It wasn’t until 12:01AM France-Time that French business owners were able to advertise on television. Retailers will now be able to advertise on air adter the ban was removed which was originally put in place to protect the ad revenue of newspapers in the country. In 2004, the European Union called the ban a restriction on free-trade. Since that time, ads were appeared on cable and specialty channels only but will now appear on mainstream television channels. The ad spending is expected to increase (duh) dramatically now that the ban has been lifted.

If you’re like me, you spent New Years sitting at home with a box of Cheetos and Vic’s Vaporub watching YouTube’s New Years Celebration (ok, so you’re not like me then eh?). Chevy sponsored a YouTube hosted New Year’s celebration this year with Warner Music Group artists performing to ring in the New Year. The ‘almost-live’ experience entailed artists uploading their videos right after performances to the website. Even some of the years most popular video-bloggers were featured as New Years Resolutions and encouraging others to upload their own.

Bob Hill of the Louisville Courier-Journal has an excellent column online that details the problems with the pharmaceutical industry advertising on television. Of his main points, Mr. Hill points out the following 1) The sexual aid ads aren’t exactly family friendly, 2) They seem to dispense medical advice and then prompt the consumer to seek out medical advice and 3) They actually can make people imagine they’re sick with something they’re not. Hill often mentions that he actually did some research on the claims made about the drugs or just on their general background, something that everyone should be doing before bursting into their doctor’s office demanding drugs for a problem they don’t have.

Goodbye Dr. Phil! You will not be missed at Match.com. Match.com has recently launched a movement to put some life in the slowing world of online dating. With the tagline, “It’s okay to look good”, Match.com has started a multi-media push on behalf of Hanft Unlimited in New York. The $60 million effort gives users a “Match Potrait Toolkit” to seek advice from America’s Next Top Model’s Jay Manuel about their image and how to make their photos more appealing. This will be a total turn around from when Match.com used Dr. Phil to help people bring out the ‘inner-beauty’. Match.com is quickly realizing that ‘outer-beauty’ is all most of us care about (too bad for me).

The television, radio, and print campaign will feature 26 real website members who talk about the website’s diversity and variety. Match.com’s competitior, eHarmony completely blew this campaign out of the water though with a $90 million ad campaign.

Coors Light Beer has recently made a push to broadcast Super Bowl XLI in multiple languages when it airs on February 4th, 2007. The nation’s growing number of Spanish speaking citizens is the reason Coors is backing the initiative. As the official beer sponsor of the NFL, Coors revealed that 77% of Hispanic males ages 21 to 34 are NFL Football Fans.

“The popularity of NFL football among Latinos in the U.S. continues to grow at an accelerated rate,” said Paul Mendieta, Coors marketing director, U.S. Hispanic and Latin America. Expect to soon see Super Bowl themed packaging from Coors that uses both English and Spanish tag lines that read “One Game. One Dream.” Coors will also be sponsoring the Tazon Latino I (Latino Bowl I) which is the first nationally televised flag football game between former Latino celebrities and former NFL stars which will air Feb. 3rd at 5 p.m. on Telemundo.

The NFL (National Football League) for the first time ever is giving broadcast network partners CBS and Fox Television this Sunday the right to air two games each in markets that do not have a home football team. Simply put, it will be a double-doubleheader Sunday extravaganza.

“With tight playoff races and so much interest in so many games, a Week 17 double doubleheader offers fans more football as they look ahead to the playoffs,” said Howard Katz, NFL senior vp of broadcasting. Those NFL markets where there is a home game will receive two out of market games, one on Fox and one on CBS, both in either the 1 or 4 p.m. time period, whichever slot is not when the home team is playing.

Cube Fabulous is basically the ‘Extreme Makeover’ show meets ‘Office Space’ by applying the concept of cubicle makeovers to a television show. Every episode features an attractive team of males and females ‘pimping’ your cubicle. The show now reaches nearly 4.5 million visitors to the CubeFabulous website per episode. Places like Honda, Monster.com, and other big names have been mentioned as interested parties for advertising on the online show. They’ve even discussed in-show product placements. Imagine getting your cubicle pimped by this crew and a new Honda waiting outside of your office.

The SoftWave Media Exchange (SWMX) company is selling about $750,000 in business transactions during the third quarter of 2006 which is three times what it did in the first quarter of 2006. The company will continue to make hard earned dough selling radio and tv time with its’ online sales platform.

For the past 16 years, the Soccer World Cup’s title sponsor has always been Mastercard. Mastercard and Visa are now battling against each other over who will be the title sponsor for the next two World Cup soccer championship games.

Mastercard is claiming that FIFA breached its contract with them by not allowing them to try to be the title sponsor again. FIFA simply went ahead and named Visa the 2010 and 2014 World Cup Tournament sponsor. Mastercard took the issue to US Courts and FIFA then had to award sponsorship rights to MasterCard. The issue was then appealed and during that time both MasterCard and FIFA have stopped all programs that were going to start in January.

On the upcoming sixth season of ‘The Apprentice’ with Donald Trump the company Dial will be placing their products throughout episodes to promote their new ‘Renuzit Super Odor Neutralizer’ and the ‘Soft Scrub Deep Clean Bathroom Cleaner’.

The first episode of ‘The Apprentice’ will involve teams competing to develop an internet web-i-sode for the ‘Soft Scrub’ product. For the task, the Apprentice teams will have to develop a 60 second advert spot which will be shown before AMC movie theatres.

When NBC debuts the new season of ‘The Apprentice’ with Donald Trump you can expect to see this massive list of product placements.

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A new promotional contest is being put in that could win you a role in an episode of “One Tree Hill.” The promotional contest will follow the increasingly popular marketing tactic known as user generated content. The CW Netowrk is teaming up with the Sunkist line of Cadbury Schweppes sodas and asking viewers to create and upload video entries in this very unsual contest. Entrants are encouraged to submit their video clips to the CWTV Sunkist website page. Consumers will be able to vote online for their favorite video clip on the website. It’s an example of 360 degree marketing and a grass roots campaign to involve the consumer from the most basic and comfortable level… their living rooms.

The “Sunkist Brings ‘One Tree Hill’ to Your Town Contest” was first promoted during the Nov. 29 episode with a commercial featuring Mark Schwahn, the executive producer who created the series. The commercial was repeated last night and will continue running until the contest ends Jan. 7.

As of yesterday, CW executives said, 370 entries had been registered, a strong response, considering that it took more than 10 weeks for the Doritos contest to accumulate its entries.

If you are interested in getting your product or service on the Oprah Winfrey Show then you better get the card of Harriet Seitlerthe executive Vice President of Marketing and Programming development for Ms. Winfrey’s Harpo Communications. She has coordinated the product placements of last years Pontiac Giveaway contest and is leading the development of new forms of media opportunities beyond the scope of the syndicated day time talk show.

I remember this Toys R Us commercial from the 1970s. They simply do not make high quality Christmas advertisements like they used to. Long gone are the original Christmas carols, animation, and soul of Christmas in todays advertisements. Moreover, what ever happened to Geoffrey the Giraffe in the Toys R Us Christmas commercials? I loved him!

The Oxygen Network (Oprah’s television network) will be promoting it’s new hit reality show “Bad Girls” with a social network online. The Bad Girls Club On Oxygen will allow visitors and fans of the reality show to voice their opinions on the show, the creators, and the characters. Cast members will develop content for the social network through blogging and weigh in on their experiences. Oxygen has also created a Myspace account and YouTube channel for clips from the show.