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A NYT piece (free registration) describes another instance of folks using Google keywords as marketing. The folks behind teen-novel “Be More Chill” created a constellation of 14 Web sites around the book’s plot device, the “squip,” a tiny imaginary edible supercomputer that gives its eater social advice on the spot. With all the new hormones coursing through teens’ systems, I can see how such a thing could come in handy.

Anyway, at the end of the book, author Ned Vizzini, exhorts readers to find out more about the squip with the words “squip: Google it.” (Just like Motionizer.)

The experience of marketing the book, at sites like iwanttobecool.org, celebritysquip.com and squipnews.com, has led Vizzini and his marketing partner, Adam Collett, to start an “interactive contextual advertising” firm, The Brain Bridge.

Other Web site constellation marketing ideas:

AI: Artificial Intelligence

BMW (for Mini Cooper)

Let me know (theriver at mcnigel.com) if you remember more than I can.

Now, I probably shouldn’t post this because the tenant living in my Manhattan apartment works for the agency that does this type of work for Mazda. (Not that my comments are going to get the agency fired, but…) Anyway, this is the most transparent and offensive thing I have seen lately. If you want to be part of the blogging world, you’ve gotta be genuine. Let’s tick off the reasons I hate this.

1. Non-user-initiated video and audio
   
2. The “blog” launched four days ago and already two of the four posts just happen to be about, or link to, “viral” videos that feature Mazda automobiles.
   
3. This is supposed to be from a 22-year-old photographers assistant, but he just happens to include “M3,” the abbreviation for Mazda’s entry-level vehicle, in his blog’s URL.
   
4. He also just happens, in his profile, to indicate he likes “cars” and all of the films he likes happen to feature car chases. (Eek, while looking at other blogger profiles who said they liked Bullit, I found NetZero’s blog for its fictional presidential candidate.)
   

What did Mazda do right? Allowing comments.

TimmyGUNZ said…

This commercial sucks. Maybe if it wasn’t for a piece of shit car like a Mazda it would have potential. Only an idiot would ever buy a Mazda!!!

[found via AdRants]

UPDATE: Allan Jenkins reports the comments have been taken down. The “blogger” also reacts to the criticism.

My husband and I are doing a lot of traveling these days, what with the bi-coastal relationship and all. So it’s a great opportunity for me to check out some of the emerging travel search players like Yahoo’s Farechase (IE only), Kayak.com and SideStep (toolbar download necessary).

So, given the above caveats (“IE only” and “toolbar download necessary”) I am probably searching with Kayak a bit more often than with the others. Booked my first flight via Kayak today and enjoyed the user experience. I love that it “remembers” my previous searches, so I can just modify slightly, if necessary — change the dates, for example. This time, to book the cheapest most convenient flight (on Delta), I had the choice of going to Orbitz or to Delta.com. Tried going direct first, and couldn’t find that fare anywhere on Delta’s site. Then, Orbitz.com had it immediately. I don’t even pretend to understand how the airlines do their distribution and pricing. I just want the best fare. Kayak’s Flash interface, which I was using, seems to be a bit of a memory hog. But since that Google Desktop Search app is STILL indexing my hard drive (I’m going on 6 days now, Fred.), things could be slowing down due to that. (Or countless other things!)

What’s fantastic from Kayak’s point of view is that it gets to be solely a search company (and a media company) and can leave things like actually booking the flight, or dealing with CRM things like flight notifications, to others. What a relief, I’d think, not to require a call center to deal with people wanting to change their flights.

Note: I wrote about Kayak on ClickZ News a little while back.

So, yesterday on ClickZ News, I wrote a piece on the launch of a new wireless ad network. Then today, I get a newsletter (archived copy here), sections of which look awfully familiar. Hmmm….

As if the famous heart attack anecdote isn’t enough, Google is once again saving lives. From the BBC comes a story of how an Australian hostage in Iraq was freed because a Google search convinced his captors he didn’t work for the CIA or a U.S. contractor.

From the story:

[John Martinkus’] executive producer at Australia’s SBS network, Mike Carey, said Google probably saved freelance journalist Martinkus.

“They Googled him and then went onto a web site – either his own or his book publisher’s web site, I don’t know which one – and saw that he was who he was, and that was instrumental in letting him go, I think, or swinging their decision,” he told AP news agency.

My former journalism professor, Sree Sreenivasan, takes it as yet another sign that journalists need their own Web sites. Point taken, Sree.

There’s been a lot of blog linking the past couple of days to a Baylor College of Medicine study on how “cultural messages” (i.e. advertising, marketing, branding) affect the brain.

The sixty-seven people tested showed no preference for either Coke or Pepsi when they didn’t know which drink was which. When told what they were drinking, roughly three-fourths preferred Coke. All 67 also submitted to brain scans, and researchers said they could tell — even before people took a drink — which brand they preferred, because of the MRI.

“There?s a huge effect of the Coke label on brain activity related to the control of actions, the drudging up of memories, and things that involve self-image,” said Dr. Read Montague, director of the Brown Human Neuroimaging Lab, in the press release.

Really fascinating stuff.

More from Montague in the press release:

“We live in a sea of cultural messages. Everybody has heard of Coke and Pepsi, they have messages, and, in the case of Coke, those messages have insinuated themselves in our nervous systems. There is a response in the brain which leads to a behavioral effect ?- in this case, personal preference -? regarding these beverages.”

The study appeared in the Oct. 14 issue of the journal Neuron.

Kudos to my homies in Houston at Baylor College of Medicine.