This is why I love sports.

Think back to 2am Tuesday morning. What were you doing? Probably sleeping (that is what I was doing). Maybe working or doing homework.

Well, you could have been joining in on a heated debate over an article/video by Dan Patrick criticizing Rick Reilly for his article ripping Jimmer Fredette.

I posted a link to Patrick's article on Facebook stating that I agreed with him. I never guessed what would follow that post. Two of my friends - Ronnie and Chris - went back and forth over the course of 73 comments until 2:30am. What they were going back and forth over is not totally clear at some points. It started about the article and then just sort of devolves.

There are a couple of things that I love about this.

1. I love sports. Don't get me wrong; I am passionate about them, I follow them way too closely, I debate hypotheticals concerning them - I love sports. But I will be the first to say that there are a lot of us that take them too far. This Facebook argument is an example of that. At the heart of all of this is Jimmer Fredette. If you don't know who that is, here is quick overview - he is a 6'1" Mormon, white kid who plays for BYU and lead the nation in scoring. He has an unbelievable shot and has taken the nation by storm. He took BYU to the sweet 16 where they lost to Florida. After which, Rick Reilly - a sports writer for ESPN.com - said that he was overrated, leading to a furious debate.

And here is what I love about sports: people - myself included - get worked up into a tizzy over things that can't be known, don't matter, and/or they have no control over.

Take the Jazz for instance. They are my favorite team. They are also horrible this year. I spend gobs of time discussing what they should do, will they get better, and what caused the problems. Yet I have zero control over it and it really has no bearing on my life. But I still do it. I still miss Deron Williams and Jerry Sloan. I still want the Jazz to get good draft picks. I still yearn for them to win the championship next year. And I still want the Lakers to lose in such glorious fashion that all Lakers fans denounce the evil franchise and burn their jerseys.

Yes, that is what I go through as a Jazz fan. And yes, I realize it is foolish, but I am not alone.

2. The second thing that makes the aforementioned Facebook argument such a gem is the fact that Chris and Ronnie have never met each other. It is glorious.

And that embodies why sports are so great. They can cause two people who don't know each other to argue vehemently online for hours about something that doesn't matter.

So here it is:

 

 

Nobody will Notice... Right?

When you're looking for a tattoo artist, do you worry about little things like the ability to spell? Because if I were having something indelibly inked onto my body (which I wouldn't), I would want the person doing the inking to have a steady hand and be able to spell.

Which is why I wouldn't go to this place:

That's right, "Forever Yours Tatto".

And in case you are wondering, you're right, the word tattoo should have two "O"s.

Some of you are probably saying, "but Kenny, it probably had both 'O's and someone stole one." Yeah, you may be right, but if I owned museum called "The History of Homo Sapiens" and somebody removed the letters "apiens" from the company van, I would not let anyone drive around in a van that said:

The History of Homo S

I would either get new letters or remove them all. Which brings me to my rules of advertising on your car:

1. Think long and hard before doing it, because chances are it won't look good. Even if the above example was devoid of spelling errors, it is still an ugly sticker on an old, nasty van. If you can do something that is well designed, looks classy, and is on a nice car, then maybe you can pull it off.

2. Once part of it starts to go, then all of it has to go.

3. Again, probably not a great idea. See rule #1.

You didn't think I would miss a Marketing Wednesday, did you?

I am not a fan of hyperbole (hy·per·bo·le : extravagant exaggeration); especially when they are actually just flat out lies.

Here are 2 examples:

This is an ad on the window of the Relax the Back store. I worry about their understanding of the word "true". When I envision "experiencing true zero gravity", I picture myself floating in the air; not sitting in a chair with gravity holding me in that chair.

Here is an idea, why not just say:

Experience zero gravity

or

Experience the comfort of zero gravity

Besides, zero gravity sounds fun and all - and I would love to go into space - but I don't associate that with a relaxed back.

FYI. There is gravity in space. It just has less force.

Moving on...

I saw this poster in the DMV (btw, I waited until the last possible day to get my license renewed before having to re-take the test; I don't recommend that action for anyone).

Our dear friends in the DMV are trying to encourage people to donate their organs. I support that. I don't support such a loose definition of the word "never". My grandmother is 87 years old and therefore is too old to donate. But I thought you were never too old to donate? I am confused... are people never too old to donate? Or can they donate up to the age of 80? Which is it?

Apparently, you are never too old to donate... unless you are too old to donate.

Actually, I can get behind this definition of "never".

I never cut class in high school.
I've never lied.
I've never been wrong.
I've never broken the speed limit.

(except for the times I did or was.)

Thanks Utah... and sorry to all the old people who got their hopes up that they could contribute to a better world.

140 Charaters... Unless Otherwise Stated.

We are all familiar with Twitter - it is like a mini-blog or a site of nothing but facebook statuses. You can follow people and they can follow you. It has become a powerful social networking tool.

The thing that makes twitter especially unique is the fact that each tweet can only be 140 characters; this is a concept and feature that they have touted and marketed and used to separate themselves from others. In fact, when Twitter won awards at the South by Southwest Festival in 2007, the company's acceptance speech was less than 140 characters

On Twitter, like most social networking sites, each user has a profile that they can maintain:

Notice, unlike your posts, your profile can be a whopping 160 characters.

What do I say to this? BOOO!

It would be one thing if the profile had no limit or an obscenely high limit, but twitter is built around the number 140, why would they give an extra 20 characters for the profile? Lame.

Who does this guy think he is!

In baseball, a triple play is pretty rare and that makes it exciting. That is how a blog should be. People shouldn't water down the excitement of their blog by posting 12 times in a day (although, most blogs are not at all exciting, so they can post all they want). But every now and again it is time for a triple play day.

Rounding out my triple play, I want to bring to your attention one man's hypocrisy. There is a blog out there who's author claims to be something of a marketing expert. I don't know his credentials, if he even has any. But I do know this - he is a fraud! He doesn't even follow his own advice. Just today he posted about the importance of timing in advertising and marketing efforts, yet look at his blog:

Excuse me? You are the one who still has a Santa image in your header. On January 20th!

Furthermore, he lies on facebook. Even worse, he lies on facebook about his blog.

Guess what, there was no post on Monday. Or Tuesday for that matter.

The fact is, he must be stopped. Sure, he is funny, and handsome... and looks good with his not-overly-thick-beard, but he must be held accountable for his actions. So what should we do? Stop reading his blog? No, no... that is too simple. What we must do is tell everyone we know about his blog! I know what you are thinking, "how will that help?" You are just going to have to trust me on this one, it will.

Now you're asking, "but how do I spread the word?" Anything is fine. Email, Facebook, Twitter.

I will even tell you what to say:

Friends and enemies alike - I have recently come across a pretty okay blog written by a smart, funny, hilariously, intelligent guy who I want to teach a lesson to. Help me out by visiting his blog daily. Just go to opinuendo.blogspot.com.

Thanks, ______________

Together we can all make a difference!

Timing Matters

Perhaps you noticed some Black Friday ads on the Saturday and Sunday following Thanksgiving. And perhaps, like me, you said to yourself, "that is dumb, Black Friday has come and gone. They need to remove these ads quicker."

It was even worse after Christmas. On December 26th, I noticed a lot of TV and radio ads for "the perfect Christmas gift", which was really helpful because I was looking for the perfect Christmas gift... except, Christmas was over. It was funny on the 26th, but it was downright annoying by the 30th. So imagine how I felt when I saw a billboard last week for the Ultimate Christmas radio station. We are halfway through January!

Don't these people know that timing is everything? But, hey, any publicity is good publicity, right? Wrong. Sometimes you actually can be noticed for the wrong thing. (Don't even get me started on that annoying guy who does the State Farm commercials...)

Yesterday (January 19th) I was in my local Wells Fargo and saw a stack of these fliers on the table where you fill out your deposit slip:

 

Why are they leaving fliers out for an offer that is over by 10 days? How hard is it to just throw them in the trash?

Now to the mother-of-all timing fails - I took these pictures at a local gas station on January 5th:

I know... it really is hard to look at. And it hurts no one more than me to have to show such gruesome images. There are some of you saying right now, "my goodness! At the time you took that picture, that ad should've been down for 86 days" and you almost right. It was actually 87 days.

Is the sign down now? I don't know. You think I can stomach fueling there? If they don't even bother to change the ads, imagine the last time the bathroom was cleaned or the hot dogs were changed.

Listen people: Timing matters.

Update - Triple Post Day!

As you probably don't know - because I didn't tell you - I have been on Blog-cation (a vacation from blogging, to the layperson) for the past 4 weeks. Of course, this has caused an uproar amongst all 4.5 of my readers; especially due to the lack of Marketing Wednesday. Well, fear not my minions! Marketing Wednesday has been moved to Thursday this week and you can expect a post later TODAY. (It's fine to applaud).

Also, to commemorate the start of blogging in 2011, today will be a triple post day (yes, this counts as one of the three posts).

So tell your friends, family, and enemies because we are going for 11 readers in '11!

Opinuendo-ians Unite!