First of all, some readers of my blog might be curious as to why the category tag cloud in the upper right hand corner of the page includes "running" as a category. Where does running fit within a blog entitled "Erik on Software"? I eluded to an answer within my first post in this category. The answer is simply that the mind is software, and the body is hardware. Personal interest in the human mind crosses over from my fascination with software designed and created by humans. (And interestingly enough, two of my three posts on running are now #1 and #6 as the most viewed by visitors here, something that I find humorous since the subtitle of this blog touts "musings on business and technology".)
Posting on this topic has been light, mainly because I am so much more intimately involved in the latter category of software in the workplace, although of course I interact with other human software systems every day. My two last posts on running were associated with the ASICS brand of running shoes. In the first post, I discussed my long-term ASICS brand loyalty and raved about this year's ASICS advertising campaign ("The Cleansing Power of Sport"), and in the second post, I discussed my (only recent) disillusionment with ASICS mainly because of the latest iteration of its Gel Nimbus line of running shoes.
The trail running I normally do each morning for work has taken a backseat to the treadmill recently due mainly to the long commute I currently take to and from work each day to my new client, and one of the new channels I typically bounce between while running (CNBC, CNN, and Fox) played an advertisement by UnitedHealthcare during a commercial brake this morning that I had not previously seen. And the advertisement, part of a new "Health in Numbers" campaign, showed a runner eerily reminiscent of the runners in this year's ASICS advertising campaign. Check out the print version of this ad:
And here, re-posted for your convenience from my first post, is a close-up of one of the ASICS advertisements from earlier this year:
While words - in this case, associated with sadness (the other three ads of the campaign are associated with anxiety, stress, and worry) - flow away from the ASICS runner as part of a seeming exorcism-through-run, numbers congregate around the UnitedHealthcare runner like an aura (the company claims that they "use information and numbers from across the health care system to help you access health care that is simpler and more responsive").
Perhaps these two campaigns were created by the same advertising agency. Let's see. The ASICS advertising campaign is apparently being run by Vitro Agency. The UnitedHealthcare advertising campaign is apparently being run by Ogilvy & Mather. Uh-oh. You might have read in my bio that I worked for a company which is now global marketing intelligence firm Synovate. As an individual with both advertising and marketing research experience from that company, the similarity between these two campaigns is too close for comfort. What do you think? Send me your thoughts.