Feeling unsafe: NFL looks for a image rebirth

In some of the previous posts, here at Bizandbuzz, and in a late comment at CK's blog, I was asking: what about is you are a sport sponsor? Still feeling safe in putting money in major sport events?

Just to recap what happened in the last months:

- the Tour de France was hit by several case of doping and some cyclists were kicked out the race, anyway too late: the two German major TV stations drop the the race from their programming.

- a NBA referee admitted he was betting on his own matches and said several other referees and athletes can be involved

- a McLaren manager supposedly bought secret papers from a Ferrari engineer about the latest F1 cars

- an acclaimed quarterback, Michael Vick, pleaded guilty to a federal felony charge of conspiracy stemming from a dog-fighting kennel

Indeed several others events happened to tarnish the image of the sport world.

Today the New York Times has an interesting comment about the adv campaign launched by NFL to mend its bruise image.
It's a warning sign that supporters and, maybe, sponsors do feel that sport is no longer such a safe world where to bring your children or put your money.

I suppose that we will see more adv and pr activities like this one, but we need something more if we want to refresh a rather damaged image.

Read more: Mending a bruised image

Technorati Tags: Marketing, sport sponsorship, NBA, NFL, Formula 1, Michael Vick, Tour de France, cyclism, football, New York Times

Blogger Social '08

As for every communities, there is always a time to meet and know each other.
If The age of conversation has been a tremendous way of gathering and then spreading the thoughts and the words of 103 bloggers from all over the world, the Blogger Social '08 in New York will be the time for the off line reunion.
An event that will mark for many of us, to me for sure, a new level of engagement in a worldwide community and the chance to further ignite our conversations.

Go there and see the no rules policy to attend the event and be a social animal.

Technorati Tags: Marketing, community, Blogger Social '08, New York, CK

Turn the table and see what happens

While some commenters, such as CK and Lewis Green, make efforts to understand why so many products made in China are dangerous to our health and where the responsibilities are, the Chinese government is turning the table and shifting every responsibilities on the western companies.

My personal opinion is:

1. western companies are indeed liable for concentrating only on saving money but with no control on method, rules to achieve the financial result
2. the Chinese government shows once more that in a country without democracy it's rather difficult to hear voices admitting problems and corruption is higher than everywhere else

China is currently manufacturing most of the products sold around the world but at what price:

1. a high rate of pollution and, as we know, pollution does not know borders and this is a price we are going to pay sooner or later
2. a significant number of concerns about quality and safety for these products, food, garments, toys, etc.
3. an incredible number of infringments of copyright and patent laws; a German car magazine, Automobilwoche, claims today that BMW and Daimler are issuing legal actions to avoid the exhibition of three chinese cars equal to three model produced in Germany, just to mention the last
4. the civil, human and animal rights are bypassed every single day

Am I a bit paranoic?
Or are we just running without considering in whole the consequences of what's going on?
What's your opinion?

Technorati Tags: Marketing, China, Mattel, BMW, Daimler, Lewis Green, CK, Automobilwoche

Would you......(3)

(picture from AndreasNYC Flickr photostream)

A football superstar, Michael Vick, is expected to plead guilty for an horrible crime: dogs fighting and dogs murder.
Why it' s horrible: cause Vick and partners were training the dogs, make them fight and kill the dogs underperforming. And they did so in a very professional way, a real industry.
He will be probably sent to jail, fired from the Falcons and by the sponsors.
But th best reaction came from the Falcons supporters: they ask the worst for him.

I ate him and his partners because I love animals and dogs, specifically, and I hope that his career is ended and not to see him anymore on a football field.


But I want to see the story from a marketing point of view.

Everyday there is more and more story involving athletes of any sports, football, basket, cyclism, etc.
And I feel that sport sponsorship is becoming a mine field.

Winning is everything, no matter the way, but this is becoming a threat to the sponsors: who wants to have his carefully nurtured brand or product linked to an athlete or a sport accused of bribery?

Would you put your money on an athlet or a sport with more or less trust today than it was in the past?
Which question would you ask for to stay as safe as possible?
Would you accept to sponsor not the questioned big winner but the one who plays ethically?

Technorati Tags: Michael Vick, marketing, sport sponsorship, brand, dogs, dog fighting

Would you...... (2)

The late Mattel case is the latest warning sign that China is a real and tangible problem to the world.

Forget all the bullshit about China being the engine of the world economy. China is a polluting engine that could kill the world.

Products are manufactured without any rules, by underpaid workers, sometimes by political prisoners.

And we close our eyes to the human rights violation for the sake of our greed.
This nation will organize the next Olympic games and there is always open discussion about the possibility for the athletes to show and tell their concerns about these violations.

The responsibilities are not only on China but on all the companies that moved productions over there: they should control and be held responsible for those manufacturing under their labels.
Since years now, labour issues and now safety and health issues are linked with products manufactured in the emerging countries, where the greed of few is creating troubles for the health of a lot of people everywhere in the world.

It’s time to give to China and to all the companies manufacturing there a strong sign that this situation has to come to an end.

Would you be willing to pay a premium for safer products manufactured in a safe environment?

Technorati Tags: marketing, china, mattel, barbie, olympic games, human rights, ethic, business

Would you.......(1)

Everyday hundreds of thousands of animals are slaughtered for the only purpose of men.
Food, skin, furs everything that can create a benefit to men.
But is this sacrifice worth?
The cruelty of men is justified by the need of food? Shouldn’t we pay a tribute to these animals and ensure to them a soft death?

All these questions are not new to me but, lately, had become more and more crucial, especially after having seen frames from Fast food nation.

We are so entangled in the quest of food at cheap price, the we lost the sense of the rituality.

In the past, the sacrifice of the animals were full of this rituality and had a extremely high value.
Today we are cruel without even think about it.

Would you be willing to pay a premium for food coming by a company investing on a gentle death for animals?

Or you just don’t give a damn?

Technorati Tags: animals, vegetarian, vegan, meatpacking, fast food nation, marketing, ethic, business

Close for holidays

Bizandbuzz goes on holidays!
Back on line August 15th!

Ciao, G.

Marketing and sport: a tricky situation part 2

While the situation for the cyclism is gettin worst and worst (yesterday Rasmussen, the leader of the Tour de France, was kicked out from his team, one other racer was arrested for doping and the French press claim the Tour is dead), other sports have no reason to be happy.

NBA: even if David Stern try to minimise the story, to have a referee who admit to put money of the matches he had to run and is involved with the mob, well this is a real mess.
Tim Donaghy undermined the legacy of the NBA. How many match final results were affected by the referee? Are we sure that he is the only one? No other referee, no other players were involved?

F1: in the meantime, in Paris, the International Federation is helding a trial against Mercedes McLaren team. The team is accused to have spied the Ferrari team. Lot of documents proving this story have been found at the house of one top engineer of the McLaren team. The team could be excluded by the World Championship with huge economic damage and image damage for McLaren and Mercedes. The main sponsor is Vodafone.

As we all can see, the sport world is under a big threat.

Should we expect a decrease of the audience for the sports involved in these events?
In your position of consultant and marketing men and women, what would you suggest to a client of yours?

Technorati Tags: Marketing, sport event, nba, formula 1, tour de france, mercedes mclaren, ferrari, tim donaghy, rasmussen, david stern

Marketing and sport: a tricky situation

The latest news from the Tour de France are a very bad sign for cyclism and for sport.

To recap:

- the former leader of the Tour was found positive to a banned drug
- the two major german TV Stations immediately stop to broadcast the race
- the new hero of the Tour, and the favourite racer at the beginning of the race, was found positive to testosterone

All this in a race who claimed to be the cleanest one.
Most of the sponsors will probably withdraw their money for the next season.

Is this story limited to cyclism?
I'm afraid not. And if I was a marketing manager who put money in sport events I would worry about it.
Who can reassure me that my brand is not linked to a doped athlete?
How badly my brand can be hurt by such a correlation?

If you were is such a tricky situation, how would you react?
Withdraw?
Resist?

Technorati Tags: Marketing, sport sponsorship, tour de france, doping

Ethic, honesty, transparency (to be cont'd)

Few weeks ago, I made a post about the Guillaume Prébois, the journalist running the his own Tour the France under medical control in clean condition.

The Tour organization has made a statement to fight against any form of doping and to stay a clean race and banning cyclists who were caught doping or under trial for doping.
A clear marketing move to retain sponsors, sell the race to the TV Stations.

But yesterday something went broken.

A German cyclist has been found positive to an antidoping control on June 8, well before the Tour, but he was in the race until three days ago.

The two major German Television, ZDF and ARD, decided to stop to broadcast the Tour.
Nikolaus Brender, from ZDF on behalf of the two TV channels, said: "We cannot air an event with athlets and teams that may be using drugs. We want to show that we can sustain the movement if and only if it is clean. And this is a message for all the other sports, too."

This is a move that should make all the marketers to think about how the sponsorship in sport events are a delicate topic, how is important to carefully choose the sport and the face to marry your brand.

The fastest is not always the best.
The honest, yes.
At least for your brand.

Technorati Tags: Tour de France, ZDF, ARD, doping, marketing, sport sponsorship

Dune restaurant blog

Dear all, a quick info about the blog.
Due to my poor technality, I turn the blog over the blogpost platform.
Typepad is far too complicated to me: my fault, indeed.

So go to the new Dune house: www.dunerestaurant.blogspot.com

Enjoy.

Technorati Tags: Dune restaurant, restaurant, roma, rome, italy, food, wine

ads that make me sick

I begin today a new series about awful ads from the Italian market.
I've noticed that the qualitative level of advertising in Italy is rather poor.
Who's to blame for?

1. Agencies are not brave enough to propose bold creative execution. How many times I was in creative presentation where the agency apologize for a proposing something out of the box.
   
2. And how many times I've heard clients doing the job of the creative dept. Getting into meeting with handwritten papers with layout and claim already fixed in their mind. The first question to ask for should have been: are you paid for that? Are you a marketing manager (or a product manager ) or you work for the agency? Who does pay for you salary?
3. Well, to tell the truth, there are the international creative execution to mess the situation further. Those beautiful ads where the local environment is passed by. How many issues this approach has created to companies and agencies?

But let's go the winner for this week.

I do not know what's your knowledge of sailing and winds. But indeed you know that waves go in the wind direction as well as you may konw that the America's Cup boats do not sail with wind over the 18/20 knots.

The Italian watch makers, Sector, defied the law of nature and the rules of the America's Cup in just one ad:

1. the boat is sailing under a gennaker with backwind but against the waves
2. the waves are for a very strong sea, well over the regatta rules and the chance of the boat to float
3. last but not least, they should work a bit on photoshop

Technorati Tags: marketing, sailing, america's cup, mascalzone latino, sector

The heat is on!

Launch date: Monday, July 16th

Formats/Prices:

Hardbacks $29.99
Paperbacks $16.95
E-book $9.99

Background
Dedication

Authors:
Valeria Maltoni
Emily Reed
Katie Chatfield
Greg Verdino
Mack Collier
Lewis Green
Sacrum
Ann Handley
Mike Sansone
Paul McEnany
Roger von Oech
Anna Farmery
David Armano
Bob Glaza
Mark Goren
Matt Dickman
Scott Monty
Richard Huntington
Cam Beck
David Reich
Luc Debaisieux
Sean Howard
Tim Jackson
Patrick Schaber
Roberta Rosenberg
Uwe Hook
Tony D. Clark
Todd Andrlik
Toby Bloomberg
Steve Woodruff
Steve Bannister
Steve Roesler
Stanley Johnson
Spike Jones
Nathan Snell
Simon Payn
Ryan Rasmussen
Ron Shevlin
Roger Anderson
Bob Hruzek
Rishi Desai
Phil Gerbyshak
Peter Corbett
Pete Deutschman
Nick Rice
Nick Wright
Mitch Joel
Michael Morton
Mark Earls
Mark Blair
Mario Vellandi
Lori Magno
Kristin Gorski
Krishna De
Kris Hoet
Kofl Annan
Kimberly Dawn Wells
Karl Long
Julie Fleischer
Jordan Behan
John La Grou
Joe Raasch
Jim Kukral
Jessica Hagy
Janet Green
Jamey Shiels
Dr. Graham Hill
Gia Facchini
Geert Desager
Gaurav Mishra
Gary Schoeniger
Gareth Kay
Faris Yakob
Emily Clasper
Ed Cotton
Dustin Jacobsen
Tom Clifford
David Pollinchock
David Koopmans
David Brazeal
David Berkowitz
Carolyn Manning
Craig Wilson
Cord Silverstein
Connie Reece
Colin McKay
Chris Newlan
Chris Corrigan
Cedric Giorgi
Brian Reich
Becky Carrol
Arun Rajagopal
Andy Nulman
Amy Jussel
AJ James
Kim Klaver
Sandy Renshaw
Susan Bird
Ryan Barrett
Troy Worman
CK
Drew Mcclellan
Gavin Heaton

Technorati Tags: Age of conversation, marketing, blog, drew mcclellan, gavin heaton, gianandrea facchini

Start me up

Yesterday evening, the Rolling Stones were on stage here in Rome.
As wrote in one of the previous post, I had an All access pass and, indeed, got to the concert.
After two hours of a flood of music, the Stones marked again the huge difference between the great rock and roll bands and most of wannabe music heroes of today.

This short video is a 1,44 minute video dedicated to Lewis Green, who made a comment saying "Start me up".
Even if a couple of days late, this is to celebrate the achievement of 1.000 comments on his blog.
Enjoy, man.




The second video is the tribute paid to Keith Richards. His guitar was the opening of all the songs.
He also sang a blues with Ron Wood at the acoustic guitar.
Rock on ,man.

Technorati Tags: Rolling Stones, Keith Richards, Ron Wood, Lewis Green, Rome, Bigger band tour

This is a bold move from MPAA

MPAA in its war against illegal download has finally taken the boldest move possible:

"has launched a site called MiiVi that's dedicated to busting those that are both in the process of downloading copyrighted content, as well as those that have already engaged in the illicit act. Unbeknownst to download pirates who think MiiVi is a legitimate site, the destination allows users to download whole movies. It also features a downloadable app soliciting "fast and easy downloading all in one great site."

As reported by MarketingVoice.

Now, these guys seem to live at the Flinstones age.
Not only, they are not able to find new business model but spend money and time to try to trick the web.
And get eventually discovered in a couple of months.
Well done, guys.
If I was in the industry and pay for your salary, I would fire you.

Technorati Tags: Marketing, MPAA, download, MiiVi, marketing voice

Tagged!!

Well, tags and tagging may be a little boring. We do all our best to avoid e -mails saying deliver to 100 people or you got headache for a weak!
But I have to admit that this is a little different as it make you write something more about yourself. Yes, we do write something about ourselves everyday with our posts and comments. And, lately, I 've seen most of us to turn on a more personal mode.

Anyway, here are Random Things About Me:

1. I love dogs, sometimes more than humans
2. I love Pinot Noir Burgundy stile
3. I love modern art
   
4. I have an All Access pass for the Rolling Stones concert in Rome of tomorrow
5. I have a tattoo with a phrase from Sympathy for the devil
6. I adore Paris (the city, not the Hilton)
7. I love to cook and try new recipe for friends
8. I love Buddhism

And now the tagging for 8 people.

CK - ck-blog
Masiguy - masiguy
Gavin Heaton - servantofchaos
Stephen Denny - note-to-cmo
Pierfrancesco - pier-blog
Simone - simonemorgagni
Drew - drewsmarketingminute
David Armano - darmano

I do not know your reaction to the meme and the tag game but consider this tagging comes from an admirer.

Technorati Tags: fun, meme, game, tag

Feel free to step in

As life is too easy and I have a lot of free time, I have a new blog along with Bizandbuzz.
Please check: http://www.dunerestaurant.typepad.com/

This is the blog of the restaurant, where you can find information about the activity, as exhibition, parties, news about the city of Rome.

Enjoy,G.

Technorati Tags: gianandrea facchini, dune restaurant, rome, roma, italy, food, wine

Small thing that helps in making the world better

Eni, the Italian petrol company, has a new dress code: until September no jacket and tie.
The reason: 9% of saving in electricity and CO2 emission for each centigrade of air conditioning.
The goal: the perception that everyone of us, from the single person to the big company, can do something real for the environment.
The result: a great pr activity that goes along with the other activity named 30% - 24 practical suggestions to save energy, money and the environment.

Congratulation to Paolo Scaroni, the Ceo of Eni.

Technorati Tags: Eni, Paolo Scaroni, environment, marketing, Eni 30percento

Ethic, honesty, transparency

On the Sunday supplement of La Repubblica, I have found this amazing story.
Guillaume Prébois, a 35 years old journalist, will participate to the Grand Boucle, the Tour the France.
He will run the legs of the Tous one day in advance under medical control and making the anti doping control everyday.
The purpose is to show that too many athletes do use addictive drugs to be faster.
Fabio Biasolo, a ultracycler, will support him in this adventure.
We can follow him at www.Lautretour.com

It all started when Tom Boonen, the world champion, at the end of one mountain leg of last Tour de France, said: "today the leg was so tough that a normal person would have gone to hospital"

Why I do post about this story?

1. Because I feel that this could be a great chance for companies to sponsor the clean face of a much discussed sport. Masiguy had some post on the dope issue. (see May 25, 2007)
2. It is a great marketing chance to link your brand to a project where ethic, honesty, transparency are the goals.
3. It is a strong message to all the amateurs of this sport, which has a huge market, about your brand and its positioning as a trusted one.
   

Is your brand in the position to support a project like this?
Is there around other projects like this one that could deliver to your brand?
And last, if Guillaume had asked support to your company, what would have been your answer?

Technorati Tags: marketing, honesty, cycling, dope, guillaume prebois, masiguy, la repubblica, tour de france, la grand boucle, lautretour

A new blogger toolbox

A great new suggestion from Drew's marketing minute: the new blogger toolbox.

Et voilà the suggestion for the new bloggers around:

Conversation Agent by Valeria Maltoni - a great thinker who write in a clear yet articulated way
Bizsolutionplus by Lewis Green - the ethic approach to business and to blogging and god knows how we need it
Servant of Chaos by Gavin Heaton - the down under look to our world making you see things from a different perspective
Webware by Rafe Needleman and others - I like the fresh insight to cool web apps
Note to CMO by Stephen Denny - a cool way to tell to CMO to wake up

Hope you'll enjoy these blogs and find them useful and inspiring.

And do not forget: this is not a "if you're tagged, jump in" sort of thing. If you know of some great resources...jump in. If you got named -- please, by all means jump in too!

Technorati Tags: community, new blogger toolbox, tips for new bloggers, z-list