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The Almighty Buck Spam

Dr. Pepper Tries New Astroturf Method 465

Posted by michael from the co-opted dept.
glh writes "Blogging continues to make its way into corporate America. Dr. Pepper is now blogging to build a community around their new dairy based Raging Cow product by using "key influence bloggers". The key influence bloggers are currently made up of six people mostly in their late teens/early twenties who get promo merchandise as their only form of compensation. In return, they get to "advertise however they want" through their blog. Seems like this experiment could turn into the next "big thing" in advertising-- assuming people are willing to sell out their blog space. Bloggers beware!"
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Dr. Pepper Tries New Astroturf Method More

Dr. Pepper Tries New Astroturf Method

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  • /. beat them to it. (Score:3, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:00PM (#5435250)
    Sorry, but we're already hosting blog-ads here @ slashdot. Nothing to see here, move along. :P

  • Where do I sign up? (Score:3, Funny)

    by GothChip ( 123005 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:00PM (#5435257) Homepage
    I'd happily write about Dr Pepper each day I was sent a crate.

    • Re:Where do I sign up? (Score:5, Funny)

      by LordFlower ( 606949 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:09PM (#5435371)
      it seems slashdot has signed up already
    • And this is almost symbiotic and worthwhile. If you *really* like a product, I don't see why it would be anything but worthwhile to everybody accept compensation for endorsing it.

      Think of your favorite computing language/OS/Environment, for an example. I'll happily go on and on about Mac OS X, for example. If Apple gave me free stuff for evangelizing, it wouldn't change that.

      The only real concern I can think of: I will also grumpilly go on and on about OS X as well. Perhaps they wouldn't like that. Perhaps no free stuff anymore if I did that. But that really wouldn't be all that different than what's happening today. :)

      • Re:Where do I sign up? (Score:5, Informative)

        by Asprin ( 545477 ) <(moc.oohay) (ta) (dlonrasg)> on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:41PM (#5435709) Homepage Journal

        And this is almost symbiotic and worthwhile. If you *really* like a product, I don't see why it would be anything but worthwhile to everybody accept compensation for endorsing it.

        And life just gets more and more like TV: Now, I have to consider whether my family/friends/coworkers are "gettin' paid" before I take them up on that recommendation to see "Master Of Disguise II".

        Thanks, but no thanks. I like to think that my wife's-best-friend's movie recommendations suck because she has bad taste.

  • Raging Cow? (Score:5, Funny)

    by wembley ( 81899 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:00PM (#5435262) Homepage
    I hope they don't try to launch that brand in the U.K.
  • Shit, if it gets me free Dr. Pepper, I'll be a shill.
    • Me too. I once had so many cans on my desk that my colleague said it was a shrine to "The good Dr."

      Although It's not good fo me I have shunned long life in exchange for instant gratification in the form of sugar and caffeine. Hell, I'd be a Dr. Pepper "Evangelist" if they supplied me with a 2 cases a week.

    • You Dr. Pepper whore! *hides a case or three of the stuff behind his desk*

  • Look, Dr. Pepper has a PhD (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    I'm sure he knows what he's doing.

  • Where do I sign up? (Score:3, Funny)

    by doublem ( 118724 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:01PM (#5435276) Homepage Journal
    YES! A way to piss and moan to all the world and GET STUFF at the same time!

    Yes!

    Where do I sign up?

    My LiveJournal is so sold out.

    • Re:Where do I sign up? (Score:5, Funny)

      by DJ FirBee ( 611681 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:23PM (#5435532) Journal
      No reason to sell your blog. Be like all the other nitwits and sell Amway instead.

      I went to a guys apartment to watch De La Hoya box on pay per view and there was a bunch of seedy fucks there trying to make me sell Amway for them. Total setup from the get go.

      They asked everyone in the room "what would you do with a million dollars?" when it was my turn to answer I said "I would become a heavily armed recluse in a sparsely populated western state with intention of training disciples to dispatch of pyramid growth scams".

      It was like ... a minute before any of those morons said their next word. I was nearly out the door by the time the guy said "...but we are not a pyramid growth scam".

      I went to a bar and watched the fight with people that were not wanna-be corporate scumbags. Definitely one of my finest hours.

      • Had one like that. Friend of mine from college who I even lived with at one point came over to visit. The Wife is out of town and he's just hanging out until he meets someone else. So at one point he asks if he can show me a video - saying that he's going to show this tape to the person he's meeting and if that meeting falls through then at least he can still write the trip off as a business expense. Seems odd, but okay - this guy was always a little off anyway.

        The video is for QuikStar (sp?), which is this deal where you start your own web business selling things like soap and toilet paper. Or something. At this point I of course realized I was being pseudo-scammed.

        Since this guy was a friend and it was my house, it's not like I could leave. So I sat there and asked him why I would buy soap and toilet paper online instead of Wal-Mart and he had some sorta valid reasonings (like bulk) but I really don't want to plan out my soap buying that far in advance. When I asked him how it is that so many online businesses could succeed against each other (see Herbalife [cockeyed.com]) he kept diverting the question.

        I basically let the conversation die without giving him a yes or no answer as to whether this would be something I'd want to do. A friend of mine got into it with him (the contact he was in town to meet, I think) and shortly thereafter was doing everything in his power to get out of it.

        Ironically, Quikstar is associated with Amway.

  • Advertising: Nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Metallic Matty ( 579124 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:03PM (#5435289)
    This is just more of the same ol' story: companies sticking their advertisements everywhere: cramming every possible orifice full of their logo. Now instead of being obnoxiously located above, below, and to the sides of all the content your reading on the net: it will now be located inside the content.

    George Carlin was right.. bend over a little more..
    • > bend over a little more..

      wait, you mean people actually read weblogs?!

      at any rate I would hazard that there's very little "bending over" going on here. Free expression and advertising are generally at odds with each other, and I'll hazard this is going to die a wimpering death.

      By their very nature, blogs will resist corporate subversion.

    • Re:Advertising: Nothing new (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Triv ( 181010 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:40PM (#5435705) Journal
      ever been to New York City?

      ClearChannel Communications (my current nemesis of choice) has such a strong foothold in NYC it's scary. Want to listen to the radio? Most of the radio stations are run by clearchannel. See a show? They own broadway theaters. See a concert? Irving Plaza and Roseland (among others) are run by clearchannel. Avoid all that and take a walk? They own a good portion of the billboards. Take the subway instead? Sorry, the advertising in the subways (including the new digital billboards cropping up around certain subway lines) goes through them too.

      Gives a new meaning to the word "Tentacle," don't it?

      Triv

      (It's not as scary as what I saw a few months ago, though - a Post Office truck with a big honkin' Microsoft MSN ad on the side.)
    • check the dialy show online's clips with Steve Carell here:

      http://www.comedycentral.com/tv_shows/thedailyshow withjonstewart/videos_corr.jhtml?p=carell [comedycentral.com]

      click on all the ad nauseam clips to laugh and fully understand the evil that is advertising :-)

    • Re:Advertising: Nothing new (Score:5, Interesting)

      by hackstraw ( 262471 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @05:28PM (#5436144)
      To be honest, I would prefer more advertising like this vs the flashy blinky noisy things all over the fscking place.

      This is akin to product placement, and I would rather my favorite actor, Bob Dole, or whoever to casually use a product in my view while not disturbing the plot or whatever else I'm doing.

      However, the problem is that everywhere I go, and everything I do is now inundated with advertisements. This is complete bullshit. I for the most part ignore advertisements. Besides the psychological, subconscious affects of advertising. (eg, Product X is a good company because we give back to the community, or simply product recognition), I don't see where advertising has any influence on my spending habits. And the few times that it has, I have felt burnt most of those times.

      Here's a list of advertising bullshit that bothers me to no end:
      • There's too much of it in magazines, I can't find the table of contents so I can read what I bought the magazine for.
      • Ticketmaster advertises. These assholes are already charging me for the priveledge of buying a ticket, and they have the nerve to charge for advertising space too!
      • Endlessly repeating .gif's or flash ads. I've got galeon set up to only repeat animation once, and I don't have a flast plugin, thank you.
      • TV music programs where they play an ad between each song
      • The amount of ads on cable television in general. What do I pay $40 a month for?
      • A local university got $10 million from a car dealership to rent their name out on their new football stadium. I will not buy a car from them ever. If it had something to do with education, fine, but all I read from the car dealers actions is that they already make way too much money.

      There must be more, I just can't think of them right now.

      I guess that advertising is like spam, it exists because there must be some kind of reward for doing it. I ignore it. Word of mouth works fine. Believe me I trust someone I know much more than some washed up actor/athlete/Bob Dole pushing a product on me because they say they like the product. I feel as though ads are insulting, because I can go to a store and evaluate products or ask a sales person, or read up on a product beforehand. Bah, I've gone on too long already.

      • Re:Advertising: Nothing new (Score:5, Insightful)

        by MisterMook ( 634297 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @06:04PM (#5436469) Homepage

        Part of the idea of ad marketing is not that a viewer actually likes the product but that they see the name so much that when the time comes to purchase a product the consumer automatically thinks of the marketer's product. There might be dozens of chicken restaurants in town, but when crunch time comes and the consumer is trying to think "where will I eat right now" they can't come up with a better solution than KFC, Churches, or Popeyes. Word of mouth might be a better solution to judging value, but advertising doesn't attach itself to better solutions it attaches itself to recognition.

        That's the reason commercials are sometimes cute and that you even KNOW Bob Dole does commercials, recognition. At some point eventually you run into an area that word of mouth doesn't cover, that's where advertising works best.

        Strangely enough, in the hermit-media culture we live in advertising has it's best chance. People work at home or don't talk with their coworkers very much, when they go out they go places to experience media formats and not to talk. Word of mouth is probably on the upswing on the internet, but it's still lacking much sense of community that makes most people's word of mouth recognizable as having more value than your average advertising campaign. After all, there are a lot of idiots who actually WATCH those commercials.

  • I'm all for it (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Bobulusman ( 467474 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:03PM (#5435296)
    Since I've never read a blog and and never plan to, I don't care how much advertising they put in it. Plus, maybe they would spend less on other areas and I would have to deal with less annoying flash ads.

  • Slashdot blog implements new astroturf method (Score:5, Insightful)

    by br0ck ( 237309 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:04PM (#5435299)
    Slashdot has legitimized this concept by linking to Raging Cow since the site is high on Google's pagerank index. I hope Michael enjoys his new hat.

  • Sheesh (Score:5, Funny)

    by Bob Abooey ( 224634 ) <bababooey@techie.com> on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:04PM (#5435304) Homepage Journal
    First they hire "Garth Brooks" as their spokesman and now they target bloggers... I think they are showing their total lack of "clue" when it comes to marketing. Why not mix the two and go after redneck bloggers who dig bad country music?

    Or maybe they should think about picking up Britney Spears now that Pepsi has dropped her for Shakira...

    • Re:Sheesh (Score:3, Insightful)

      by cmallinson ( 538852 )
      I think they are showing their total lack of "clue" when it comes to marketing

      If people now are talking about Dr. Pepper more than we were yesterday, then the marketing approach has already worked.

    • Re:Sheesh (Score:3, Funny)

      by sean23007 ( 143364 )
      Hey, I'd try to pick up Britney Spears if she's available, but she got dumped by a large corporation? I mean sure, she's been dumped by a lot of people, but a company? That's low... :)

  • I guess it's OK (Score:3, Funny)

    by The Bungi ( 221687 ) <thebungi@gmail.com> on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:05PM (#5435307) Homepage
    After all, any self-respecting geek knows that it is NOT Jolt that gets one through those late-night coding sessions, no. It's Dr. Pepper.

    Dr. Pepper is the Official Elixir (TM) of the United Brotherhood of Freaky Coding Sprees, bless our jittery hearts.

    So I suppose that if I get some free Dr. Pepper I'll blog their warez to death. I mean, it's just par for the course.

    • Re:I guess it's OK (Score:5, Funny)

      by stratjakt ( 596332 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:07PM (#5435340) Journal
      It's all about Mountain Dew Code Red these days, old timer.

      I'm sure Dr Pepper goes just fine with your FORTRAN subroutines.

  • corporate buyouts (Score:4, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:05PM (#5435310)
    These bloggers should be ashamed of themselves; if I ever catch them I'll beat them senseless and then celebrate with an ice cold Mr. Pibb

  • Okay let me think this through.. (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    1. Slashdot is a weblog.
    2. A company is advertising a product through weblogs.
    3. Said company is giving away merchandise for the advertisements to weblog owners.
    4. Slashdot is advertising the product and linking to product.

    Therefore, Cowboyneal already got a case of the stuff and is mixing up moos & rums.
  • You read the 'opinions', 'news' and thoughts of an individual, but it's really just an ad for a product thinly veiled as personal insight?

    Where have I seen that before?

    Oh well, it doesnt matter.

    BTW, CmdrTaco, that t68i phone [slashdot.org] sounds amazing! I'll be sure to buy one tout-suite! Thanks for the information!
  • By reading the article, it appears clear that even if the people who will be reviewing the products think the drinks taste like stale goat urine, they won't be able to voice it.
    Beginning with an initial group of six people in their late teens and early 20s--flown to Dallas with their parents for an induction session
    Does this sound kind of familiar [bookofseg.com] to anyone else?

  • Blogging For Dollars (Score:2, Interesting)

    by E-Rock-23 ( 470500 )
    Now, if I were to sell out my blog space (be it on my site, here on /., or wherever) to advertise for any one thing, it'd have to be either Pr0n (send me some porn stars, man!), a Dutch "Coffee Bar" (yeah, send me the green stuff, chief!), or a company like Manga Ent. or Pioneer (send me free Anime, baby, yeah!).

    On the good side, allowing regular folks to say what they want about a product in a public forum might just curtail the "popular culture" ideas forcefed to us by corporations. Take the spin out of there hands, and the public is less dizzy and more observant. Send me one of those Diva Stars dolls that talk, and I'll slam it for improper use of English. Send me a Brittany Spears CD, and I'll trash it for lack of quality song content. Send me anything Disney, and I'll tell you about how they've made their fortune off of Public Domain works (Snow White, Cinderella, Jungle Book), yet refuse to let Mickey Mouse (circa Steamboat Willie) go into the Public Domain.

    Maybe if people started listing to other people just like them, we can buck this corproate trend setting kick we're on...

  • Raging Cow is great (Score:5, Funny)

    by Col. Klink (retired) ( 11632 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:06PM (#5435331)
    Why would they have to pay people? Raging Cow [ragingcow.com] is such a wonderful product, it sells itself.

    Before I used Raging Cow, my life was miserable. Now I'm more popular than ever and my sex life has improved!

    Where do I go to apply for my free stuff?
    • Col. Klink (retired),

      Thank you for advertising our 'Raging Cow' milk-based (now less phlegm inducing than 'Code Red Cow Drink') drink. My company and I applaud your efforts of joining the 21st century of blogging. Our Vice President recently remarked, and I quote, "Col. Klink (retired) has increased our sales three-fold! Send him a 12-pack of our finest non-phlegmy milk-based drink".

      I concur, Col. Klink (retired). You can now look forwards to receiving a refreshingly cool phlegm-free drink in your mailbox (please allow 6-8 weeks for shipping).

      Tell your friends!
      CEO Dr. Pepper

  • next "big thing" in advertising... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Queelix ( 635663 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:07PM (#5435342)

    What does it tell you about this 'next "big thing"' that I spent 5 minutes at this site trying to figure out what it was trying to sell and had to google 'raging cow' to figure out somewhere else that it is flavored milk. Ugh.

    Chicks wrestling in mud to sell beer. Now *that's* the 'next "big thing"'!

    Q...

  • So they flew in 6 people and their parents to talk about this extreme milk drink called Raging Cow, and all they are going to pay these people is promotional products? Like Raging Cow shirts and hats?

    Wouldn't it have been cheaper to just offer to mail out a shirt or hat or bumper sticker to anyone that posts a banner or something in their blog? And how did they determine that these 6 people are the ultimate in-crowd?

    It sounds to me like some marketing monkey just started scanning headlines to see wht was popular. "BLOGS! That's the next big thing! We'll get lots of marketing done that way!"

    Uh huh. Riiiiiiiight.

    Unless one of those 6 was Michael. After all he did post the story to /. I hope he gets a shirt out of it :)

  • This is absurd. (Score:5, Funny)

    by generic-man ( 33649 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:08PM (#5435356) Homepage Journal
    I find it impossible to believe that in this day and age, a large soft drink company such as Dr. Pepper thinks that they can buy their way into the hearts of good American people and get them to buy their new drink Raging Cow. Shame on you, Dr. Pepper, for inciting many good-hearted Netizens to shill for your company, Dr. Pepper, and its new drink Raging Cow.

    I would just like to say that advertising has no impact on me and that I do not associate this ongoing Dr. Pepper campaign with Raging Cow. I am a free-thinking, free-willed individual, and it would be an outrage to think that I am dumb enough to fall for Dr. Pepper's marketing. In fact, all marketing is evil, and you (Dr. Pepper) are furthering that stereotype with the marketing for your new drink, Raging Cow.

    I'm so mad, in fact, that I will instead drink dnL [dnl-flipit.com] , another new beverage. dnL has all the great taste of 7-up, but with caffeine and a new rush of citrus flavor taste! dnL - Flip it! In fact, if you reply to this post, I'll send you a coupon good for one free dnL. dnL - Flip it!

  • they're testing the advertising, not the colas (Score:5, Insightful)

    by GLowder ( 622780 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:08PM (#5435357)
    With product names of "Chocolate Insanity" and "Pina Colada Chaos" it seems they'll bomb. Some exec at Dr Pepper probably decided to try and see what kind of impact this "new medium" might do for advertising what should be a quickly dead product. If it makes their marketing marginally better, you'll see it down the road for Dr Pepper's regular products. (Dr Pepper Exec)"Let's not just tarnish the good old Dr Pepper and Diet Dr Pepper just yet with something that might be thought of as odd from an advertising standpoint."(/Dr Pepper Exec)

  • this doesn't bother me a bit. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Hitch ( 1361 ) <hitch@nOSPAm.propheteer.org> on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:08PM (#5435358) Homepage
    no one takes bloggers as an "unbiased news source" to begin with - and the people are free to advertise in any way they want, right? that means if they really do think it's crap, they're either a) going to say so or b) stop accepting it and stop writing about it. their only form of compensation is merchandise, so I'm more inclined to trust them than someone who says "oh, yeah, I LOVE Dr. Pepper! that's why they paid me $30,000 to appear in this commercial!". This blogger is saying "I LOVE Dr. Pepper! That's why I'm happily accepting crateloads of stuff to tell you about them!". IMHO, (I know, no such thing) this is actually a bit more sincere.
  • This is really going to undermine the people that blog about how much Mountain Dew they drink. Now we'll think they were being paid.
    Bah. They're not "up all night coding/playing Quake" or whatever. They really do sleep 8 hours a night.

    Damn posers.

  • It works better that they thought... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by jea6 ( 117959 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:08PM (#5435360)
    I bet there aren't really "key bloggers of influence". Bloggers out there are writing about "Raging Cow" astroturfing with no compensation thus attaining the original goal of spreading brand awareness (http://www.google.com/search?sourceid=navclient&q =%22Raging+Cow%22+blog [google.com]). Nobel Marketing Prize 2003.

  • gah (Score:2, Insightful)

    by nomadic ( 141991 )
    assuming people are willing to sell out their blog space.

    Oh please. Most of the people who run weblogs would probably sell out faster than a $5.00 PlayStation 2.
  • I can't possibly see how this could really work in Dr. Pepper's favor, but considering the cost, it sounds like an interesting gambit. Individual blogs, while growing in popularity, will never reach the critical mass of readers to drive advertising interest. A more realistic model would be to tie in with the major blogging sites, to get visibility across a wide class of blogs, rather than hook up with individuals.
  • So, in other words, in the near future, we're going to see the editor, Michael, walking around with a Dr. Pepper hat and toting a Dr. Pepper bookbag....

    He posted the story, he must be one of the six.
  • "Yeah, I read his Blog till he sold out."

    And you though punk and indie rockers could be bad.
  • They've done this with segway. They selected people that were highly involved with internet from a social aspect to give the first free segweys. Then the dorks did a better job than marketing ever could.

    For this level of work, I think this is much better than hiring a marketer.
  • In a related story, Star Jones is suing Raging Cow manufacturer, Dr. Pepper, for trademark infringement.

  • "Hi.." (Score:2, Funny)

    by grub ( 11606 )

    "Hi, like.. my name is Ashley and I'm.. like.. a corporate BlogWhore.."
  • So they plan on getting people to talk up a new product by plugging it on their blog. Then I suppose the idea is to make this new product into a cult phenomenon. Will that make the Raging Cow the next golden calf?
    Hmm...making me hungry now. Anyone want to go get a Mooby burger [dogma-movie.com]?

  • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

    by account_deleted ( 4530225 )
    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Well at least SOMEBODY is trying new things (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Bvardi ( 620485 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:13PM (#5435413)
    At least it is nice to see some advertisers not going the route of picking traditional media and then using legislation to force that media upon people despite changing technology (Can anyone here remember a certain quote about using PVR's to skip ads being "stealing"?) Personally it's nice to see different models of advertising being explored... maybe with some luck we'll see a less invasive model that is more effective for advertisers and less annoying for everyday consumers. (Mind you I realize the likelyhood of that is about the same as Microsoft going the non profit corporation route..) Still, at least product endorsement/placement in blogging is preferable to having them install an LCD on the inside of my eyeballs and forcing ads into my subconscious. After all my subconscious is scary enough as it currently stands.

  • Beware of what? (Score:5, Insightful)

    by nanojath ( 265940 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:14PM (#5435427) Homepage Journal
    bloggers beware


    Beware of what? Guess what kids - your culture is being appropriated by the marketeers! (pause for gasps of astonishment and chagrin).


    Is there even a line between culture and commerce anymore? In any event, the raging cow site drips with manufactured "kewl" - if you're influenced by this kind of pap you deserve to be sold carbonated milk, or whatever the hell it is.

  • Hmm. (Score:4, Funny)

    by superdan2k ( 135614 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:14PM (#5435428) Homepage Journal
    Looks like I should contact Apple [apple.com], Nissan [nissan.com], and Seven [sevencycles.com] about improving my lifestyle. I already sing the praises of my iBook and XTerra...and a custom built Axiom Titanium would round out my stable quite nicely.

  • I'm a blogger, you're a a blogger (Score:5, Funny)

    by sulli ( 195030 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:17PM (#5435471) Journal
    he's a a blogger, she's a a blogger, would you like to be a blogger too?

  • So long as the blogger is honest (Score:3, Interesting)

    by lavalyn ( 649886 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:18PM (#5435479) Homepage Journal
    I don't have a problem with it. If the blogger states on their site that they are receiving promotional goods from Dr. Pepper, then this form of advertising is about equivalent to banner ads with the little word "advertisement" underneath. Annoying but fair.

    Somehow I don't think the bloggers will do that, so ignore what I just said.
    • I took a quick look on the blogs linked to hte Raging Cow page and none of them mention it, and a few of them included links or photos to the Raging Cow page, and referenced it like it was just another blogger.

      Pretty sad.

      Of course, it is pretty stupid of Dr. Pepper to have paid the money to fly them out if all they are doign is putting a link in their blog.

  • drink ads (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Lxy ( 80823 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:19PM (#5435495) Journal
    I dunno, you can advertise a drink in any way you want to, but good advertising does not a good beverage make. Maybe it works for some people, but an advertisement makes me buy a drink once. From there on, the only way I'd buy it again is if it lived up to the hype.

    Friends tell me how much I need to try Red Bull. I finally buy a can. Tastes like shit. No amount of persuasion from friends or TV will ever convince me to try it again.

    Code Red. Why Pepsi is messing with Moutain Dew is beyond me. I try a bottle. Tastes like shit. I'll never buy Code Red again.

    Vanilla Coke. I hear it advertised on the radio. I'm passing a convenience store, buy a bottle. Tastes like Coke and vanilla, but seperate. No blending of flavors. I'll never buy that again.

    So, now there's some new drink from Dr. Pepper. I'll probably hear about it on the radio, or maybe see a blog. I'll buy a bottle some day. If I like it, I buy more. If I don't, I won't buy it ever again.

    • Re:drink ads (Score:5, Funny)

      by cgreuter ( 82182 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:46PM (#5435766)
      Code Red.

      I'd never heard of Code Red until that IIS worm. Maybe that's what Raging Cow needs too.

      After all, aren't they trying to do viral marketing here?

    • Re:drink ads (Score:3, Insightful)

      by Idarubicin ( 579475 )
      So, now there's some new drink from Dr. Pepper. I'll probably hear about it on the radio, or maybe see a blog. I'll buy a bottle some day. If I like it, I buy more. If I don't, I won't buy it ever again.

      That's what advertising is supposed to do.

      You heard about the product; you tried buying the product.

      If 10% of the people in the States buy only one bottle, that's still more than 25 million units sold. Small potatoes, yes--but if they get 10% of those to like the stuff, then that's nearly three million hooked customers. Ka-ching!

  • I figured out how they chose the 6 bloggers! (Score:5, Funny)

    by GreyyGuy ( 91753 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:25PM (#5435557)
    If you look at the blogs linked on the Raging Cow page, you will see they all have one thing in common.

    Each one has some of the most horrible web design I've ever seen! Getting rid of any sort of indicator for URLs. Lots and lots of frames. Colors that make my eyes bleed. It's like they all read every book on what not to do and did it.

    The marketing people must have thought that the pages are so bad they loop around the scale and become super-impressive and a hip.

  • Blogging Synergy (Score:3, Funny)

    by poena.dare ( 306891 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:28PM (#5435592)
    Corporate America has found a new advertising medium in blogging. However, to cut costs they have turned their prison-run call centers into "blog farms." While the results were extremely entertaining, they ended up sending the wrong message.

    ---

    Slash, Rapist: Nothing in life is better than roughly grabbing the firm, artificial nodules of a semiconscious drunken whore and yelling exuberantly, "Ollie, Ollie, Oxen Free" at the top of my lungs to passing fear-filled elderly couples. Afterwards I had a Raging Cow with a shot of tequila in it...

    Jim Tumor, Paranoid Schizophrenic: At the party we all had Raging Cows and celebrated by taking a slightly soggy slice of very moldy wheat bread and meticulously fashioning a quaint decorative party hat out of it for our dearest companion and pet lama, Cuthbert...

    Lonnie Tingle, Murderer: Man, those Raging Cow drinks are great! I wish my life could have been as good as one of them. I guess it all went wrong when I repeatedly stabbed my parents with a dull kitchen knife because the circumcision I had when I was 8 days old went horribly awry...

    Dave Candyman, Burglar: Often while enjoying the quaint bouquet of a Raging Cow, I would follow rich looking strangers at the local mall parking lot until they noticed. To explain myself I would innocently explain that I was looking for my baby brother, and at the same time, memorize their licence plate number...

    Delbert Flapdoodle, Habitual Drunk: Gosh darn! Life can sure be funny sometimes. I always thought Raging Cow was an insult. It wasn't until the time my Jug and Washboard band was mistakenly booked to perform in a seedy dive in Harlem that I learned the truth...

    Mac Soul, Stalker: As we relaxed on the couch, we shared a Raging Cow. I needed her to understand me. I would never hurt her in a million years! So I kept slowly massaging her delicate legs in a way that said, "Don't worry, I know we are just friends - but - if you ever want to take it further then it's fine with me." I kept waiting for her to say yes. Desperately waiting. Desperate...

    Magzo Berman, Sociopath; I am taping the empty bottle of Raging Cow on my keyboard. Tap. Tap. Tap. Just 'cause I like the sound of the tapping, ever tapping, like the tapping on my chamber door. Quoth the Raven, "Nevermore!" Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha and ha!

  • I don't know which is worse. (Score:5, Funny)

    by RatBastard ( 949 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:30PM (#5435604) Homepage
    I don't know which is worse, the number of "Sign me up, dude!" posts, or the cheap price you all have for selling your soul to corporate America. It's like those Tufts students who let spammers use their email accounts for $20.00 a month.

    What amazes me about America is NOT that we seem to be a nation of whores, but that we are a nation of cheap whores.

  • What's really amazing... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by foo fighter ( 151863 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:32PM (#5435627) Homepage
    isn't that people are marketing this stuff in their blog. It is Dr. Pepper providing gear for their efforts.

    Most people walk around happy to sport logos everywhere: their t-shirts, shoes, cars, computers (or computer components). They actually pay for the privilege. Why anyone would be surprised or upset about the tables being turned, I don't understand.

    Product placement in our entertainment is everywhere and will become even more prevelent as traditional marketing becomes less effective. I view blogs as primarily entertainment and was frankly expecting this.

    BTW, anyone see the Ford Focus car chase in Alias? I had to turn it off when they zoomed in for a lingering shot on the Focus' logo. Blech.

  • Cycle (Score:3, Interesting)

    by pizza_milkshake ( 580452 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @04:54PM (#5435827)
    Ah, it's a new cycle. Suddenly there's a fresh new thing, blogs (which i never got anyways... how is posting stuff to a website different than what we were doing before blogs were big? but that's its own post). blogs are hip and cool and edgy, because people talk about anything and everything, from the mundane to the extraordinary. from work to movies to politics to sex.

    there are no boundaries, etc etc. some of these bloggers start to get extremely popular -- popular enough for big companies to notice. an untapped market! there are tens of thousands of blogs and millions of regular readers. the 10 most popular blogs get more traffic than some daily newspapers. the people who write these things are influential, because the readers can identify with them and their daily struggle/musings/etc.

    so now the marketers recruit the bloggers and pay them to endorse their product. it seems great at first -- we can have edgy *and* corporate messages. but then someone goes too far. they talk politics or say something in very poor taste and the company's lawyers get worried that they will be identified as promoting this kind of thought/talk/ideology. not good for the company's image, which said company spends $10s of millions promoting each year.

    the company implements one tiny rule. and then another slip-up, and another rule, etc etc.

    now instead of a "stream of consciousness public journal" you have what amounts to be a person being paid by a company to endorse their product and not talk about "bad things" and it ceases to become what made it so popular in the first place and blogs join other less-exciting media channels like radio, tv, and the pre-previews at the movies.

  • and in other news (Score:3, Funny)

    by British ( 51765 ) <british1500@gmail.com> on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @05:08PM (#5435957) Homepage Journal
    Pfeizer will be teaming up with LiveJournal.com to test out new antidepressants for various teens. Results from the new antidepressants can be measured by the "Current mood" feature pesent on most livejournal entries.

  • Sign up Stile. (Score:3, Funny)

    by supabeast! ( 84658 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @05:22PM (#5436082)
    I would LOVE to see StileProject promoting Dr. Pepper.

    Too bad the Goatse man is dead...

  • How Ironic (Score:4, Funny)

    by skintigh2 ( 456496 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @05:41PM (#5436257)
    I ran a Dr Pepper rip off page (one of the first, not the best) and tried repeatedly to get any response from Dr Pepper. They had no interest in me whatsoever, and the one time I visited Texas and took the opportunity to take a photo of their sign, a SECURITY GUARD ran out and chased me away, as it was a SECURITY VIOLATION TO LOOK AT THE SIGN. What a bunch of assholes. Why the fuck do you put up a sign next to a fucking highway if you don't want people to look at it? And exactly how the fuck is looking at a fucking logo going to ,make a fucking difference to their "security?" (I am not aware if that guard's name was Rumsfeld)

    Anyway, when I got tired of my collection and knew others were, too, I wondered if Dr Pepper would want it for their Dr Pepper Museum. Although they make it impossible to find a way to contact them, I eventually did, and was replied to with a form letter about where I can buy merchadise.

    I felt loved.

    I'm glad I've been so loyal.

    Anyway, here is my sadly outdated page [tripod.com]

  • Obligatory Futurama quote... (Score:5, Funny)

    by taernim ( 557097 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @05:50PM (#5436334) Homepage
    Leela: "Didn't you have ads in the 20th century?"

    Fry: "Well sure, but not in our dreams! Only on tv and radio...and in magazines...and movies. And at ball games, on buses, and milk cartons, and t-shirts, and bananas, and written on the sky. But not in dreams! No sirree."

  • What's the difference? (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ccnull ( 607939 ) <null@@@filmcritic...com> on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @06:02PM (#5436454) Homepage
    99% of blogs exist solely to promote their creators and their works -- I know that's what mine [chrisnull.com] is for, he said with no trace of irony. If anything, this just gives people a chance to stop droning on and on about themselves for a second. Seriously... I think the blog community is nifty, but honestly I'll be glad for the break from navel-gazing.

    PS Anyone need a plug? Paypal me...

  • We're helping plug the Good Doctor as we *speak*.. (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Aropax20 ( 636154 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @06:52PM (#5436804)
    Has anyone stopped to think how this article is giving Dr Pepper a really thorough promotion? I mean, how many times has the product in question been mentioned in this article on /. so far? I heard a theory once that if J. Random Consumer is confronted with a name 7 times in quick succession, it'll stick!

    I don't drink the stuff, but I can guarantee I'll be thinking about it all day *grimace*

    Now there's an interesting way to advertise - get your product made the subject of a /. story... we've been had!

    Fly, my pretties! Storm those blogs and slashdot them to hell and back!!

  • Semi-existence of Bryon (Score:3, Informative)

    by 3ryon ( 415000 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @07:43PM (#5437102)
    I don't know if any of you remember my site but I was one of the original bloggers. Anyway, sometime in ~1996 Intel took notice of my site and decided to make me a "beta user" of their new web cam. They asked nothing in return, but it was obvious that they were hoping to get a mention on my page (it was pretty popular...about 5,000 readers at its peak...remember this was the mid-90's). So, what I'm saying is that this is nothing new.

  • Does advertising work? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Merk ( 25521 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @07:59PM (#5437187) Homepage

    This may be the wrong place to ask this question since Slashdot is mostly computer geeks and not marketing geeks, but I'll try anyhow:

    Has there ever been a study that shows conclusively that advertising works?

    I ask this question because I know that there are times when it doesn't work. My dad used to work for the local phone company in an economics position. At one point a study came across his desk that said that in studies the phone company had done, the rate of advertising for long distance services had absolutely no effect on the rate of long distance calls. But did they stop advertising? No! His take on this was that advertising was so ingrained in the corporate culture that nobody was willing to get rid of it, even if it didn't work.

    Now this is one study of one service offered by a local monopoly so it's not anything I'd use to generalize, but I sure found it interesting. Here was a huge company that had seen a study saying that their advertising had no effect but they still kept advertising.

    I just wonder how much of advertising is based on sound science. I would imagine that there are situations where advertising does work. If people are unaware of a product, advertising can announce its existence. Another one I'm sure works is advertising sales or discounts. Again, informing a potential consumer of a fact that might change their mind about buying a product. But what about advertising for established brands? If Coke stopped advertising altogether, how much of an effect would it have on their bottom line? Do the costs of their ads pay for themselves in increased sales?

    I would love to see fewer ads. I already use an ad blocking proxy so I miss most of the ones on the web, but I still see commercials, billboards, magazine ads, and all kinds of other obnoxious things every day. Wouldn't it be great if someone could prove that most of these ads just don't work? I'd even be happier if they were replaced by more effective, informative ads. I just always have the impression that ads are chosen because the people with the advertising budget like them, not because anybody can show what effect they'll have on sales. Maybe I'm wrong?

  • I don't "get" blogging. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by LazyBoy ( 128384 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @08:54PM (#5437424)
    Why is anyone reading anyone else's daily adventures?
    Seems worse than reality TV (which I hate). Ugh.

  • Sponsored Slashdot Comments (Score:3, Interesting)

    by ruzel ( 216220 ) on Tuesday March 04, 2003 @09:06PM (#5437476) Homepage
    I've always thought that Slashdot (or any other slash site) could make some money by having "sponsored" comments. Companies could list themselves as being available to be sponsored in comments. When a user posts a comment and marks it as a candidate for sponsorship (presumably by choosing a sponsor from a list), then the company gets emailed the post and dis/approves. For every comment they approve, they pay Slashdot some amount of money that could be split with the poster -- or maybe some amount of money towards a subscription.

    The comment would get posted as sponsored so that purists can filter them out. I think it would be generally good for software and web site reviews/comments.

    The bullshit thing about advertising is that companies can say whatever they want without backing it up, which means most of us have become very cynical about advertising -- and advertising in turn has become little more than an "awareness" tool. But commentary from users is usually pretty helpful (as long as it's not vague). Just look at the Switch campaign for Apple for a good example.
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