A la carte vs. value meals

David Taylor’s piece at NTV on people’s media buying patterns contains this key paragraph:

When we have the choice to spend for exactly what we want, we spend less. But given the choice between assembling our own bundle and buying one that someone else has built, we choose the latter. I can’t count the number of times I’ve given up on the dollar menu and selected a “combo” meal just to get through the line at the local drive-through. When the music industry was selling us albums, we’d buy an entire CD to get one or two songs. In a world of Internet downloads, we spend a couple of dollars on the one or two songs we know and give up on the rest of the album.

Fantastic point and, if you read the story, you’ll see he backs that up with solid stats on consumer behavior.

More on Joe’s marketing

Aris at AdAge has a very good story up about the marketing of G.I. Joe: The Rise of Cobra, and not just because he links to yours truly. Aris dives a bit deeper into the “no critics screenings” and “let’s just appeal to Middle America” strategies than I did and you should go check his piece out.

Executive Shifts: Kops joins Summit; Two upped at Searchlight

agency-chair-bigEric Kops has been hired by Summit Entertainment to be the studio’s Senior Vice President, Publicity, taking on publicity campaigns for the studio’s entire slate of theatrical and home video releases.

Fox Searchlight, meanwhile, has promoted Michelle Hooper and Stephanie Allen to the role of Executive Vice Presidents of marketing, teaming up on all components of that studio’s marketing campaigns.