December 05, 2012

Truth Is Stranger Than Satire


I have watched this thing three times and I am convinced that these people are serious.

I'm a peaceful man, but I have to be honest here and say I had disturbing fantasies of violence.

The marketing industry has gone completely bat-shit, pants-down, weenie-waving crazy.


I quit. No, I mean it. I quit.

Big thanks to Matt Jay for pointing me to this

32 comments:

Dev Sh said...

Make sure that you "are messaging relevant messages". ****ING GENIUS!

Anonymous said...

Downfunnel metrics! Add value!

I think this was made to annoy you.

Anonymous said...

this is some high quality bullshit. North Korea believes The Onion. Ad guys believe this. Who's dumber?

Jim Powell said...

I am speechless. I wish they were.

Anonymous said...

I don't get why people are getting so ancy. This kind of BS talk happens all the time in marketing board rooms and, in that context, the essence of what they are saying makes sense.

If they were men, you wouldn't be saying the same thing.

Anonymous said...

Amazing: New world record of empty buzzwords per minute.
Even more amazing: some people believes this stuff

Paul Benjou said...

Help! I am caught in this horrible, horrible loop of babble and I can't get out!

Anonymous said...

This kind of gibberish DOES get said in our marketing meetings and it's not limited to any one gender. We built a HUGE Facebook community and gave them "insider" goodies that cost lots of money and targeted the right messages to them and it got us about 25 sales conversions in a year. All people want is free $hit. That doesn't make it right.

Rob Hatfield said...

Unbelievable. it all boils down to Facebook, because of its sheer numbers, is the most efficient way for companies to give out coupons. And if your goal is give your shit away for free, by all means, head on over to Facebook. You can go broke a lot faster!

As for the babble: I think we are caught in an ever increasing cycle that has become self-perpetuating. Alice has gone through the looking glass... and she's never coming back.

The Honourable Husband said...

I think Bethany might be borderline aware of how silly they both sound. I base this on the little smile at :30, the "love it" at 1:14 and the "Lucy, very wise" at 3:41.

"Quantifying the metric" sounds a lot better than "measuring the quantity", doesn't it?

Anonymous said...

This can't be real - it has to be a spoof

Anonymous said...

Well, besides being a primer on buzzwords, all I could think was that this would make a GREAT segment of Creature Comforts, with Lucy Jacobs as a hedgehog.

Freddy J. Nager said...

Miss South Carolina has apparently found a new job as a social media consultant.

ad-qaeda said...

"The marketing industry has gone completely bat-shit, pants-down, weenie-waving crazy."

Love it... Sounds like something Parker would write. Hilarious.

mightiermouse said...

At "love it" I just stopped watching. OMFG.

Ken said...

Somewhere beneath this shit storm of Swahili I suspect this woman may well know something useful about Facebook. It's an egregious example of Masonic jargon, but it doesn't mean she's devoid of insight.

We work pretty regularly with a social media guy who's great - honest, delusion free, comprehensible and deeply respectful of other disciplines. He's never used the word "metrics" in my hearing. This video is a cautionary tale about marketing's love of lexicographical horseshit and trying to look smart whilst camping out in the bubble. Social media types don't have that to themselves. We're all prey. (I say this as a copywriter by the way.)

My deeper sense - and probably what's goading Bob - is that the whole thing translated is a tortuous apology for the fact that Facebook is decidedly mortal. Which is plainly not the business model that the fine people of "Spruce Media" operate on.

Kate Richardson said...

This is why I am getting to the end of my tether with this industry. I know buzzword filled blathering is not unique to advertising but really....REALLY.

Sean Peake said...

This is Harvard MBA talk. And you wonder why the US is totally screwed?

CCB said...

I could not watch past 2:03....this is without a doubt...ok did you guys know that the NOrth Korean discovered UNicorn Lairs

CCB said...

Sorry about the typos but I was shaking as I typed....

sheriffshooter said...

they are to this decade what boy bands were to the last.

Geoff said...

She's selling ads on Facebook to CEOs and CMOs at giant corporations. Kellogg's, Coke, State Farm.

Of course she's going to babble like this. At some point she needs to show those quantified metrics, and justify them.

Don't blame the auctioneer for talking fast. It works.

Anonymous said...

I do not speak this language but I did get the impression that the tall one was chatting up the shorter one. Am I right?

Unknown said...

What else would you expect from animatronic robots that lack the capability of facial expression or gesticulation. Talk talk talk, turn. Talk, talk, talk, turn.

Graham Strong said...

Bob,

At the risk of being contrarian to the contrarian...

I think she is at least saying the right things -- keep an eye on ROI, make sure you're generating quality leads instead of quantity, and plan your strategy and goals before you roll out a campaign.

Whether or not that can be delivered effectively using Facebook is another thing altogether. But at least she's not going on about the normal things that bother you Bob, such as "likes, not sales, count" and the usual mantras of social media marketing.

~Graham

BOB HOFFMAN said...

You're a kind man, Graham

Chuck Nyren said...

The all-male version:

http://adcontrarian.blogspot.com/2011/04/why-you-need-mba.html

Unknown said...

More jump cuts than a Godard film! Makes me wonder what was trimmed out. We can only hope we'll live long enough to see this bubble burst.

Anonymous said...

Spruce Media's has 1,700 fans on its Facebook and a PTAT of only 285 (or a measely 15% of its fanbase).

Be relevant she says? She might want to try it first with her own company's FB page.

Anonymous said...

wow, she doesn't sound smart even with an English accent. usually that does the trick.

Andre said...

Just curious how one can quantify the metrics of success without spending money??? Just like magic right?

Anonymous said...

'My mouth is moving so I must be saying something AMAZING!'