Giant Balloons Company

Having a bit of fun at the expense of sext-o-holic Anthony Weiner, the folks over at Butler, Shine, Stern & Partners created this MINI ad which they tweeted from a Twitter account they created called @CarlosDMotor. “Wanna get your hands on my stick?”

The ad and the tweet mocks the pseudonym Weiner chose for himself, Carlos Danger, when he sent naked pictures of himself to younger women.

With just 37 followers, the @CarlosDMotor Twitter account isn’t gaining much ground but, hey, it’s a nice diversion on a Friday.

Wanna get your hands on my stick? pic.twitter.com/ZpDQbUnWB8

— Carlos D. Motor (@CarlosDMotor) July 26, 2013

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– Google has added favicons to its AdSense ad units.

– Awesome advice for those looking to become a social media guru:)

– Here’s more data that support Apple’s latest ad campaign is a failure.

– Seems a couple of ad ladies are miffed over the fact Nike doesn’t sell shoes in women’s sizes and aren’t designed appropriately for women. Need more pink, we guess.

– AOL plans to launch an ad-tech upfront with a focus on programmatic. AOL CEO Tim Armstrong says,”It’s essentially a machine upfront. We believe you will have an upfront commitment cycle that will rival TV.”

– Not everyone is a fan of the Dove Real Beauty campaign. Predictably, it’s a fashion form founder who has become a vocal critic of the campaign.

– A new study finds too much social media usage causes low self esteem in teenaged girls? How about in us grownups who can’t stand reading about the latest and greatest accomplishments of their peers?

– Joe Jaffe’s Evol8tion has acquired Bob Knorpp’s Beancast podcast. Bob will continue the podcast and become SVP Chief Analyst of Evol8tion’s BrandWatch product.

– A grounded viewpoint on inbound marketing that doesn’t trash inbound marketing.

– This is just funny. To promote the 2013 Wiener Nationals (a dog race), Orange County-based DGWB shot a promo using GoPro cameras.

– Chloe Hilfiger goes to college in the new Tommy Hilfiger ad campaign.

– If Tanay Jackson, daughter of Tito and niece of Michale endorse your company, that’s kind of awesome, right?

In perhaps, one of the most ingenious uses of a fake product to sell a real product, Portal A is out with The Roominator, a fake video conferencing product used to sell a real video conferencing solution from Blue Jeans Network.

Comedian Hasan Minhaj plays the role of an office worker whose boss is threatening to fire him if he doesn’t close a deal on a video conference call. To make matters more stressful, Minhaj’s character receives a call from his wife who is in labor.

Minhaj, faced with either losing his job or losing his wife, gets very creative and comes up with The Roominator, a device that allows him to appear to be in his office closing the deal while, in fact, he’s running his ass off down the street so he can be there for his wife to give birth.

While a bit longer than it needs to be, the video is quite hilarious. And you’ve got to love the ending.

There’s a simple truth about blogs–readers rarely, if ever, come to one to be marketed to. Advertising runs counter to the raison d’etre of the blogosphere. Ads are an interruption, a betrayal of the natural purpose and flow individuals expect of a well-written, informative blog.

Yet blogging and revenue-generation don’t have to be at cross purposes. What many bloggers, online forums, product review sites and other “independent” sources of online content haven’t yet embraced, is that the very thing people come for–credibility–is a trait that has economic value.

Native monetization–the ability to create an income stream that integrates organically into the user experience–leverages that hard-won credibility without resorting to “tacked on” display advertising. Google’s paid search results are similar in effect: looking and feeling like organic search results, they come across as credible, familiar and consistent. Moreover, Google relentlessly ties ad serving to ad quality, making the ads they do serve both relevant and effective.

Brands can translate their area of credibility into opportunity when they establish themselves as a go-to expert in a particular niche. Their authenticity compels readers–those who are interested in the same industry or topic–to listen. In fact, a blog that documents expert points of view, or expounds from a position of authority, is considered more trustworthy than almost any other form of web-based content.

According toVigLink estimates, content-driven e-commerce — that is, purchases driven by content sites — is growing more quickly than overall e-commerce. It’s becoming easier than ever for those who generate content, including brands and other independents, to turn their pages into profit through native monetization.

Many brands don’t know how to incorporate native monetization into their sites. Yet every time they insert a link from their content to another site — especially a retail site — they establish an opportunity to produce revenue organically. Like a Google paid search result, these links meet stringent quality and relevancy criteria. They can equal editorial integrity, while also feeling familiar and consistent with the site’s intent.

If properly handled, content publishers can realize the benefits of native monetization without betraying reader trust. Today’s web user, of course, knows what “marketing” looks like. They’ve been targeted by ads for years. When they encounter a site that appears to exist for the purpose of making money, they flee. This was one of the reasons Facebook was able to steal MySpace’s thunder; when MySpace began to look like one giant advertising billboard due to ad clutter, Facebook benefited because its perceived intent was simply to help friends connect with one another.

When blogs are genuine about their purpose for being, and express a clear and well-reasoned point of view, visitors respond — especially by clicking on text links. Moreover, the greater the perceived value of the content, the more likely readers are to to click through to the associated product or service.

Retailers and other e-commerce companies are recognizing the growing influence of blogs as a source of new business. “We see the potential of fashion and beauty blogs to add incremental sales to our online store,” said Ellen Shing, owner of LulaLu.com, an online retailer of lingerie for petite women. “It’s impossible for us to connect with every prospective customer out there through our traditional forms of web advertising. It makes sense for us to tap into these sources through inbound links.”

Whenever new forms of economic value emerge, those who are inherently positioned to take advantage benefit the most. Content creators are the fortunate ones in this new era of democratic social media. By maintaining authenticity while also exploiting new technologies like automated link monetization, content publishers have the unique opportunity to turn native monetization to their long-term advantage.

This guest post was written by Oliver Deighton, Vice President of Marketing at VigLink, a technology company helping publishers earn from the content they create and the commerce they drive.

The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas is out with the third rendition of its much-lauded, Fallon-created “Just the right amount of wrong” work that continues to position the luxury property as anything but normal.

Last year’s Bohemian Rhapsody redux and 2011’s original hinted at all manner of mischievously illicit behavior occurring inside the property and positioned the hotel as an adventure rather than a bed on which to sleep.

The work, particularly the Bohemiam Rhapsody commercial, was a masterstroke of genius which separated the hotel from all others in Sin City and touted the destination as a place for fun and frivolity like no other.

Of this latest work, Cosmopolitan CMO Lisa Marchese tells AdWeek, “We wanted to create a spot that was radically different in form–the mix of typography to imagery, the way the imagery was shot. The tone is radically different. We wanted it to look like nothing else out there.”

The spot is, indeed, radically different. With it’s quick cut phrases such as “Mutation is progress”, Correct is mistake” and Misfit right in,” the work adheres to the original’s mystique but lacks the pompously witty demeanor of the second.

Though for a brand aiming for grandiose, hipsterific magnificence, the work delivers.

Last week Heineken launched Departure Roulette, a stunt at JFK airport that allowed people to immediately change their flight plans and get on a plane to a random location all at the push of a button. As would be expected, most people are not adventurous, daring or silly enough to make a random travel change at a moment’s notice. Some though, much to Heineken’s (and our) amusement, are and this video lets us in on the action.

What we’d really love, though, are follow up stories that reveal what happened to these adventurous souls to who Heineken up on their offer. Now that would be fun.