Quebec’s only Francophone beauty mag launches
Pure magazine launched yesterday, hitting newsstands across Quebec. The mag, a sister publication to Shoppers Drug Mart vehicle, Toronto’s Glow, will be published by Rogers six times a year and distributed to 65,000 Optimum card bearers and on newsstands. The Quebec-only Pure bears an introductory cover price of $1.99 and advertisers already onboard include L’Oreal, Revlon and Maybelline, among others. Pure‘s content includes international beauty and fashion trends to health, lifestyle and cuisine ideas aimed at women in Québec. A one-page ad costs $7530.
Viacom changes to CBS; 24/7 Canada rebrands as 24/7 Real Media
Viacom Outdoor Canada has changed to CBS Outdoor Canada. The company is a division of CBS Corporation. The change in company name will not affect its day-to-day operations.
And in a bid to align itself with its parent company, digital marketing shop 24/7 Canada has adopted its parent company’s name, 24/7 Real Media. Canadian operations will remain unchanged. Seven-year veteran Peter Rehdner has been named GM at the Toronto-based company.
Entertainment and retail equal in English Canada – Eloda ad analysis for May 5-11, 2006
Entertainment and retail both boast silver in the categories with the largest variety of TV ads on the English market for May 5-11. Both categories have nabbed 16% of the pie with the largest taker going to the ‘other’ catch-all category. And in the race for the brand with the largest variety of TV ads, in a year-over-year comparison, it’s no surprise that the names at the top are P&G and GM, respectively. Check out others topping the charts, and which brands had the most new spots. This info was gathered through Montreal-based ELODA’s online TV ad tracking, auditing and viewing services. All data supplied is based on the ELODA recording grid.
http://www.eloda.com
Sears dethrones Wonderland: Top radio ads – Media Monitors for May 8-14, 2006
Sears moved up from number nine to first place last week in the race between brands with the most spots on rotation across Toronto airwaves. New entrants to the top 10 last week include Canadian Tire (at number three), Hotels.ca, Staples, and Old Navy – all of which took the number six, seven and eight spots, respectively. Check out others topping the radio charts by category and brand in the Toronto market for the week of May 8-14, 2006.
http://www.mediamonitors.com
Fine Living names two new series
Two new series are on the slate to debut on Monday, July 3. Home to Go follows host Peter Fallico as he undertakes portable and affordable home improvements. The program runs in a 30-minute format and airs weeknights at 7 p.m. Immediately following Home to Go is Kitchen Equipped, a 36-part series that creates designer kitchens. The series airs weekdays at 7:30 p.m.
CTV Travel hosts The Royal Tour
Monarchs and presidents play host in a five-part series entitled The Royal Tour. The week-long series debuts on Monday, June 12 and airs daily to Friday, June 16 at 9 p.m. on CTV Travel. The show tours New Zealand, Peru, Jordan, Jamaica and Uganda.
Lister becomes AOL Canada GM
Jonathan Lister, former VP, Audience for AOL Canada has stepped into Craig Wallace’s shoes. Wallace was GM at Toronto-based AOL and has left the company after three years. The change is effective immediately.
Event
May 24
Mobile Communication Devices and the Media Revolution
Verity Club, Toronto
647-393-9649
http://toronto.marketingpower.com
The market for wireless data services in Canada is growing by leaps and bounds. This conference hosted by the American Marketing Association’s Toronto branch, looks at how you can tap in. Panelists include Globeandmail.com‘s editor Angus Frame, The Weather Network’s VP/GM interactive services Taylor Emerson, IDC Canada’s VP communications practice Tony Olvet and Nokia Canada’s client direct Jason Offet. Moderator is Nancy Helstab, MD of BrandEdge.
PHD engages in neuroscience
PHD Canada has really gotten inside consumers’ brains with a new neuroplanning system it’s adopted to help model media plans for maximum engagement. This proprietary process and model was developed by PHD in the U.K. about two years ago with U.K.-based Neurosense, a specialist consultancy that uses cognitive neuroscientific methods to gain insights into consumer thought and behaviour using psychology, psychophysics, and fMRI (functional magnetic resonance imaging) and marketing skills.
Budget growth highest since 2003: ICA survey
The ICA’s Survey of Marketing Budgets showed that budgets were up in Q1, with 27% of companies increasing budgets while 21% decreased them. Media adspend saw a modest rise for the fourth consecutive quarter in Q1, with 22% of companies reporting an increase and 20% reporting a cut. Internet spending showed good growth, resulting in 4% of total marketing spending, up from 3% a year ago. Sales promotion and DM budgets were also up while ‘all other marketing’ current budgets were left unchanged. ‘The reason is crystal clear,’ says Theresa Treutler, SVP and media director at Toronto-based Doner Canada. ‘The Internet, sales promotion and DM are activities where the accountability and results are much easier to see immediately. The more traditional media can’t be measured as quickly or as easily.’ Treutler says the industry will continue to see growth in Internet spend. ‘As our expertise grows in applications of the Net, the spending will increase. And the funding will come from traditional media. We won’t see large growth in budgets.’
The survey also showed that 51% of companies are setting budgets higher for 2006/07 than their actual spend was in 2005/06, and that marketing spend grew more in 2005 than at any time since the survey began in 2003. Conducted by NTC research, the survey is based on quarterly info provided by 270 senior marketing execs in Canadian.
Cheeky e-newsletter launches
Toronto-based creative agency The Artist Group launched Cheek Weekly yesterday, a free online newsletter touted as a guide for ‘beauty queens, fashionistas and culture cravers everywhere.’ It drops into subscribers’ inboxes once a week with the latest in celebrity beauty and fashion trends, application tips and product reviews. Reach for the first issue is 25,000 per week with the initial list of staffers’ friends and business contacts already spreading virally to that number.
Julie Miller, agency director at The Artist Group (an agency that reps photographers, stylists, and makeup artists) and Cheek’s head of business of development, says the newsletter will take a light look at a combination of beauty, fashion and cutting-edge popular culture. Miller says her audience is North America-wide. The site will offer advertisers ‘a number of integrated and customized advertising solutions such as banners that click through to the advertiser’s site.’ Miller says: ‘We’d like to keep the mainframe more editorial but there will be other opportunities to tie into product placement and subscriber contests. We’re open ideas to how to stretch the click-through.’ Cost for these ventures varies. A vertical banner is $350 while a sponsored link combo is $650. Miller says the target market is wider than one might expect. Age-wise it runs the gamut of adults and there isn’t even the expected female skew. She says men are more interested in grooming products these days but even the ones who aren’t, will like the cultural edge.
BBCK takes its basement on the road
Teen-skewing net BBCK has taken its recreated 70’s-look basement on the road. The 24-stop BBCK Basement Tour made its debut in both Toronto and Vancouver last weekend. The campaign has also brought in retail chain HMV as partner in the ‘Kause a Rukus’ contest, which gives away a party trip to London and Paris. Five HMV superstores will also play host to the BBCK video kiosk, a screen that will loop BBCK programming. The net targets teens 15-17. Youthography masterminded the media buys, with creative done in-house.
MIC’s K.I.S.S. pick of the week: Softlips campaign targets prom queens
Softlips is using prom season to target prom queens shopping at Fairweather. Vaughan, Ont.-based SitesMedia, which owns a network of ad faces in retail fitting rooms across Canada, will host creative for the month-long campaign in the chain’s fitting rooms. Fedele Naccarato, GM at SitesMedia, says the Softlips spot will be on 182 of his 10,000 ad faces nationally. ‘This is a great vehicle for this brand.’ Ffig Communications, created the Softlips campaign with media buys by Gaggi Media, both of Toronto.
Notes from the media landscape: adBay? Wal-Mart bids for online TV ad auction
Wal-Mart is spearheading a test of an online eBay-type auction system for the buy, sell, and trade of TV ads in the U.S. Earlier this week at Association of National Advertisers’ Advertising Financial Management Conference in Naples, Florida, Julie Roehm, the retail giant’s SVP, marketing communications, outlined the idea and called for an advertiser investment of $50 million U.S. to buy the ‘media stock’ needed to test the online system. Other major marketers supporting the idea include Hewlett-Packard, Masterfoods, Microsoft, Philips, and Toyota’s Lexus USA.
At the conference, eBay presented an online platform that could be used for the media marketplace. TV would likely be the only medium used for the test although all of the details have not yet been worked out. The group still needs to decide whether the auction would operate by having the marketer or its agency bid on the available inventory meeting their criteria or whether it would be a reverse auction with media sellers responding to requests for proposals.The plan calls for the test to be up and running early next year.
