Category: Single Minded2c3169a786

Tinder-garten

9/9/2017

by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

It’s great to watch kids grow and mature, for instance, as they take their first steps, attend their first day of school . . . have their first hook up?! Most parents don’t want to imagine that last experience, especially if their children are still young; yet, some companies are making meeting apps that many are calling “Tinder for Teens.”

If you’re not familiar with Tinder, that’s not a bad thing. It’s one of the seemingly hundreds of dating apps that have hit the market over the past few years, helping people find significant others. However, there are big differences between Tinder and some of the more traditional dating sites.

For instance, eHarmony users answer a lengthy set of probing questions, aimed at finding one’s true soulmate, which takes over an hour. The cost for one month is $49.95. A Tinder profile, on the other hand, is free at the basic level and takes only a few minutes to setup: “You simply download the app to your smart phone, link to your Facebook account, choose up to six photos of yourself, and write a brief bio. That’s it!”

The use of Tinder is equally easy, and as many would say, pretty superficial. Even though bios are available “it’s all about the photos.” Users review others’ pics, and if they see someone they like, they swipe right, while everyone unattractive gets swept left. If two people swipe right on each other, the app invites them to start chatting.

This quick and easy vetting reflects the way many users regard the people they meet through the platform, i.e., users turn to Tinder to find candidates for casual sex, i.e., one-night stands, i.e., “hook ups.”

Sexual intimacy without commitment tends to end badly for people of any age. It’s especially abhorrent to encourage lascivious behavior among adolescents, who are even less cognizant of the consequences of their actions. Some teen-targeting apps are doing just that, however. What’s more, there can be other consequences for these young people that are even worse than those of casual sex with their peers.

Probably the most popular friend/dating app for teens is Spotafriend, which describes itself as “the hottest teen swiping app for meeting new friends.” The company’s website goes on to claim that it is “not a teen dating app, it’s a new way to make friends.” However, that self-assessment is quickly questioned as Spotafriend’s own LinkedIn site says: “Meet teens near you with Spotafriend, the Tinder alternative for people ages 13-19.”

But, maybe Spotafriend’s comparison to Tinder is just puffery; or perhaps it’s only referencing the more demure uses of the adult app. It’s hard to make those interpretations, however, after reading one of the featured posts on Spotafriend’s blogsite titled “5 Major Hook-Up Ground Rules.” Here are a few excerpts from the article:

“Hookups in high school and college are exciting, and can be your first real meeting with the issues of love and sex, issues that most of us don’t really understand in our teenage years.”

“If you’re just kissing, or going all the way, make sure both participants are comfortable and willing to continue with the interaction.”

“Do Whatever Makes You Comfortable”

“Many acts that people consider “hooking up” carry the risk of infectious diseases being spread from person to person.”

Unfortunately, the possibility of reckless sex with someone the same age is not the only serious risk to teens using Spotafriend. Given that the app’s parameters are “for people age 13 to 19,” there’s built-in potential for 18 or 19-year-old men, legally adults, to interact with 13-year-old girls. What’s even worse is the ease with which even older adults can access the app and join the mix.

Lisa Schmidt, a 42-year-old dating coach and matchmaker, was curiously concerned about the rise of dating apps for teens, so she decided to check-out Spotafriend. In her guest blog post on Global Dating Insights, she recounts how easy it was for her to access the app and pose as a 15-year-old girl. It was even easier for her to change her birthday once inside.

As Schmidt’s experience suggests and leading child psychologist Michael Carr-Gregg confirms, apps like Spotafriend are “‘on-line playgrounds’ for paedophiles.” Carr-Gregg adds, “All it would take is a smooth-talking paedophile to send some silky little messages to these kids and away we go.” The fact that such apps are location-based and work seamlessly with messaging apps like Snapchat makes teens all-the-more vulnerable to predators.

It’s great when people use social media to build friendships. Spotafriend’s name and promotion, however, are misleading. The app’s real aim appears to be more about helping teens “hook up,” while providing few safeguards against sexual predators. Unfortunately, many innocent young people fall victim to the appeal, making Spotafriend an example of “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Virtue or Vice?

8/25/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

When you hear “ice cream,” you probably don’t think of diet, healthy, or nutritious; rather, words like creamy, rich, and luscious come to mind. After all, most people don’t eat ice cream to be healthy or to get fit; they just want to indulge in something they really enjoy. That’s the motivation one upstart ice cream maker is tapping into, in a way like no other.

Brands like Häagen-Dazs and Ben & Jerry’s have made decadent ice cream for decades, but even they have not capitalized on the concept of uninhibited indulgence as much as Boston-based Vice Cream. As the company name implies, its ice cream isn’t just good; it’s sinful. Other elements of the company’s brand support the unusual positioning.

Most notably, the product itself is very ‘full-bodied.’ Pictures and descriptions on Vice Cream’s website illustrate various flavors overflowing with add-ins such as “stacks on stacks of mint-chocolate coins,” “rich peanut butter ice cream mixed with chopped toffee bars,” and “chunks of chocolate chip cookie dough, salted caramel truffles, and thick swirls of chocolate fudge and caramel.”

As you might imagine, those kinds of ample, rich ingredients add up to some sizeable, undesirable numbers on the ice cream’s nutritional labels. For instance, one particular flavor boasts the following stats per half cup serving: 270 calories, 15g of fat, 10g of saturated fat, 50 mg of cholesterol, and 30g carbohydrates. By the way, I wonder how many people can eat just a half cup of ice cream; I can’t.

While those “nutrition” numbers are certainly high, they aren’t unusual for indulgent desserts. For instance, a small Brownie Batter Blizzard at Dairy Queen has 440 calories, 14g of fat, and 9g of saturated fat. Those stats are puny, however, compared to desserts at the Cheesecake Factory, where a piece of Oreo Dream Extreme Cheesecake has 1,490 calories, 53g of saturated fat, and 162 carbs.

If Vice Cream isn’t setting any records for nutritional negligence, what makes it so sinful? Well, beyond its product composition, the company has decided to play upon the idea of immorality with other aspects of its branding, such as its product names and promotion. More specifically, Vice Cream has opted for the classic low-brow strategy—serving up sex, with a side of profanity.

The company’s 'sex-sells' approach starts with the names of its ice creams, which may seem innocuous, until you start to unpack and compare them. For instance, there’s “Toffee Wife,” a play on the sexist term “trophy wife,” and “Afternoon Delight,” homage to the Starland Vocal Band’s 1976 hit by the same name, which was all about making love. There’s also “Breakfast in Bed,” a flavor name that seems benign until you interpret it in context with the other monikers and you see some of the company’s additional branding.

Vice Cream’s most blatant sex appeal is through a promotional video, which is the first thing you see on the firm’s homepage and which is easily found on YouTube. The slightly less than two-minute spot features an attractive young woman, wearing a short black dress and high heels. The actress’s words and actions exude sensuality, while an enticing instrumental arrangement plays in the background.

Granted, the ad doesn’t rely exclusively on sex appeal. There’s also a heavy dose of humor that seems like an attempt to offset some of the strong sexual innuendo. For instance, the main premise of the spot is that although consumers can’t get a free sample of Vice Cream, they can call the company’s “vice-line” and listen to “virtual tasters” describe in “sumptuous detail what it’s like to eat any of our delicious flavors.”

Of course, the unambiguous reference is to phone-sex, but the silliness of listening to others sensually describe ice cream downplays that allusion. Vice Cream also tries to take the edge off the sexual imagery by showcasing one rather unappealing virtual taster, “Gary,” who gets dropped by a caller who’s not aroused by his less-than-sexy product description.

Meanwhile, there’s also a smattering of profanity throughout the promotion, as the main actress lets slide “son of a [bleep] that’s good” and “F[bleep]’n Gary.” The spot censors the specific expletives, but it’s easy to understand what she’s saying.

What should we make of Vice Cream’s unabashed approach to confectionery marketing? On one hand, the company can be commended for not putting on pretenses. Yes, there are a handful of companies striving to make 'healthy' ice cream, like Halo, but ice cream is an indulgence, and Vice Cream calls it what it is. People tend to appreciate candid communication—even if it’s a little negative, at least it’s honest.

On the other hand, Vice Cream makes gratuitous use of sex to sell its products. Unlike a honeymoon vacation or Viagra, there’s no natural connection between ice cream and sex. As many other unscrupulous companies have done, Vice Cream tries to take the feelings people have for sex and, by way of classical conditioning, transfer them to its product.

Appetites for food and desires for sex are two separate things that can be disturbing, if not dangerous, to combine. Such an artificial pairing could be especially hazardous for adolescents, who, amid surging hormones and ravenous hunger, have enough to handle separately for each biological and physiological drive.

The addition of profanity only makes matters worse, particularly when one considers that anyone with an internet connection, from nine to ninety, can see Vice Cream’s ad. Users don’t need to verify that they’re 18 or older, for instance, to enter the company’s website or to watch the ad on YouTube.

Some may argue, “But the ad is supposed to be funny.” That may be true, but couching an ad or anything else in humor doesn’t cover-up the unseemly content. The sexualization and profanity are still easily seen and heard. To think that the humor makes them okay is like believing you can call someone a nasty name, then quickly disclaim, “I was just joking.”

Vice Cream looks delicious and probably tastes great too. Those positives likely explain most of the company’s rapid growth and early success. It’s okay for people to indulge in a decadent dessert every once in a while, but it’s never okay for companies to use sex gratuitously to sell products. For this reason, Vice Cream’s ingredient list also includes “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Anything for Income?

8/4/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

One of the traits of successful entrepreneurs is their ability to sell themselves: They need to persuade potential stakeholders not only to embrace their product but also to believe that they personally have the skill and passion to make it succeed. Summers VonHesse is one such successful entrepreneur, who has given “selling yourself” a whole new meaning.

A 30-year-old mother of two living in Nevada, VonHesse hasn’t worked outside the home since she and her military-career husband married eight years ago. However, she has been quite active around her house, earning about $5,000 a month, thanks to some creative and compelling photography that she puts online for a price.

The pictures aren’t the things you might expect a mother of a five-year-old daughter and two-year-old son to post on Pinterest or upload to Instagram. They’re photos and videos of VonHesse, posing seductively in all sorts of settings, wearing little or no clothing. VonHesse takes some of the photos herself, while her husband, who supports his wife’s unusual business venture, often helps. Patrons pay $5 to $50 a month to access the pics on a special website.

Besides the extra income she provides for her family, VonHesse says her entrepreneurship helps her feel good about her body, which many describe as full-figured or curvy. Her self-esteem has risen. When asked about her work and the example she’s setting for her children, she says:
“I think that the human body is a beautiful thing, and there is nothing to be ashamed of. I want them to love their bodies, and if they wanna profit from sharing images, then I would be fine with that.”

Seems like a nice marketing success story: An busy mom finds time to do something she enjoys and turn it into a business that provides significant income for her young family. Meanwhile, she and her husband develop important skills for the digital age. What’s not to like?

Well, the problem begins with a fairly obvious fact: This type of photography is pornography. The SUN, a UK News Company, describes the photos and videos as “racy,” while Yahoo Beauty reports that “strangers pay different sums of money to get glimpses of VonHesse in lingerie and sometimes even nude.”

Webster’s Dictionary defines pornography as “the depiction of erotic behavior (as in pictures or writing) intended to cause sexual excitement” and as “material (such as books or a photograph) that depicts erotic behavior and is intended to cause sexual excitement.” Meanwhile, Dictionary.com describes pornography as “sexually explicit videos, photographs, writings, or the like, whose purpose is to elicit sexual arousal.”

The pics and videos VonHesse and her husband post online for free are at least soft porn. One can speculate that the shots people pay $5 to $50 a month to see are even more graphic. It’s also likely that the explicitness has and will increase over time, as happens with most shocking communication: Consumers become desensitized, so to elicit the same reaction, images must become more and more graphic.

“But, wait,” some might argue. “This is about loving your body. In an age of rail-thin supermodels and fat-shaming on social media, VonHesse is setting a good example.” While it’s true that her work might be a positive influence for some, the highly sexualized content undoubtedly carries very negative repercussions for others. The issue isn’t body type.

If VonHesse’s goal were to inspire others with body-positive messages, she could do so while fully clothed, like many other “curvy” bloggers do, most of them tastefully-clothed and showing a fine sense of decorum. Instead, VonHesse’s pornographic images, appeal to one of the lowest common and most dangerous denominators: sexual infatuation.

Here are some of the troubling pornography-related statistics that Webroot.com shares:

40 million American people regularly visit porn sites.
35% of all internet downloads are related to pornography.
Every 39 minutes a new pornography video is being created in the United States.
About 200,000 Americans are “porn addicts.”

On a macro level, pornography is a major economic drain, responsible for $16.9 billion in lost business productivity each year. However, that financial cost pales compared to the devastating impact pornography has on individuals and their relationships.

One study that looked at brain scans of men who self-identified as “porn addicts” found that consumption of pornography can affect dopamine secretion in the brain and “alter the reward centre,” resulting in a variety of undesirable outcomes such as obsessive cravings and less satisfaction with real sexual partners.

It’s not surprising, therefore, that pornography has a very negative impact on marriages. Those who regularly consume pornography find it increasingly difficult to be aroused by their spouses, as their natural desire for sex “has been transferred somewhere else.” Author Sheila Gregoire continues to explain: “When you spend a ton of time teaching your brain to associate arousal and release with pornography, your brain can’t associate arousal and release with a person anymore.”

The Family Research Council presents a variety of other troubling consequences of pornography use, including the following:

Married men who are involved in pornography feel less satisfied with their conjugal relations and less emotionally attached to their wives.
Pornography use is a pathway to infidelity and divorce.
Pornography viewing leads to a loss of interest in good family relations.
Men who view pornography regularly have a higher tolerance for abnormal sexuality, including rape, sexual aggression, and sexual promiscuity.
Prolonged consumption of pornography by men produces stronger notions of women as commodities or as "sex objects."

Having positive perceptions of one’s body is important. While it’s great that VonHesse has achieved such self-acceptance, it’s unfortunate that she and her husband have decided to forgo privacy for profiting from indecency, putting themselves and others at risk. Being proud of your body doesn’t mean you have to show it all to everyone. Selling oneself in this way is “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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E*Trade Encourages Envy

7/14/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

People often point to advertising as the main influence on individuals’ buying decisions. Certainly ads can be effective, otherwise there wouldn’t be so many of them; however, another major influence on what we buy is other people, e.g., "keeping up with the Jones." E*Trade’s new ad campaign leverages the persuasive power of peers, but is the firm’s two-pronged promotion effective and ethical?

E*Trade bills itself as “the original place to invest online” and “the first to give Main Street the chance to trade like Wall Street.” The company has become well-known for empowering ordinary people to trade like professional stockbrokers. Instead of paying costly commissions, individuals who open E*Trade accounts put down just $6.95 per trade of stocks, bonds, and exchange-traded funds (ETFs), and that fee drops to just $4.95 after 30 trades in a given quarter.

Do E*Trade and similar on-line trading platforms (e.g., Ameritrade and Scott Trade) work? They can, if you know what you’re doing. Online trading is much like do-it-yourself (DIY) home projects. Getting the tools to renovate your own kitchen is easy; using them properly is the hard part. Some, however, have been very successful using online trading tools, like the New Jersey high school student who turned $10,000 into $300,000 in about a year, by buying and selling on E*Trade.

This information provides an important backdrop for E*Trade’s new advertising campaign, as each spot features an unambiguous attempt to pit poor against wealthy. The commercials entice the “have nots” to long for the lifestyle of the “haves.”

For instance, in one commercial a young cubicle-dweller gets blown-off by his much more affluent boss, which launches the young office worker into imagining the extraordinary lives of the exceptionally well-to-do: lounging around lavish pools, hitting golf balls off yachts, doing donuts in super cars, feeding exotic pets, waterskiing behind helicopters, having food fights with expensive edibles. A music bed of “If I were a rich man” from Fiddler on the Roof plays beneath these and several similar clips, all culminating with an arousing call to action: “Don’t get mad, get E*Trade.”

The campaign’s other spots feature different video footage and music but suggest the same problem/solution: Your life is lacking because you don’t have what the rich have, but you can get it all with E*Trade.

What’s been the reaction to E*Trade’s campaign? Adweek gave it the designation of “Ad of the Day” for June 19, 2017, describing the ads as “remarkable,” while adding that the company “stokes rage at the 1%.”

Fast Company’s take was more critical: “By using opulence to sell its investment services, the online broker patches together a plutocratic vision of the American dream, ignoring how entrenched inequality is–and how much more difficult it is to overcome.”

In addition, CNET succinctly summarized the campaign’s ironic prescription: “The rich are awful, so use ETrade to become one of them. That seems to be the logic behind the company's new ad campaign.”

I tend to agree with these analyses and draw my own conclusion about the campaign’s mindfulness through a combination of these points and several new ones. Here are the five unfortunate outcomes I believe E*Trade’s ads inspire:

1. Unrealistic expectations. Certainly people can go from rags to riches by trading stocks, but how likely is it to happen? Making a fortune in the stock market requires considerable skill and some luck—much more than just opening an online account.

2. Envy: Benchmarking helps businesses get better by showing them how they might improve their products and processes. Personal comparisons, however, are often problematic, especially when they involve wishing for what others have.

3. Terminal Materialism: Money isn’t inherently bad; it depends on what one does with it. Many of its uses in the E*Trade ads, however, suggest owning for the sake of owning, vs. buying practical things (instrumental materialism), or using money to help others, e.g., paying for education, creating jobs.

4. Poor Stewardship: Beyond being impractical, much of the behavior the campaign glamorizes is overindulgent and outright wasteful.

5. Inaccurate Perceptions: While some extremely rich people live lives of ridiculous luxury, most are not so crass and careless with their spending. The way they became wealthy was not by being frivolous but frugal. Also, many use their money in ways that benefit others.

Against these points, some may argue that the ads are puffery, i.e., extreme exaggerations meant to be funny and not taken seriously. While some of the scenes are over-the-top, e.g., the all-out food fight among elites, most of the cuts are realistic and certainly could happen, if they haven’t already. For instance, a Google search of “helicopter water skiing” produces over a million hits, including a variety of real pictures and the story of a father who towed his son on water skis with a copter, to the chagrin of others.

Will the E*Trade ads be effective? Probably. As mentioned at the onset, the desire to emulate others, especially in terms of their possessions, is a very powerful one. Consequently, E*Trade’s appeal to become one of the very rich will strike a nerve with many, and the oversimplification of achieving the dream will help induce people to try online trading. As suggested above, however, the campaign rests on a foundation of deception, disrespect, and excess, among other indiscretions, which results in E*Trade earning this return: “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Hotdog Heroes?

7/7/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

What did you enjoy eating during your recent 4th of July celebration: a burger, some watermelon, a side of potato salad? How about 72 hotdogs? If you’re competitive eater Joey Chestnut, that’s exactly what you downed on Independence Day, in just ten minutes.

According to Nathan’s Famous, people have been gathering at its first hotdog stand on Coney Island, NY every July 4th since 1916, to see who could devour the most dogs. The first recorded contest came in 1972. Since that time, Nathan’s has built the event into a media spectacle that attracts contestants from around the world, draws over 40,000 spectators to Coney Island, and engages nearly two million viewers on the ESPN broadcast.

Yes, ESPN televised the event live, and SB Nation provided a thorough recap of the action. Does that mean that eating qualifies as athletics? If so, the United States, which ranks as the 12th most obese country in the world, might also be one of the most athletic!

Although we shouldn’t expect eating to become an Olympic event anytime soon, it’s helpful to understand exactly what competitive eating is and why it’s so popular:

“Competitive eating, or speed eating, is an activity in which participants compete against each other to consume large quantities of food in a short time period. Contests are typically eight to ten minutes long, although some competitions can last up to thirty minutes, with the person consuming the most food being declared the winner. Competitive eating is most popular in the United States, Canada, and Japan, where organized professional eating contests often offer prizes, including cash.”

Beyond individual participants, there are actual organizations whose mission is consumption as sport, most notably Major League Eating (MLE), “the world body that oversees all professional eating contests.” Its logo features a hand holding a fork. MLE’s website lists dozens of official eating contests ranging from oysters to ice cream sandwiches, with prize purses between $1,750 and $40,000. Chestnut has won many of these events, including Nathan’s contest 10 times, which gives new meaning to the saying “eat to live.”

Surprisingly, Chestnut, Miki Sudo, who ate 41 hotdogs to take the women’s title, and most other competitive eaters are not big people; they’re average-size, and some are even very fit. So, how do they eat so much? Here’ the basic strategy:

“Many competitive eaters, like those competing in the Nathan’s Hot Dog Eating Contest, practice stretching out their stomachs for the main event by drinking gallons of milk or water very quickly, or by downing lots of filling, fibrous foods like watermelon and oatmeal in a matter of minutes.”

Nathan’s website goes on to explain the exercise and eating regimens of many of its contestants:

“Despite consuming mass quantities of high-calorie foods during competition season, most professional competitive eaters are very fit. Many contestants weight train and exercise vigorously to build muscle and increase their metabolism. Most also eat healthy, low-calorie diets after competitions. Why? Because their stomachs are so stretched out, they can no longer tell when they’re full!”

So, maybe competitive eaters are athletes who deserve more recognition for their accomplishments. Not so fast. It’s also important to consider the ‘damage’ they do to themselves and potentially others through their day-of-event activities.

For instance, Chris Weller of Business Insider wrote an article titled “The terrifying totals of calories, fat, and sodium consumed at Nathan's Famous Hot Dog Eating Contest,” in which he presented the nutritional numbers for the 72 Nathan’s Famous skinless beef franks (4 kg) and 72 Ball Park hot dog buns (3 kg) that Chestnut quickly consumed this past July 4. Here are some of those statistics, which include the metric weights and their respective percentages of daily nutritional values:

Fat: 1 kg, 1606%
Saturated Fat: 360 g, 1800%
Cholesterol: 2 g, 667%
Sodium: 46 g, 1917%

To help put these numbers into perspective, that’s about 16 days’ worth of fat, 18 days’ worth of saturated fat, and over 19 days’ worth of sodium, all packed into a ten-minute timeframe. Of course, Chestnut and his colleagues aren’t downing those kinds of calories (19,433), every day, but if competitive eating is their job, they’re engaging in similar indulgence more than a few times a year. Even if someone exercises regularly and maintains a trim physique, it’s hard to imagine that kind of extreme consumption doesn’t take its toll over time.

Such overeating reminds me of a now-defunct television show I watched several times, not without misgivings: the Travel Channel’s “Man vs. Food.” In each episode, host Adam Richman visited a different city where he interacted with locals at a couple of their favorite restaurants and eventually took on a mammoth eating challenge, like a 5 lb. sandwich.

After four seasons of such extreme consumption, Richman retired from the popular series without offering a specific reason; although, some suggested there were “concerns over ensuring Adam Richman's health if the show had continued in its previous format.” Richman has since lost about 70 lbs.

Some may argue personal choice: “If people want to tackle food challenges as TV show hosts or as competitive eaters, it’s their prerogative. They’re only affecting themselves.” Unfortunately, it’s not that simple.

While an individual’s gluttony does primarily impact him/her, it also affects others by virtue of the fact that we’re social beings who often learn from and emulate the behavior of others. That influence is greatly magnified when mass media share the actions, and it’s even worse when the destructive behavior is presented in a positive light.

The bottom-line is competitive eating glamorizes gluttony. Chestnut and other eating contest winners receive prize money and they’re lauded as champions. There’s nothing praiseworthy, however, about stuffing oneself with 72 hotdogs in ten minutes.

True, few rational people will attempt to consume the quantities of food that competitive eaters do, but they’re still teaching wrong attitudes toward food, e.g., that eating is sport and that it’s okay to continue consuming even after you’re full. Those are likely the kinds of beliefs that have helped place America 12th on the list of the world’s most obese nations.

Competitive eating comes into even poorer taste when one considers the hundreds of millions of people around the world who don’t have enough to eat. “The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that about 795 million people of the 7.3 billion people in the world, or one in nine, were suffering from chronic undernourishment in 2014-2016.”

According to Poverty.com, it’s estimated that “a person dies of hunger or hunger-related causes every ten seconds.” That means about 60 people passed away during the time it took the Nathan’s competitors to each down several dozen calorie-heavy hotdogs.

Competition is generally a good thing that brings out the best in people. Competitive eating, however, showcases an unseemly side of humanity—one that’s harmful to its participants, as well as to hosts of others. Given the great attention it receives each year, Nathan’s Famous Hotdog Eating Contest appears to be effective promotion, but the bad behavior it encourages makes the competition an example of “Single Minded Marketing.”

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Mean Tweets Encourage Bad Behavior

6/29/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

It’s painful to repeat these social media putdowns, but there’s a reason: “[Amy Poehler’s face] looks like she survived a nuclear blast.” “Melissa McCarthy is the Madea of white people.”   “Anthony Mackie is probably just angry because he looks like a *#@% Aardvark.” “Gina Davis is a real man’s man.” “If you skinned Larry King & ironed out his leather, you could make enough coats to give 1 to every poor child in America.”

While one might wonder how individuals can be so insensitive as to post these kinds of insults on Twitter, what’s even more incredible is that a national television network curates the cruelty, repackages it, and presents it as comedy. What show does such things? ABC’s Jimmy Kimmel Live.

For over five years, the show has aired a segment called “Mean Tweets.” Each edition features scathing criticisms that ill-mannered individuals have tweeted about specific celebrities. While simply sharing the verbal abuse would be bad enough, to create more compelling television, producers have each celebrity read his/her own Mean Tweets on camera, heightening the humiliation.

Despite its animosity, the segment has been well-liked, as suggested by both the bit’s longevity and the growing number of special segments, e.g., NFL and NBA players, country music stars, and even a President Obama edition. Several of these spin-offs have garnered tens of millions of views on YouTube. Why have they been so popular? Perhaps for the same reason motorists slow down to checkout a car accident when they know they shouldn’t, yet they can’t keep from looking.

Some may be thinking, "What’s the harm? Many of the tweets are funny because they’re stupid. Plus, celebrities are used to public scrutiny and don’t seem to mind reading the tweets; if they did, they wouldn’t participate. In fact, the celebrities are doing a service by showing how to laugh at criticism rather than let it bother you.”

Those are fair arguments, but those who make them, not to mention the creators of Mean Tweets, are missing the most important point: No one should encourage verbal abuse; yet, that cruelty is the foundation for the Mean Tweets segment.

In most editions of Mean Tweets, the show shares not only heartless posts but the Twitter handles of the mean tweeters, lifting them out of obscurity and giving them an undeserved moment of fame. They are essentially rewarded for comments that most would call “abusive, vulgar or rude.”

In many ways, Mean Tweets is doing exactly the opposite of what most TV networks do when a misguided spectator enters the playing field during a live sporting event: The producers refuse to broadcast the reprobates, denying them any additional recognition of their bad behavior and avoiding encouragement of copycats. Mean Tweets, in contrast, glamorizes the offensive act, suggesting that it’s okay to gain attention by demeaning others.

Granted, most people do not hope for network television coverage of their tweets, but they do want the attention and approval of people in their social networks. Given the wide acceptance of Mean Tweets, many may reason that disparaging others is a path to popularity. That’s exactly the kind of behavior our society can ill afford to encourage.

If one took away the TV cameras and the celebrity cameos and put Mean Tweets in a school setting, it would be called shaming or bullying, which include teasing, name-calling, inappropriate sexual comments, and taunting. According to bullying statistics.org, “Over half of adolescents and teens have been bullied online, and about the same number have engaged in cyber bullying.”

The consequences of bullying are always bad. Children who are bullied are more likely to experience anxiety, depression, health complaints, and decreased academic achievement. And, sometimes the results are fatal, as was the case for 15-year-old Sadie Riggs, a Pennsylvania girl who recently hanged herself. In the obituary, Sadie’s family cited social media bullying for making her feel “worthless” and helping precipitate her suicide.

Should Sadie have read her cyberbullies’ comments in public and learned to laugh at their putdowns? Of course not. The solution to bullying is not to further shame the victim but to stop the bullying. Among other things, that means not making light of abusive language or giving it undeserved exposure.

Ironically, ABC News, which belongs to the same network that airs Mean Tweets, shared a press release about Sadie Rigg’s premature passing. The story recounted her family asking well-wishers to forgo flowers and instead “be kind to one another.” Jimmy Kimmel Live should take that plea to heart and put an end to Mean Tweets and its “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Marketing Violence

6/9/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

Do you have keepsakes that remind you of special life experiences, e.g., the playbill from a Broadway musical, the lunchbox you used in elementary school? How about the shirt you wore when you had a big argument with a coworker? Of course, most people want to forget unpleasant incidents like that, but apparently not Major League Baseball (MLB).

Even if you don’t follow professional baseball, you may have heard of the brawl that broke out between the Washington Nationals and the San Francisco Giants this past Memorial Day. The clash occurred in the eighth inning when Giants relief pitcher Hunter Strickland pegged Bryce Harper in the hip with a fastball, which many believe was planned payback for Harper homering twice off Strickland in the 2014 playoffs.

Harper charged the mound, where the pair exchanged a few blows as the benches cleared and players from both teams enveloped the combatants. The altercation earned Harper and Strickland suspensions of four and six games, respectively, as well as fines of undisclosed amounts. So, MLB took a strong stance against fighting—well, not exactly.

A few days after the incident, the jersey that Strickland wore during the ruckus appeared for sale on the league’s dedicated auction website: http://auctions.mlb.com. The site, which is “The Official Online Auction of Major League Baseball,” offers to the highest bidder all matter of baseball memorabilia, ranging from Albert Pujols’s 585th career home run ball, to seats from Wrigley Field. MLB has a painstaking process for ensuring the authenticity of such collectibles, which includes employing an authenticator at every game who affixes a tamper-resistant, serial-number-linked holographic sticker to each item that may have special future value.

Somehow jersey #60 made its way off Strickland, through the authentication process, and onto the auction block. There the shirt quickly began collecting bids, which rose to $1,500, making it “by far the most coveted game-used Giants jersey” from the Memorial Day game. Those competing for the collectible were well aware of what they were after; in fact, “the item listing noted that ‘Strickland was ejected from the game after fighting with Bryce Harper.’”

Meanwhile a representative of MLB Auctions told the Washington Post that proceeds from the jersey’s sale would go to the Giants. The league also listed for sale Strickland’s Memorial Day cap and the shirt that Giants outfielder Michael Morse wore in the same game. Morse ended up on the seven-day concussion disabled list after the game because he hit heads with one of his own teammates, pitcher Jeff Samardzija, during the scuffle.

Successful businesses and businesspeople need to be opportunistic, right? They see chances to make money and they take advantage of them. So, was MLB just following best practices in realizing revenue from the Memorial Day merchandise? No.

The league’s sale of the memorabilia implied acceptance of the fighting. Principled organizations and individuals only market products that they feel are good and right. A firm that sells smartphones believes that the technology benefits its users. Even owners of preschool lemonade stands believe that their customers benefit from their beverages. In contrast, we question the integrity of individuals who sell products that they would never use themselves, although they could.

Some may argue that Strickland’s Memorial Day jersey is just a shirt, and that there’s nothing inherently violent about a piece of clothing. That’s true, but it’s also obvious that the jersey would never have been worth $1,500 aside from its unseemly association. As the seller, MLB intended to capture significant extra value because of the violence.

Our world is rightly enraged by violence that terrorists, abusive spouses, and school bullies act out on innocents. In comparison, major league players pummeling each other on a pitching mound seems less severe because they are highly paid elite athletes and baseball is entertainment, but the brutality is still very real.

As angry as individuals may be, belting someone with a baseball and throttling them with fists aren’t ways rational people resolve differences, and they certainly are not behaviors we want young people to emulate. Yet, selling shirts and other merchandise connected to such incidents legitimizes those actions and even glamorizes the violence.

Granted, there’s gratuitous violence in other sports that occurs even more frequently, e.g., the fighting that’s tolerated and even glorified in ice hockey, which is also problematic. That discussion, however, will need to wait for another blog post.

Fortunately, MLB realized the error of its way and closed the auction a couple of hours before it was scheduled to end. Still, the message had already been sent, and the perceptual damage had been done. Unfortunately, people will pay to partake in violence in various ways, but the organizations that stoop to satisfy such demand are guilty of “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Carl's Jr. Says Goodbye to Sex

5/19/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

Some things in life are certain: death, taxes, and super-sexualized ads from Carl’s Jr. Surprisingly, one of the three is changing, and it’s not death or taxes. Yes, Carl’s Jr. has finally decided to put an end to erotica and curtail its notoriously risqué commercials.

If you haven’t experienced firsthand the chain that claims to be “the Pioneer of the Great American Burger,” you might be familiar with its sister brand, Hardee's, or you may have seen one of the many Carl’s Jr. ads that have aired nationally. More than burgers, Carl’s Jr. has become known for very sexually provocative TV commercials that show significant skin of young, attractive women, and little food.

Although it seems like the ads have been airing forever, Carl’s Jr.’s foray into promotional profanity began in 2005 with a 60-second spot that featured Paris Hilton in an extremely revealing bathing suit, washing a Bentley, while taking a brief bite out of a spicy barbecue burger. Over the next twelve years, dozens of other women reprised the same stereotypical role of sex object in a variety of settings, such as a volleyball court on the U.S.–Mexico border, a farm, and a football stadium. While some of the women were celebrities (e.g., Kate Upton, Heidi Klum, and Kim Kardashian), others were less famous women put in the same sorts of compromising positions.

As recently as this past fall, Carl’s Jr. was still airing sexually explicit ads. One of the last spots was for its Bacon 3-Way Burger, which featured three, similar-looking, bikini-clad, blond models, seductively cooking and feeding each other bacon. Meanwhile, background music set a very lascivious tone, including super-suggestive lyrics: ‘’Hey, girls whatcha doin’ this weekend? We should stay in and have us a threesome.”

Then, out of the blue, Carl’s Jr. did an about-face: no more sex in ads. When a friend of mine first told me of the change, I couldn’t believe it. I clicked on the link he sent me to a new 3-minute Carl’s Jr. commercial that presents a fictionalized reason for the reversal. To summarize the supposed story, Carl Hardee Sr. returns to the business, cleans up Carl Jr.’s philandering, and resumes control of the business with a back-to-basics focus.

Even after watching this spot, I was still incredulous, thinking that the new Carl’s Jr. promotion was probably just a ploy. However, I’ve since done more digging and found it’s true: The company has decided to stop using sexually explicit ads and to start emphasizing its products. The change is certainly a welcome one, but it also left me wondering ‘why'? More specifically, what caused Carl’s Jr. to make such a drastic course-correction?

I hoped to hear that the restaurant chain had realized the error of its ways—that it now understood the need to respect women rather than objectify them and that it no longer wanted to lead its largely young male target market into self-destructive and relationship-wrecking lust. Unfortunately, however, the motives for the change appear to be more self-seeking than other-oriented.

A recent Washington Post article shared excerpts of an interview with Jason Norcross, executive creative director and partner in 72andSunny, the agency responsible for Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s advertising over the past eight years. In the interview, Norcross explained, “It was time to change. Those [sexually-charged] ads just weren’t driving business as they once did.” Norcross added that the chain, which had become better known for its advertising than for its food, needed to compete more effectively against companies like Shake Shack and Habit Burger Grill.

Carl’s Jr. and its ad agency can be commended for making a data-driven, results-minded business decision. Organizations need to consider relevant consumer behavior and competitive forces, then act strategically in order to stay afloat; otherwise, there are no products for customers or jobs for employees.

What’s disheartening, however, is that the company hasn’t shown any regret for its past, longstanding and destructive indiscretions. Yes, the fictionalized return of Carl Hardee Sr. is somewhat redemptive, but the ad’s humor (e.g., “then that lady got in there and her clothes flew off”) makes light of a truly reprehensible, twelve-year run of dehumanizing women and misguiding men.

What’s worse, there’s no indication, from Norcross’s comments or from the new commercial, that Carl’s Jr. would refuse to return to its prior salacious promotion if it appeared at some point that sex could again be used to sell hamburgers. If/when racy ads once more become effective in “driving business,” it looks like Carl’s Jr. would be back on board with super-sexed ads.

It’s good that the airwaves and other advertising spaces will be free of smutty spots from Carl’s Jr. for the foreseeable future and that there will be a proper focus on product, which may help the chain regain market share. It would be even better if the company had articulated genuine and serious support for societal values like decency and respect. It’s a tough call, but in lieu of such a commitment, Carl’s Jr. current strategy stays in the category of “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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The Wrong Place to Race

4/28/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

When you’re in the market for a new car, what do you want: good gas mileage, safety, reliability, style? How about acceleration from 0 to 60 in 2.3 seconds and speed of 140 mph? You may be thinking, “I want to get to work fast, but not that fast.” Well, you could carve minutes off your commute with the new Dodge Demon.

Dodge, a division of Fiat Chrysler, recently announced the Demon, an 840-horsepower ultimate muscle car it calls “A Beast Unlike Any Known to Man.” That extreme title is more than puffery. The bold claim is backed by an array of outrageous automotive features that together produce such superlatives as:

Highest horsepower of any production car
Fastest 0-60 time of any production car: 2.3 seconds
Fastest 0-100 time of any production car: 5.1 seconds
First wheelie by a production car

What’s a production car? They are “mass-produced identical models, offered for sale to the public, and able to be legally driven on public roads (street legal).” In other words, they’re the vehicles in front of and behind us on highways. They’re the ones pulling up next to us at stop lights. They’re the cars that any of us can buy and drive around town.

So, why does someone need a ‘monster’ like the Dodge Demon to drive back-and-forth to school or work? It seems like using a sledge hammer to kill a fly. Of course, a similar question can be asked about other cars, e.g., Does anyone really need a Lamborghini, a Lincoln Navigator, or a Lexus to get from point A to point B?

There is a key difference, however: Dodge has designed the Demon for one specific purpose—drag racing. That’s the reason for the “superlatives” listed above and the reason the company’s own website says:

“Race-Ready”
“Every feature was chosen to optimize drag strip performance. That’s why the Dodge Challenger SRT® Demon is equipped with 315/40R18 Nitto NT05R™ drag radial tires.”
“Built for the drag strip”
“Designed with drag races in mind”
“The Dodge Challenger SRT® Demon is designed for one thing: dominating the quarter mile. These essentials will help ensure you get to the stripe first, win some trophies and put the other guy on the trailer.”

Of course, other companies also make dragsters, and some of those cars are much faster than the Demon: “Top Fuel dragsters are the quickest accelerating racing vehicles in the world and the fastest sanctioned category of drag racers, with the fastest competitors reaching speeds of 335 miles per hour (539 km/h) and finishing the 1,000 foot (305 m) runs in 3.7 seconds.”

Again, however, there’s an important difference: You can’t take these Top Fuel cars or most other dragsters onto the street, but you can easily do so with the Demon. This Dodge car can run legally on regular roads. Therein lies the problem. Public streets in cities, towns, and even rural areas, aren’t meant for solo vehicles traveling over a hundred miles per hour, let alone a couple of cars racing each other. What’s more, other vehicles and pedestrians inevitably cross paths with street racers, resulting in disastrous outcomes.

A quick web search of “street racing accidents” produces images of some of the most mangled automobiles you’ve ever seen, as well as continuous stories of people tragically impacted by races gone wrong. Here are some of those headlines:

“Arrest made in street racing accident that killed 3.”
“Father, daughter killed in street racing accident.”
“More than 60 people witnessed fatal L.A. street race.”
“2 Killed, 1 Injured in Fiery Street-Racing Crash.”

But, does Dodge or any automaker deserve blame for these foolish accidents? After all, individuals with more bravado than brains use all sorts of tricked out cars for street racing, especially Honda Civics and Toyota Camrys, which happen to be the top selling sedans in America. These car companies don’t make or promote their vehicles for street racing, yet some consumers go to great lengths to use them that way.

Dodge, however, is no innocent bystander to street racing. As described above, the company purposely manufactures and promotes the Demon for drag racing, which could just mean the relative safety of closed-course stadiums, but it doesn’t. Consider some of Dodge’s other messaging that is specific to street racing on the site www.dodge.com/en/ifyouknowyouknow/:

An initial video clip briefly shows a young man waving what appears to be a starting flag on what looks like a nighttime street.
Even less subtle, Tim Kuniskis, Head of Passenger Car Brands for Dodge, introduces the Demon by saying: “We have a duty . . . to literally leave our mark on the strips and streets of America,” and “This is the most technologically-advanced, street-legal, production drag car ever.”

One can argue that those words and images are fanciful, not intended to be taken literally, or that they’re inconsistent with the corporation’s culture, but even the mission and values of Fiat Chrysler advocate “competition” and taking “risks.” These principles take on an eerily ‘demonic’ meaning when considered in the context of street racing.

Finally, there’s the car’s name and related branding. Most car names have a positive or neutral connotation, e.g., Accord, Daytona, Envoy, Expedition, Explorer, Focus, Malibu, Odyssey, Park Avenue, Pathfinder, Sedona, Tacoma, etc. “Demon,” however, carries a decidedly negative and even evil association, which Dodge reinforces with the car’s logo and other visual identifiers.

On one hand, a name is only what you make of it. On the other hand, if you call your son Spike, you’re charting his path for him. Similarly, naming a car “Demon,” suggests some disregard for law and morals.

I must admit: I’m not a car guy; my knowledge of things automotive is limited. However, a more expert source has offered a similar opinion. In a recent editorial, Automotive News has called for a ban on the Demon saying that “Dodge is wrong to offer a purpose-built drag racer as a road-legal automobile.” The piece goes on to suggest that the company “places bragging rights ahead of public safety.”

Unfortunately, even with such significant safety concerns, Dodge will likely find owners for all of the 3,000 Demons it plans to offer for the 2018 model year at a price of nearly $100,000 each. As Forbes suggests, “Speed always sells in the new-car business, and being able to boast having the ‘world’s fastest production car’ guarantees Dodge magazine covers and millions of fanboy followers.”

So, in the end, Fiat Chrysler wins, as do the adrenaline-seeking street racers who buy Demons. Meanwhile, the general public bares the risk of the “Beast,” suffering Dodge’s decision to use “Single-Minded Marketing.”

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Frozen in Hope

3/18/2017

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by David Hagenbuch, founder of Mindful Marketing & author of Honorable Influence

A recent arctic blast and some significant snow left many Americans feeling frozen. The frigid experience reminded me of a recent news story about a young girl in the U.K. who actually asked to be frozen, and a judge granted her wish.

No, her desire was not symbolically tied to the popular Disney movie (“Frozen”); rather, her request stemmed from a much more serious need. The fourteen-year-old girl, known as JS, suffered from a rare form of cancer, such that there was nothing modern medicine could do to remedy her terminal condition.

Knowing that her fate was sealed, JS searched the Internet to see if anything could be done to extend her life of just fourteen years. She came across cryonics and spent her final months researching the controversial process in which humans are frozen with the hope of reviving them sometime in the future, when medical advances presumably will make such resuscitation and extended life possible.

However, before contracting with one of just a few organizations in the world that practice cryonic preservation, JS had to surmount two other significant obstacles: 1) the high cost of the procedure, which ranges from $28,000 to $200,000, and 2) permission to undergo the process, since she was not of legal age.

Fortunately, her maternal grandparents raised the $46,000 that JS need to be preserved. However, a court battle ensued between the girl’s divorced parents: Her mother was in favor of the procedure, but her father was not. Shortly before JS passed away in a London hospital, Justice Peter Jackson ruled in favor of her mother, granting the dying girl’s request. After she passed, JS’s body was preserved and flown to the Cryonics Institute in Michigan where it’s now stored in a 10-ft.-high vat of liquid nitrogen.

The case of JS’s death and freezing is both fascinating and tragic, but what does it have to do with marketing ethics? Well, the organizations offering cryonics are marketing a service that an increasing number of people are considering despite its very high price. Again, the cost of cryonic preservation can range from $28,000 - $200,000. Of course, people ‘of means’ often pay that much or more for all sorts of other exclusive and possibly superfluous services, such as entertainment and travel, so why shouldn’t they pay handsomely to hold onto something far more valuable—their life?

The big difference is that when someone books something like a $50,000 European vacation, there’s a high probability that the trip will happen. However, when individuals undergo cryonics, the chance that anyone will ever see them alive again, not to mention healthy, is extremely slim. In fact, one might even say the possibility is virtually nonexistent.

Despite the fact that cryonics has been used for about 50 years, no human being has been successfully unfrozen. Science has no real track record for bringing people back to life. Yes, there have been instances in which people have “died” on operating room tables, etc., and miraculously kept living. There was even a case in 2015 in which a Pennsylvania man was revived after spending 12 hours unconscious in the snow, while temperatures dipped to minus 4 degrees Fahrenheit.

In such situations, it’s questionable whether the subjects had truly passed. In the case of cryonics, however, people must be legally dead before they can be frozen (freezing live subjects is not allowed), which of course adds another degree of difficulty: It’s not ‘just’ a matter of carefully thawing a previously frozen living person; medical technicians also somehow need to bring that person back from the dead. Then, after performing that miracle, they must solve other significant issues, like curing the person of the advanced-stage disease that killed him or her.

All this to say, someone who purchases a cryonics contract is far from holding a guarantee of a second chance at life. These risk-takers are, however, recipients of an ever-so-slim ray of hope: Perhaps at some point in the future, science will discover a way to overcome death and cure currently fatal diseases. Maybe that hope is worth tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars when the alternative is certain, irreversible physical demise.

Cryonics isn’t the only industry to place a price tag on hope. Everyday, people spend significant money on many items that cannot promise positive outcomes. Certain surgeries are extremely risky with low rates of success. Likewise, there’s no guarantee that cancer patients who undergo radiation or chemotherapy will survive. Or, to take a completely different example, only the smallest fraction of people who play the lottery win. The rest enjoy just a brief period of belief, prior to the drawing, during which they imagine that they might be the winner.

So, what’s different when cryonics companies make a similar sale of hope? The main distinction is that other entities have shown they can succeed, or produce positive results. Some of their customers will, in fact, realize their wishes. However, again, cryonics has no history of success and its future prospects are extremely dim.

Furthermore, cryonics introduces an array of other ethical issues, especially if more and more people place hope in the uncertain science, for instance:

Use of resources
Responsibility for bodies if/when a cryonics organization closes
Reintegration into society of people who have been dead for decades or centuries

So, should cryonics be offered at all? That’s a question that has significant spiritual implications, as well as environmental, financial, and social ones. I’ll simply suggest here that if it is, it should be framed as entirely experimental, such that people who participate essentially donate their bodies to science. Those individuals, then, should not be charged. Furthermore, only a limited number of select cases should be accepted—not everyone who wants to add another ten years to his or her life.

There are many positive outcomes that organizations legitimately promise and successfully deliver, some more reliably than others. Restoring to life the frozen deceased, however, is not a current reality, and it may never be one. Consequently, any over-inflation of such hope should be seen as “Single-Minded Marketing.”