LeBron James Brand

I think it is time that I throw my expert opinion out there on the LeBron James situation that occurred over the summer. Many people say that LeBron James brand is taking a hit since "The Decision." Mark Cuban said he lost a billion dollars in brand equity but I disagree maybe he lost a billion fans but not brand equity.

Let’s look at his brand through the social media aspect. He opens a twitter account two days before "The Decision" and now currently has over 900,000 followers and close to 4 million on Facebook. I'm sure that sponsors are going to want to capitalize of LeBron's social network following. No wonder Dan Gilbert was so angry at LeBron's decision he is going to lose millions of dollars in sponsorship deals for the Cavs.

You can say all you want about how he handled it could've have been a lot been and his PR team was stupid for letting him do this. It is evident that it was a completely brilliant business decision. The buzz he generated for months leading up to and now after has soared dramatically. I cannot imagine the kind of buzz that will happen if the Heat wins the championship this year.

LeBron said it best it is a business (the NBA). What a brilliant business man he is.

Ryan Nguyen

Halloween Candy

Did you start getting candy for little children running up and down your street dressed up as little monsters and of course you will get the occasional teenagers? Halloween is just around the corner.

According to Brand Passion Index Butter apparently Butterfinger has a large online following. I imagine it is from the very entertaining campaign from a few years back with Bart Simpson and Homer Simpson. Next are Brach's Candy Corn, Hershey's Kit-Kat, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups and Mars' Snickers.

This brings me to my favorite holiday campaigns by Reese's Peanut Butter Cups. It is great. It makes me laugh because it is so true the scariest part of Halloween is in fact giving away all your Reese's.

You see a lot of advertisers these days trying to appeal to consumers by just making them laugh. For instance, every adult beverage commercial, old spice commercials, car insurance commercials and so on they just want to make you laugh while of course selling their product. Comedy does not work for everybody because everyone has there own definition of what makes them laugh.

Ryan Nguyen

GAP Logo

It took four days for GAP to realize that it made a mistake changing its logo. GAP rolled out its new logo on their GAP.com website on October 7th after listening to consumers opinions on the logo on their Facebook page. 

The GAP logo an iconic image well font to people all over the world decided they wanted to change their logo to show the evolution of the GAP brand. That understands since the targeted audience for GAP is the millennia generation. They used Facebook to communicate with their consumers about new designs for the logo.

GAP old logo and now there current logo is not the problem. The problem is that instead of an agency coming up with a new design it turn to crowd sourcing. A cheap way to try and change its brand image with the help of the targeted audience.

Instead what they should be trying to do is focus on the great quality of their jeans and t-shirts. That is what a brand is truly made up of not a logo.

Ryan Nguyen

Snow Days At The Ball Park

Recently, the Cleveland Indians announced that Progressive Field would be turned into a snow park with ice skating, snow tubing, slides and more. This is the first time I have ever heard of a ball park opening up its doors in the winter months for events such as this. This will be the first downtown snow park in Cleveland.

I think this is a great idea especially for the city of Cleveland with all the Lake Effect snow they receive during the winter months. This "Winter Wonderland" will be great for the citizens of Cleveland and college students as well because this way they will not have to travel to ski resorts and ice arenas outside the city for winter entertainment.

Also, this is great for the Cleveland Indians themselves to gain revenue when there is nothing going on in the ball park during the winter months. This is a phenomenal opportunity for the Indians to capitalize on the massive amounts of snow receive by giving the citizens a place to go snow tubing and ice skating without having to travel far in the inclement weather.

Ryan Nguyen

Mustafa > Lewis

There is no doubt that you all have seen the new Old Spice commercial featuring Baltimore Ravens linebacker Ray Lewis. I am curious as to why Ray Lewis is the new spokesperson for Old Spice now. I guess Mustafa got to big for the commercials with his role in an upcoming movie with Jennifer Anniston.

Since the change Old Spice viral videos have been falling down the charts according to AdAge.com. The ad is ok with Ray Lewis but it doesnt captivate the audience with its redicuousness. Ray Lewis maybe be a better football player than Mustafa was. Yes he was in the NFL for a short period of time. Look it up. He doesn't have the swagger that Mustafa had and not mention that voice of a greek god that sucked you in.

For me I have never seen an ad campaign sweep the nation quite like Mustafa did with the Old Spice campaign "The Way Your man could Smell." He is an internet legend. But I guess all good things must come to an end.

My advice to Old Spice cut your losses with Ray Lewis. Bring back Mustafa.

Mustafa's Ad
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=owGykVbfgUE

Lewis's
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxqlw3cKZHA

Mustafa's is better isn't it? Thought so.

Ryan Nguyen

Geico Commercials

In response to my one loyal follower, I decided to look up to see just how many Geico commercials there are on television. I think I saw 6 different Geico commercials on television today. There is like 100 different viral videos on their YouTube page.  I read one of the comments on there YouTube website that said something along the lines of "I love Geico commercials I'll be sure to get their insurance when I get a car." Who really are they trying to reach with all these different campaigns? It seems they are just throwing campaigns out there to reach a vast majority of people. While their competitors seem to be selling you peace of mind after accidents and how there rates will not increase after accidents. Geico has made campaigns that are fun and interesting to their audience and actually get people to watch their commercials. While you may think they are silly, there is a consistent message they put out and that it can save you money if you switch insurance companies. Geico dares to be different and actually seems to make buying car insurance fun.

Ryan Nguyen
Here is an example of one of Geico's campaigns
Geico Commercial

Private Label Experience

Today, I drove up to NY and really got to experience what my life could be like if I was not fortunate enough to attend college. I was in a Private Label Food  plant there with my boss and co-worker working with a client. I got to experience first hand how food is processed, manufactured and packaged.

We were shooting a corporate video for this client so they can drum up some more business. I assisted our videographer along the way as shot how some of the machinery worked. Imagine watching "How It's Made" on the Science Channel, that was the type of stuff we were shooting. Lastly for this video we needed some shots of happy workers although that was pretty tough to come by since no one wanted to be on camera. We actually had to get the supervisors to ask them if we could film them.

One of the cool things I saw today was enormous bags of sugar they have in their warehouse. This place is one of the larger producers of sugar substitute on the east coast. The bags were carried on a forklift off the trucks because they were so big.

Ryan Nguyen