The BSW Leading Swiss Agencies wants to create a
uniform poster research. In a press release, the
Association of Advertising and Communication Agencies against two different
research approaches. He expects the General
Plakatgesellschaft (APG) and Clear Channel Plakanda (CCP) have reached an agreement.
and a continued joint approach to poster research. APG and
CCP had agreed on the Swiss Poster Research project at the beginning of 2002.
agreed that with the help of satellite technology the chances of contact
of poster sites and their effect as a network. This summer
However, CCP suspended cooperation due to doubts about the suitability of the
measurement method. After hearing both parties, the BSW is of the opinion that
that the principles developed to date for a standardized
poster research in Switzerland are trend-setting. The current
In the opinion of the association, existing differences are likely to
can be eliminated with relatively little effort. The
Representatives of the media agencies in the BSW are convinced that only with
a common approach and a common planning tool
standard that can be achieved for the agencies and their
The client is the prerequisite for a clear and transparent
Planning creates.

The sponsorship and cross-media manager of the
Publisuisse, Marcel Zwahlen, has left his post. The
cadre position had been created only a few months ago, Zwahlen is
now gone after just two months. As reported by the Klein Report
the departure has nothing to do with the way of working, but lies in the
personal area. More details are not known. Marcel Zwahlen was
previously worked for IP Multimedia for six years.

From July 11 to August 12, 2005, 25
episodes of the popular community portraits. Every Monday to
Friday from 18.30 onwards, one community from each region
presented. As in the previous year, the program was hosted by
the former SF-DRS reporter Victor Rohner. With the summer series "I de
Ostschwiz dehei" he wants to give something to that growing number of people.
who are spending the vacations at home. The program was
accompanied by sponsoring measures from Raiffeisen, Tele Ostschweiz,
Schützengarten and Appenzeller cheese. The St. Gallen agency Pulpcom
was engaged to ensure that these measures were implemented and led
successfully completed these 25 times.

With a leaflet campaign in front of the Bern
City Hall, the journalists' associations Impressum and Comedia
Thursday on the threat of job cuts at the daily newspaper Der Bund
attention. 15 jobs - a quarter of the jobs in the
editorial team - are at stake, according to a press release.
With reference to the 2006 budget, the shareholders of the editorial
made it clear "that they would receive one to one and a half million francs subito
must be saved". This information corresponds to a report in the NZZ am
Sunday from mid-October, where there was talk of 10 to 15 jobs.
In an interview with the news agency SDA, the editor-in-chief of the Swiss Confederation
Hanspeter Spörri announced the job cuts on Thursday. He confirmed the
amount of the sum to be saved. However, it is not the case that a
quarter of the editorial office should be sacrificed. The federal government should be
journalistically produced quality newspaper. According to Spörri
Various savings options are under discussion, although it does not have any
happy about it. The future of the alliance and its cooperation with
of the Berner Zeitung ("Berner Modell") will be presented this Saturday at the Berner
Media Day. Organizers of the conference, which is open to the public free of charge
are the journalists' associations and the Institute for Communication
and Media Studies at the University of Bern and SRG Bern.

To the London International Advertising
Awards (LIAA), Ruf Lanz was the only Swiss agency to win a prize.
won. The prize was awarded to the radio commercial "I just called to say I love
you", in which residents of the Mühlehalde home for the blind sing the evergreen by
Stevie Wonder. The commercial won in the "Special
Adaptation of Music". Ruf Lanz also won four
Shortlist placements: with the pencils and telephone numbers for
McKinsey in the below-the-line area, with the subject "Horror" for the
Suva, both as a poster and as an advertisement. Other Swiss finalists:
Publicis with the Christmas mailing for Wilson Tennis Equipment, the
Fitness poster campaign for the Federal Office of Public Health and the
Posters for Médecins sans Frontières. Spillmann/Felser/Leo Burnett with
the snow-covered cars for Alpenarena.ch, the spot for Mammut and the
spot campaign for Feldschlösschen and with the campaign for Baileys,
both in the poster and print sectors. JWT+H+F with the
Smirnoff campaign as billboard, poster and ads. Advico
Young & Rubicam with the posters for Bread for All and a
Advertisement for JAP Asian Fashion Store and for the ADC Yearbook 2004 in
in the category "Best Use of Illustration". Matter & Partner with
a mailing for the Tribis dog school. Euro RSGC with an advertisement
for Riposa. Jung von Matt with the advertising campaign for Julius Baer.
Lichtspiele with a corporate video for Atel. Walker with a commercial
for Powerflame. Futurecom interactive with the "Ingenieur Movie" for IWC.

On Wednesday, an SVP advertisement on "bus terror" filled half a page of the Tages-Anzeiger. As 20 Minuten now reports
writes, this published version was from the legal department
of the Tages-Anzeiger publisher Tamedia has been toned down. From "So lügen
Elmar Ledergeber and Esther Maurer" became "So say Elmar Ledergeber
and Esther Maurer the untruth". The advertisement had been changed because
otherwise a defamation could be present, through which in turn the
newspaper would be legally contestable. As 20 Minuten further reports,
In contrast, people at Blick are less concerned about legal sanctions.
Head of Communications Marco Castellaneta told the
Free newspaper: "We want to uphold freedom of expression."

2005 proves to be a good vintage for
Communication managers. The number of participants in the
diploma examinations increased by 12 to 49 compared to the previous year.
41 passed, which represents a remarkable success rate of 84 %
means. 24 of the new graduates are women, 17 are men. The good
performance naturally also had an impact on the average grade
has had a significant impact on the share price, according to a press release. It stands at 4.33. With
with an overall score of 5, Christian Meier from Bern and Viviane
Rauch-Lyoth from Steinmauer presented the list of graduates
on. The graduation ceremony, including the presentation of documents, will take place on December 9.
evening in Zurich.

The development of the opening rates of
emails continues to decline, on average only every
third e-mail sent is opened. This is the result of the
Email trend report for Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) from the
online advertising service provider Doubleclick, which sends mails as
marketing tool for the second quarter of 2005. In comparison
Compared to the previous year, the EMEA opening rate fell from 40 % to 32 %. According to
Doubleclick explains the sharp decline
possibly due to the fact that the increasing volume means that users have a
more targeted selection of the emails they actually open. To
The online service provider has conducted its own study on this topic.
published.
In addition to the results of the opening rates
The trend report also includes the delivery quotas, which are derived from dispatched
emails minus bounce-backs. They are still
very high, in EMEA a year-on-year increase of 1.6 % to
90.9 % were recorded. The click-through rates are in comparison
remained stable compared to the previous year. The
average rate for EMEA amounted to 9.7 % in the second quarter of 2005.
Doubleclick examined this value for three European countries
more precisely. Accordingly, France recorded the highest growth rate of 11.1 %.
click-through rate, followed by the UK with 9.8 % and
Germany with 7.9%. Further holds
the e-mail trend report states that HTML remains the most popular e-mail format.

The authors of the study assume that e-mails continue to play an important
important and influential channel for marketing.
The result also shows that customers are now more aware of
decide which e-mails they respond to. Accordingly
advertisers are now adapting their strategies. The data used for the study
The necessary data was collected from over one billion emails,
between April and June 2005 via the Dartmail platform of
Doubleclick in Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

The French investor Vincent Bolloré
has further increased its stake in the media and market research group Aegis.
expanded. The chairman and shareholder of the advertising holding company Havas owned
Thursday according to the Aegis website already 24.99 %. The fact that Bolloré is
the 20-% threshold, the Financial Times believes that the
Times (FT) as a sign that he is considering a merger of the group with Havas
plans. As the competitor Publicis refrained from making an offer for Aegis
and was also taken by the consortium Hellman &
Friedman/WPP has so far received hardly any indication of an offer,
The FT analysts do not believe that the acquisitions as financial investments
make sense. Rather, they suggest that Bolloré is using this method to
a takeover of Aegis by Havas is being prepared. The Aegis shareholders
are only likely to agree to a cash offer, says the FT. But that
would put a strain on Havas' financial structure. The solution: a
cash offer with an option to convert into Havas shares, which
Bolloré would be redeemed. This would give the investor a larger
investment in Havas, the advertising holding company with the Aegis subsidiary Carat to
more market power in media buying, and the research arm of Aegis
could be sold to WPP in order to recoup part of the cash offer.
to catch up.

The "Public Relations Book Award 2005" for the best book concept on the subject of
"Public Relations" is awarded to Dr. Peter P. Knobel from Switzerland. His concept
with the working title "Managing PR Agencies. Best practice for clients
and agency managers" was judged by the five-member jury to be an important issue,
on which a fundamental presentation for practitioners has been lacking up to now. Convinced
the clear structure of the concept, the high quality of the
Orientation assistance, which the technical book offers to clients and agency managers
The award winner is the managing director of the PR agency Dr. Peter P. Knobel Zug,
the exclusive associate of Hill & Knowlton in Switzerland. Impetus for
According to Knobel, his textbook concept was given a teaching assignment at the Institute for
applied media science at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences Winterthur, the
showed that there is a lack of literature on the leadership issue of PR.
The award is associated with a book contract. The book will be published in
coming early summer in the Viola Falkenberg, which specializes in PR topics.
Publisher in Bremen.
For the "Public Relations Book Award 2006" can be submitted until September 1, 2006.
Concepts for a non-fiction book on the basics of PR or on
industry-specific PR may be submitted. The conditions of participation are
at www.falkenberg-verlag.de/award.htm.

Sports sponsorship (I) The National
Association for Stock Car Auto Racing, Nascar, will become the
increasingly popular advertising platform. In 2004, it achieved a turnover of three billion dollars - and an even higher advertising value. America's biggest movie stars seem to have a
have found a new favorite meeting place: It's no longer just the
red carpets of the Oscar and Emmy ceremonies, where celebrities like
John Travolta, Britney Spears or Ben Afflek. Recently
they often romp around on the black tar surface of the Daytona
International Speedway in Florida, where some of the competitions of the
Nascar racing circus. They not only sing the
national anthem or give the famous start command "Gentlemen, start
your engines". They also come to present their new films or albums.
and because they get just as much publicity there as on the
Couch from Jay Lenos' "Late Night Show". Nascar benefits from the fact that
the famous faces attract even more viewers to the television than
the current 5.5 million TV households in the USA when the races
be transferred. However, the cross-promotion deals in
usually no money. "We have a good relationship with Hollywood and
now also have an office in Los Angeles," says Andrew Giangola, the
Director of Business Communications at Nascar.
entertainment companies to do marketing through Nascar."
And vice versa: this summer, Nascar was one of the main sponsors of the
movie "Herbie: Fully Loaded" with teen star Lindsay Lohan, in which the
Film motif of "Herbie", a vintage model of the VW Beetle, revived
was. "Herbie" is to compete in a Nascar race in the movie, and
During the filming in Daytona, it just came naturally,
that star racing drivers such as Jeff Gordon and Tony Stewart play supporting roles.
were given. "Nascar is thus becoming part of pop culture," says Giangola.
The Nascar racing circus has become one of the most popular and
most prestigious sports in the USA. After
American football as the sport most frequently shown on television.
is seen. According to a survey by the sports business agency Turnkey
50 percent of the top managers surveyed in the industry believe that
Nascar is a "rising star with even more growth potential".
The figures speak for themselves. The annual turnover is estimated at three billion
dollars and is made up as follows: 50 percent
from sponsorships (1.5 billion US dollars), around 15 percent from each of the
Revenue for broadcasting rights (USD 543 million) and tickets (USD 429 million)
million US dollars), merchandising (322 million US dollars) and food and beverages (322 million US dollars).
drinking (184 million US dollars). The value of free advertising alone
for the Nextel Cup series increased sevenfold between 1995 and 2004
- from 0.6 to 4.2 billion dollars.

Fans with high brand loyalty
Nascar is considered cool. Not only for the visitors and spectators at the
TV screen, but also with the advertisers and car manufacturers who
are represented on site. The events provide fans with "a
brand awareness at the highest level," says Terry Dolan, Nascar
Marketing Manager at Chevrolet. The message is: "If you want a car
that could be produced at such a high speed.
performance, then it must already be of a pretty good quality.
have." In its early years, i.e. after the Second World War, this meant
this strictly that all brands that participated in this form
were also driven by the public on the road. About the
years, certain extras were permitted, for example with tires, suspension and
Safety equipment. Although the Nascar racing cars today are equipped with the
models in the shop windows of brand retailers have little in common.
cars that win races will continue to sell well. "The
Fans like to associate themselves with a winner," says Dolan. On
In this way, the old truism from the 1950s, "Driving
Race on Sunday, sell cars on Monday", still has a certain
Validity to: The probability that a Nascar fan will find one there
participating car is, according to the Chevrolet manager
five times higher than for other brands. The purchase decision is made
fans by so-called mini car shows, which take place before every
races are reeled off in front of the arena to give them hours of
waiting time until opening.

High advertising value guaranteed
The broadcast of the races is of particular value to Nascar marketers
on television, for which the two networks NBC and Fox and their
cable channels together 400 million dollars annually over a period of
of six years. "This gives the cars endless possibilities,
their logos," says Eric Wright from the research institute
Joyce Julius & Associates, which analyzes the effectiveness of brand advertising.
calculated on television. "And because the presenters like the cars
compare, they also get free entries." Chevrolet,
one of the most frequently exhibited brands, was thus given the
year "free" TV advertising in the amount of 414 million dollars.
Ford, Dodge and Pontiac also recorded similar nominal values.
But it is not only the car manufacturers who benefit from the transmissions.
Event sponsors in particular benefit from the same advantages. Is
It is common practice for the races on air to be labeled with their sponsors' names.
such as the "Nextel Cup" or "Nascar Busch Series". And the
Companies are asked to pay massively for their sponsorships: Alone
Nextel secured a total of 750 million dollars for Nascar in 2004 for a ten-year
years of commitment. Even companies that are familiar with the
not directly involved with the automotive industry are
Space bookings such as perimeter advertising. Over 100 of the
Fortune 500 companies such as Hewlett & Packard, Coca-Cola and UPS,
drive in the sponsor entourage of the high-profile Nascar events
with.

A unique community
And that's not all. Even the Nascar fans, of whom there are 75 million
in the USA - over a quarter of the total population - are considered to be
unique. "They feel like they belong," Giangola enthuses. One
Study by the Center for Sports Sponsorship at the
James Madison University in Virginia found that Nascar fans are more likely to use the
buy Nascar sponsor brands than other population groups. "96
percent of those who call themselves 'big' fans know that
Budweiser is the sponsor of Nascar racing driver Dale Earnhardt Jr,
says Larry DeGaris, director of the center. "I have conducted similar surveys
made in other sports, and none of them even come close to
these figures," he says. The fans also think it's good that
companies invest money in their sport: 93 percent of those surveyed said that
stated that sponsors are "very important". Given these figures, it is surprising
not when DeGaris, an avowed non-fan, summarizes: "A
Sponsorship with Nascar is the best investment in marketing."
   

Gerti Schön

Since October 1, 2005, Carsten Barth has been
Vice President Corporate Communications at Unaxis. He is responsible for the
responsible for the Group's global communications and is
Contact for media and analysts. Carsten Barth was previously
Marketing Director of GE Money Bank in Vienna for the Austrian market.
market. Prior to this, he spent eight years in senior
Marketing and communications functions at General Electric
in the financial services and plastics industries as well as in
corporate functions.