are several problems with the execution of this promotion: the full page announcing the ESPN/ABC “kick off” games is a waste of very colorful ink as those likely to watch these game are not those likely to be look at the Sunday coupons—and this isn’t front of the fridge material. Disney and P&G probably entered into a cross promotional deal where P&G was given a discount on advertising for this away too early poorly targeted advertisement.

The praised heaped on to P&G in Part #1 as the ubermen of marketing takes a hit on the execution of the tie in this contest:

Gillette Power Fusion is running a contest for college students through its Web site and a group on Facebook.com to see which college football fan has the best "game face."

Note that is about last years contest with Brad Quinn was used because you get a group of top business school MBA’s that know the formula for a textbook successful promotion yet know little about the grimier real world side of things. The losing formula here is established brand, star power plus, kick off event, tie in advertising, and clever promotion using Facebook. Given the complexity of the formula it is difficult to judge what is not working and given the desire to protect your kingdom within the P&G empire, complexity is your friend. No one will ever be able to parse the numbers well enough to find out that part of this promotion did little more to drive Gillette sales than the 1950's tailfins did to move a car down the highway.


Buy the Fusion Pay for the Blades

CLICK HERE and look at the 2007 rules (as of 8/4/08) which if P&G is kicking off the contest with the FSI on August 3rd, 2008 the new contest webpage should be in place. Or CLICK HERE for 2007 less that memorable ad via You Tube. Bad show!

Maybe this contest was aimed toward a younger demographic and those beyond age 22 need not watch nor care. Or more likely this is just a lame marketing package.


Just what every college student needs. Or are these for the parents.
Hey, Dad Ms. Ladd looks nice.


Just maybe Cover Girl can improve your looks as much as Drew