Aug 04

Response July: Digital (Focus). Digital (TV). Digital (Creative).

I decided to take a quick Friday break from working up the August and September issues of Response — summer can be a great time to catch up, after all — to recap our recently delivered (and posted) July issue. Along with this month’s cover story — an interview with Tumi/Samsonite C-level executive Charlie Cole — the issue includes features on the shifting market for entertainment content and our annual look at what’s new in the video production space. Let’s dig into how these stories — and other facets of the issue — came together.

  • July’s cover feature got its start in a conference room at the JW Marriott Desert Springs Resort in February. There, at the eTail West event in Palm Desert, Calif., Charlie Cole — then merely chief digital offer for Tumi, who’s since added the title of global chief e-commerce officer for its parent company Samsonite — gave a presentation about his company’s digital marketing and measurement efforts during the past two years. His no-nonsense talk was impressive, and the story it told about Tumi’s efforts was one I wanted to know more about. I reached out to Cole after returning from the event to gauge his interest in a story — and he responded quickly. An open book throughout the process, Cole was one of the more refreshing cove subjects I’ve worked with in recent years. Unsurprisingly, then, the story — just a slice of how Tumi/Samsonite is tackling the great e-commerce revolution — feels like fresh air at a time when marketing and technology teams tend to find themselves at loggerheads more often than necessary. If you missed the link above, here it is once again: Digital Determination
  • What TV will look like three, five — or, god forbid, 10 — years from now is anyone’s guess. Our freelancer Nicole Urso Reed took the assignment for our annual look at marketing in the entertainment space and decided to poke around for answers to that question, as well as what those changes might mean for marketers who’ve long given TV the largest cut of their budgets. From mobile and online video to over-the-top (OTT) and video-on-demand (VOD), the possibilities are exciting. Oh, and Nicole’s headline nod to one of my favorite Dr. Dre songs certainly doesn’t hurt. In case you skipped the link above: The Next Episode
  • Those different possibilities are also driving changes across the video production space, as our freelancer Bridget McCrea continued to learn in her latest look at the production and creative space. Speaking with a half-dozen experts, McCrea finds that different ad lengths — yes, all the way up to a half-hour — still work, depending on the product, the target, and the media outlet. How are producers changing how they do things based on these opportunities? Here’s that story link again: Creative Leverage
  • Our monthly direct response TV and radio media billings enter the 2017 calendar year with a look at first-quarter long-form DRTV results. A market that’s lost ground in nine of the past 10 years started 2017 in similar fashion, dropping nearly 12 percent in comparison to its 1Q 2016 totals. However, the problem doesn’t seem to be availability of half-hour spots but rather the gaining power of the lower-cost broadcast and satellite markets at the cost of the contracting cable network sector. As cable pricing continues to fall to compete, overall spending results continue to dip. For a full look at 1Q 2017 long-form DRTV media billings, click here: Long-Form DRTV Billings Start 2017 on the Wrong Foot
  • The July issue also includes a number of strong submissions in our column well:
  • My Editor’s Note column got its first inspiration from the wide array of music I listen to each day at my desk (currently playing: The Hold Steady‘s “How a Resurrection Really Feels”) and how important great songs (and great songwriting) are in my everyday life. At its essence, great songwriting is great storytelling. Somehow, in fewer than 500 words — with a well-deserved (and, sure, gratuitous) shot at “bro country” included — I get from there to a brief exposition on Response‘s ongoing transition. If you missed the link above, here it is: A Change in Focus Doesn’t Mean a Change in How We Tell Stories

Thanks again for reading and interacting with Response!

Jan 27

#LOTD2014: February Playlist

I’m jumping back into the way-overdue Lyric-of-the-Day project recaps from 2013-2014 with the February 2014 playlist. As a refresher, each day from Jan. 1, 2013 through Dec. 31, 2014, I posted a lyric on my Twitter feed. At the end of each month, I created a Spotify playlist of the songs featured, and throughout much of 2013-14 here on the blog.

Here’s February’s #LOTD2014 playlist (find the Spotify playlist I’ve created from these lyrics linked at the end of the post or on the clickable image at right), with some brief explanations (in italics) for a number of the lyrics.

  • “In all that exists/None have your beauty/I see your face/I will survive” #INXS “Mystify” #LOTD2014 2/1
  • “The soul’s escaping, through this hole that is gaping/This world is mine for the taking” #Eminem “Lose Yourself” #LOTD2014 2/2
  • “I was in a fog, I didn’t notice everything everything/Was coming all apart inside of me” #TheNational “You Were A Kindness” #LOTD2014 2/3
  • “We could be daytime drunks if we wanted/But we’d never get anything done that way, baby” #RiloKiley “The Absence Of God” #LOTD2014 2/4
  • “The light’s shinin’ through on you/Yes, I’m with you my love/It’s the morning and just we two” #Cream “Sunshine Of Your Love” #LOTD2014 2/5
  • “It’s a rainy afternoon in 1990/The big city/Geez, it’s been 20 years/Candy, you were so fine” #IggyPop “Candy” #LOTD2014 2/6
  • “Gonna get me a little oblivion, baby/Try to keep myself away from me” #CountingCrows “Perfect Blue Buildings” #LOTD2014 2/7
  • “Hey, little dolly won’t you say you will/Meet me tonight up on top of the hill” #BruceSpringsteen “Ramrod” #LOTD2014 2/8
  • “Baby if you’re feeling good/Baby if you’re feeling nice/You know your man’s workin’ hard/He’s worth a deuce” #Kiss “Deuce” #LOTD2014 2/9 (The night our crew discovered one of America’s greatest dive bars: Mac’s Club Deuce in Miami Beach.)
  • “Everyone around me is a total stranger/Everyone avoids me like a cyclone ranger” #TheVapors “Turning Japanese” #LOTD2014 2/10
  • “I don’t care/Alright!?About your past, dig/I just want/Hey!/My love to last, come on” #JamesBrown “Cold Sweat” #LOTD2014 2/11
  • “They’ll stone ya and then they’ll say good luck/But I would not feel so all alone” #BobDylan “Rainy Day Women #12 & 35” #LOTD2014 2/12 (An unexpected rooftop suite party in South Beach … thanks Kleiner.)
  • “Love you every day girl/Always on my mind/One thing I can say girl/Love you all the time”#TheBeatles “Eight Days A Week” #LOTD2014 2/13
  • “I’d give this world/Just to dream a dream with you/On our bed of California stars” #WoodyGuthrie #Wilco “California Stars” #LOTD2014 2/14 (Happy Wedding Day, Allen & Meredith!)
  • “Deep beneath the cover of another perfect wonder/Where it’s so white as snow” #RedHotChiliPeppers “Snow (Hey Oh)” #LOTD2014 2/15 (Lounging around in Charlestown, Mass., watching it snow, snow, snow.)
  • “I’m feeling supersonic/Give me gin and tonic/You can have it all but how much do you want it?” #Oasis “Supersonic” #LOTD2014 2/16
  • “President say/Little fat man ain’t it a shame/What the river’s done/To this poor crackers land” #RandyNewman “Louisiana 1927” #LOTD2014 2/17 (“Happy” Presidents Day!)
  • “Whatever you heard about me is true/I change the rules and do what I wanna do” #Prince “Let’s Pretend We’re Married” #LOTD2014 2/18
  • “I am lost, I’m no guide/But I’m by your side/I am right by your side …/Young lover I stand” #PearlJam “Leash” #LOTD2014 2/19
  • “I never did believe in the ways of magic/But I’m beginning to wonder why” #FleetwoodMac “You Make Loving Fun” #LOTD2014 2/20
  • ‘He’s drunk/He tastes like candy/He’s so beautiful/He’s so deep/Like dirty water/God he’s awful” #Hole “Awful” #LOTD2014 2/21
  • “Left for dead left for good/Left for dead not understood/But you/Always came back for more” #Whale “Hobo Humpin’ Slobo Babe” #LOTD2014 2/22 (A random callout in conversation while on a wedding planning trip to Santa Barbara brought this song back into consciousness.)
  • “There was a time/Before we were born/If someone asks this is where I’ll be” #TalkingHeads “This Must Be The Place” #LOTD2014 2/23 (Agreed upon wedding event locations!)
  • “He quoted some poetry/He’s Tennyson in denim & sheepskin/He looked a lot like Izzy Stradlin” #TheHoldSteady” “Chillout Tent” #LOTD2014 2/24
  • “And this is how it all ends up/When you run the whole thing down” #Sugar “Believe What You’re Saying” #LOTD2014 2/25
  • “Me catch a ship across the sea/I sailed the ship all alone/Never think I’ll make it home” #Kingsmen “Louie Louie” #LOTD2014 2/26
  • “And in another world nothing was like this/There may’ve been a girl/There never was a kiss” #TomPetty #Heartbreakers “Echo” #LOTD2014 2/27
  • “Well, show me the way/To the next whiskey bar/Oh, don’t ask why/Oh, don’t ask why” #TheDoors “Alabama Song” #LOTD2014 2/28 (USC hoops and postgame drinks, a long-standing tradition.)

Here’s the Spotify playlist if you’d like to listen along: #LOTD2014: February