Now that I have your attention let us begin theorizing what it means for a company to stay on top once they get on top. In the technology industry companies rise and fall very quickly; some never even rise at all, but all eventually fall; even if it’s not off the mountain.
Let’s take a quick look at MySpace and Facebook. MySpace came first, and they raged as everyone was joining and making their home pages. Then came Facebook, they had a different angle but still the same premise. MySpace has more US users than Facebook, but Facebooks growth is almost 4% per month vs. MySpace, who is at less than 1% per month *. Does this mean that MySpace is dead? No, not at all but the perception is that they are falling. When it comes to social media sites in the main stream media you only seem to hear about Facebook and Twitter. MySpace seems to come up in “To catch a predator” episodes, although not anyones fault. The point is that MySpace came on strong, like morning wood, they grew and stayed up for quite awhile. But, over time morning wood falls and the stamina to stay up is no longer there, thus leaving the door open for another young company with wood; that is were Facebook came in. (more…)
Posted: 31st January 2010
In 1985 the movie ET was still all the rave; a little candy became wildly more popular. Enter the Reeses Pieces candy! Back in the day, before product placement was a necessity a movie producer asked the makers of M&M’s if they could use their candy in a little movie about an alien; extra-terrestrial. Rumors have it that the M&M folks said “no,” so the producers went with something similar but a little different. Well, we all know the movie and the famous scenes; forever remember those little candies. But what struck me as odd was this ad I found in a Marvel Comic from 1985.
The add features the candy, and an alien. But that isn’t the alien… what gives? Could the producers have said ‘no’, to the candy company that had once said ‘yes?’ Or maybe the price to use the ‘real’ alien was just a little too high?
This is an example of not being able to afford the right pitchman. The candy company ends up with Billy Hayes, instead of Billy Mays, close but not close enough. If you have the money buy the right pitchman’s services, or you end up with something that doesn’t quite complete the circle. The message is, don’t be cheap on the promotion of your idea or product! While the Reeses company is large enough to survive this situation, you may not be.
Posted: 31st January 2010
I was thumbing through some old comic books while getting them ready to hand over to my son; noticed how interesting the ads and artwork really was. The was, circa 1975-1988, was never about high quality art, but rather cheap paper and ink. “Pump out those comics, get ‘em on the shelves, take that kids money!” was the mantra of they day, or so it seems. But I digress.
The real reason for this post is to start off a little “look at this” and “remember this” vibe. After all, the 70′s and 80′s, didn’t just have bad fashion and hair… they had this too
Kids! Put down your PS3, and get ready for the hot new game system… the Atari 2600. But wait, there’s more! TRON! That’s right, the TRON video game was once available! Only one other game was rated higher, than TRON, on the sucktitude list… ET.
Now you too can relive the horrid days of early 80′s video games and Movies. Remember kids, when they make a video game out of a movie it usually sucks! It does now, and it did then.
Posted: 31st January 2010
