The "new normal" for American marketing executives appears to be a resolutely sober state in which they're seeking cost cuts whether the economy is good or bad.

That's why 82 percent of marketers surveyed by the Association of National Advertisers are still pushing for cost savings and still streamlining marketing budgets despite more signs of U.S. economic recovery including a buoyant stock market and an apparent uptick in first-quarter growth. Two thirds of the 82 percent planned to reduce their marketing budgets by up to 10 percent this year, about the same level who had such plans in 2012.

"Even in better times," ANA group executive vice president Bill Duggan told brandchannel, "a large, large percentage of marketers will still check that box to say that they're looking for cost reductions in their marketing efforts."Continue reading...

ICANN has been moving full-steam ahead under new CEO Fadi Cherhade, announcing that April 23rd will be the approval date for the first TLDs for delegation.

Once recommended for delegation, an applicant must pass a technical test and sign a Registry agreement with ICANN, which takes between five to six months, before a registry launch—which can take up to a year after they have been approved for delegation. 

There is no “sunrise” period for branded TLDs (Top Level Domains), but generic terms or open registries require a sunrise period of 30 days for trademark holders, followed by a 60-day landrush period, after which public domain sales could start. 

About 1,900 applications for new gTLDs are currently pending; 40 percent are for brand names and another slice is for “generic” words like .app, .insurance, .search and .book. “If allowed to register as closed domains, a single player could control the entire domain string related to a “generic” word – and prevent others from registering within it,” notes an article by InfoLawGroup.

Many have already voiced concern about “closed generic” domains and ICANN has asked the public for comment by March 7, 2013. 

Meanwhile, the American Association of National Advertisers (ANA) has asked ICANN to slow the process down “to set up a defensive mechanism so trademark holders can prevent registration of their exact trademarks across all the registries for a single reasonable fee.”Continue reading...

The Dreamliner has a name that makes it sound as if it should be the smoothest-riding and fastest thing on the planet, evoking the grand age of travel with ocean liners by taking them to the sky. Unfortunately, reality has caught up to Boeing's vaunted 787 Dreamliner.

Fourteen months after Boeing revealed the sophisticated jet, Federal Aviation Administration said Friday that it is “undertaking a comprehensive review of the design and manufacture of Boeing's 787 Dreamliner after a series of problems this week,”  according to USA Today.

That said, the FAA feels that the still fledgling Dreamliner — for which Boeing increased production in November — is still safe enough for passengers to climb aboard and won’t stop any airline from using the plane. "I believe this plane is safe and I would have absolutely no reservations about boarding one of these planes and taking a flight," said Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

So what’s the problem?Continue reading...

Activision goes bigger with Skylanders line extension and marketing effort.

AIG pays $1.7 billion for ING Malaysia.

ANA conference poised to set attendance record.

Android robot is a hit with 3-D printers.

Audi and BMW starting to leave behind Mercedes-Benz in global premium-auto race.

BAE in play for U.S. buyers as report says EADS merger failed because of discord among participating European governments.

BP moves closer to overall settlement of Gulf spill as Louisiana blames company for perma-sheen.Continue reading...

The "Is Japan Cool?" campaign from All Nippon Airways, Japan’s largest airline, aims to lure Americans to fly ANA and visit Japan. Unlike the UK's cocky (and to some, uncool) "Cool Brittania" campaign in the late 90's, it's a rhetorical question that peddles Japan's charms with a soft sell. Some might argue, too soft of a sell.

The goal of the “Cool Campaign,” now in its second phase, is to help Americans more easily understand places in Japan through pictures and videos mapping locations and enlightening visitors about cultural institutions, tourist attractions and quirkier trends (Cosplay, anyone?)Continue reading...

While more than 70% of marketers are using new media platforms, 62% are increasingly concerned with the inability to prove ROI across these channels according to the ANA (Association of National Advertisers) 2012 Digital and Social Media Survey, conducted in April and May 2012 with 224 client-side marketers.

Use of online video (e.g., YouTube) increased from 64% last year to 80% in 2012, and since 2007, overall usage of social media and mobile marketing has grown significantly, with 90% and 74% of marketers using them, respectively.

Respondents' preferred social/digital channels for consumer outreach:Continue reading...

As Microsoft released its new version of the Bing search engine today, it was another browser move that caused a flap. While potentially a win for Microsoft's brand, its consumer-first decision to embed 'Do Not Track' functionality in version 10 of its Internet Explorer browser in Windows 8 — with a default setting in the 'on' position — is "strongly" opposed by the Association of National Advertisers.Continue reading...

More than seven years in the making, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers is now accepting applications for new generic top-level domains (gTLDs).

As ICANN puts it, "The world of .com, .gov, .org and 19 other gTLDs will soon be expanded to include all types of words in many different languages. For the first time generic TLDs can include words in non-Latin languages, such as Cyrillic, Chinese or Arabic." And, as brand marketers and lawyers are well aware, .brand URL extensions are now possible for company names, too.

Click here for more on what brands need to do in this new TLD era.