So you know how I like to have the TV on in the background when I read, blog, play my app game, etc, right? (Not when I eat, though. I detest having the TV on anywhere in the vicinity when I eat.)
Yesterday I had “Sex and the City” playing in the background. Then the show went to a commercial.
“This is the place where you can do anything you want, be anything you want,” a velvety voice intoned.
“Must be a commercial for a sex club,” I thought.
As I glanced at the screen, I almost fell off the bed. It was a commercial for my university. This is the first TV spot I saw for my school and I still can’t figure out why anybody would think that prospective students might be found among the fortyish fans of this old show.
Clarissa's Blog 
Is it possible they paid for ad time and weren’t able to or didn’t specify when they wanted it shown?
LikeLike
That would be my guess. My mother sometimes had to buy tv advertising time (she was involved in PR) and I remember seeing some of the ad rate schedules.
This was a long time ago but I don’t think that much has changed for local tv, basically in addition to charging more for peak times (like prime time) any targetting of timing (during specific time or shows) cost more than buying a number of airings which would be fit in at the TV statons’s pleasure.
LikeLike
Fortyish fans of the show would include the mothers of high school juniors and seniors, who are the real decision makers of where their children go to school.
LikeLike
Except that a lot of the student body is minority IIRC and I don’t recall SNTC being popular in that demographic (I could be wrong…)
LikeLike
Hah! That’s a brilliant insight. Makes total sense.
Wow, our PR department is good.
LikeLike
SITC is probably too draggy compared to the average telenovela or other kind of soap opera. OTOH, it feeds into the Chinese stereotype that white women are tigresses compared to the more demure traditional Chinese woman, so I can see some of my relatives watching it and commenting on those wanton white devils in Cantonese.
LikeLike
Or maybe it’s for something like Keiser/Everest/University of Phoenix. In that case, older adults who hadn’t been to college or need more education would be watching the show (and the ads).
Weirdly, no universities with established reputations advertise on tv.
LikeLike
Very true, now I’m wondering if it’s an ad as such or aired as a public service announcement type thing (in which case the university would have no say whatsoever in terms of when it was aired).
LikeLike
No, it’s an actual ad. Until now, we’ve been doing billboards and this is a new stage in the PR campaign, I guess.
LikeLike
Yes, Harvard hardly needs to advertise. 🙂
LikeLike
Probably not as cool as this ad:
best line (after the ad): You know I love to be seen agreeing with you, Troy.
LikeLike
There are plenty of “mature students” to be had, and their general profile is that they are middle income, married, female, and white.
LikeLike
Of topic, but have you ever analyzed why you can’t eat comfortably when the TV is playing??
LikeLike
The ones who need to analyze are those who eat in front of the TV. That can lead to serious overeating.
LikeLike
I was going to suggest that you get over the mealtime TV aversion by watching the food channel, but since you put it that way…
LikeLike
Turn on any episode of “Man vs Wild” with Bear Grylls and that’ll sort it. 🙂
LikeLike
SO YOU’LL TELL ME WHAT YOU WANT WHAT YOU REALLY REALLY WANT …
Fantastic — now when I’ll think of your university, I’ll have the song “Wanna-Be” by the Spice Girls running through my head. 🙂
LikeLike
Who could have thought, you know? We are so Bible Belt that students freak out when I say “Oh God.”
LikeLike