Under the Influence with Terry O'Reilly

In this episode, we explore the controversial topic of Humane Marketing. From circuses to SeaWorld to fashion runways to fast food restaurants, each industry is dealing with mounting issues when it comes to the ethical treatment of animals, and their marketing is being affected as a result. This week, we'll look at how Ringling Brothers started using humane storytelling to  draw  custome...

This week, we enter the delicate world of Sponsorship Marketing. Close to 20 billion sponsorship dollars are spent each year in North America. That money can keep a brand afloat, or it can cause a lot of tension. We'll look at how a single phone call from Coca Cola changed Christmas tradition forever, how Barbie helped save the Girl Scouts and what happens when a sponsor has to weather the demands...

This week, we peek into the emerging world of influencer marketing. Today, the most popular social media Influencers aren't celebrities, they're regular people. Bloggers, Instagrammers, YouTube stars and Snapchatters have amassed millions of followers, promoting products using only the trust of their fans as currency.  We'll look at a single YouTube review that shot Patti Labelle to the top o...

This week, we take a look at the biggest day of the year for the advertising industry: The Super Bowl. The only sporting event where viewers pay as much attention to the commercials as they do the game.  We'll analyze a tiny but ambitious brand that bet its entire marketing budget on one single Super Bowl commercial, a website that created a purposefully banned ad to generate free buzz and a...

This week, we look at brands that separate themselves from the herd. In the world of marketing, standing out is the most critical thing a company can do. Having a distinct personality gives shoppers a reason to remember a brand and a reason to buy. We'll analyze a wrestler who used a delicate flower to intimidate his opponents, a single eyepatch that gave one company a $28M bump in sales and a mot...

In this episode, we explore why some big brands fail when they attempt to expand internationally.  It’s always interesting when massive companies with marketing firepower move into a new country and end up packing up their tents and going back home. Sometimes those companies succeed in other countries, but one just trips them up. We’ll look at how Home Depot and eBay originally struck out in...

This episode explores what happens to brands when a completely unexpected event occurs. Most companies tightly control every aspect of a brand - but occasionally, an unforeseen circumstance rears its head. And it’s always interesting to see how the company reacts and what happens to their business as a result. We’ll look at what happened to Ford Broncos after the OJ Simpson slow-speed car chase, w...

In this episode, we explore the crazy world of Trademarks. The key to success in marketing is to stand out from the crowd. One of the best ways to do that is with trademarks. Brands try to create logos or slogans or design features that they can protect legally, giving them unique marketing tools. In this episode, we'll look at a lawsuit between Disney and a music performer over a mouse trademark,...

This week, we take a peek into the risky, yet delicious world of commercial parodies. Some spoof ads are created just for the laughs, while others are sharp critiques of questionable products, overzealous advertising claims and self-congratulatory corporations. We'll look at a magazine that satirized one of the most controversial court cases of the century, a company that parodied the competition,...

This week, we take a peek into the risky, yet delicious world of commercial parodies. Some spoof ads are created just for the laughs, while others are sharp critiques of questionable products, overzealous advertising claims and self-congratulatory corporations. We'll look at a magazine that satirized one of the most controversial court cases of the century, a company that parodied the competition,...

This time, we explore the little known and surprising world of Industrial Musicals. In an unexpected collision of Madison Avenue and Broadway, companies in the '50s began staging full-fledged musicals in an effort to inspire their employees, parade new product lines and boost morale. We'll look at one company that tripled the production costs of  My Fair Lady  to inspire its sales team,...

The research team at Under The Influence does a lot of reading over the year, and finds a lot of great stories - many of which don’t fit into our regular episodes. But that doesn’t mean they shouldn’t be told! This week, we’ll tell the story of how Stephen King’s wife fished a story out of the wastepaper basket that changed their lives, how Engelbert Humperdinck’s manager tricked his record compan...

This time, we explore the world of loyalty programs. In this day and age, marketers do everything possible to encourage loyal customers, and loyalty programs are one of the most effective ways to retain them. We’ll go back in time to see how the first loyalty programs started, and we’ll analyze the marketing strategies behind today’s programs to see how they really work. Loyalty cards may give sho...

This week, we take a trip to five different countries to listen to some astonishing radio advertising. From a theatre company in Switzerland that sponsored the traffic in a whole new way, to a radio campaign that tried to bore you to sleep, to an amazing radio ad that asks you to donate your voice to help other people - all of these amazing campaigns are turning radio on its ear. We know you want...

It’s part two of our Strange Bedfellows episode. It’s not just smaller brands that are beginning to advertise on porn sites, Hollywood has come knocking, too. Large audiences and cheap ad rates are making advertisers ignore the risk in the hunt for reward. At the same time, porn sites are starting to advertise in mainstream media, and are trying to entice advertisers with analytics, public service...

In this show, we explore the increasingly blurry line between advertising and porn. There has always been a line advertisers wouldn’t cross to promote their wares - but now some marketers have tiptoed over that line to advertise on porn sites. From food companies to fashion brands to Hollywood movies, marketers have breached the final frontier in their search for bigger, more affordable audiences....

This is our annual episode where Terry tells some interesting stories about the brands he admires. This year, it includes the very first toy ever advertised on television in 1952, a teen magazine dedicated to heartthrobs, the only trailer people can name-check on highways, and a book that can be found in every hotel room. Each of these brands has a special reason why it has survived and thrived. W...

In this show, we explore the world of business-to-business advertising. It used to be the most boring advertising in the world - where green copywriters cut their teeth, and washed-up copywriters ended their careers. But all that changed when B2B companies dared advertise on the Super Bowl, and showed the marketing world that advertising industrial equipment could be as sexy as advertising a sport...

This week, we search for some of the world’s oldest brands. 80% of companies fold after 18 months, the ones that survive average a 50 year lifespan - then there are the ones that manage to last 100, 300 or sometimes even 600 years. We’ll look at a retail store that began in 1670, a brewery that poured its first beer in 1366, and the oldest fast food joint that used root  beer  to attract...

This week, we look at how marketing companies bounce back from blunders and epic missteps. Yes, most apologize, but what happens after the apology? We find out by telling the story of an airline that mistakenly offered business class tickets to Europe for $39, the cautionary tale of a company that made fun of a very serious Twitter hashtag and paid the price, the way a major candy bar company was...

While there are many strange products in the world, there are even stranger service companies. This week, we talk about a company that rents wedding guests, a company you can hire to actually cuddle you, and we’ll explore a company that promises to cure your hangover in just a few hours. And if you need an alibi to go with that hangover, there’s a company that markets lies, too. We know you want t...

The most interesting cultural differences aren’t country to country, they are province to province, state to state, and even city to city. This week, we explore how and why people living in different locations buy such vastly different products. British Columbia likes to show off luxury cars, Toronto likes big homes, and New York likes luxury watches. The most pampered pets live in Saskatchewan. L...

This week, we explore when a smaller advertiser attacks the weak spot in a bigger advertiser’s marketing. It’s a strategy of brinksmanship, because it means a smaller company not only chooses to attack a larger company, but it attacks the weakness in a bigger company’s strength. It takes surgical precision, but when done well, the smaller advertiser gains market share, while diminishing the bigger...

In this episode, we explore the marketing of movie merchandise. From the earliest days of merchandising book characters, to the true beginning of movie merchandising with the birth of Mickey Mouse and the Disney Studio, the marketing of toys and games became a critical strategy for movie and television studios. We chart the milestones in entertainment merchandising, how those milestones became a m...

This week, we explore words invented by marketers. Many of those words found their way into the dictionary and have become part of our daily language, like “Dependability” and “Halitosis.” While some other familiar words like Retsyn and Fahrvergnugen were around for a short time, then disappeared into the annals of commercial history. We’ll also get to the bottom of Corinthian Leather. We know you...