the buzz log
The Late Billy Mays and His Perfect Pitch
Garrulous and ever congenial, Billy Mays believed in what he preached. Or pitched. In a month of unexpected celebrity passings, the man who sincerely believed in his hype died reportedly of hypertensive heart disease on June 28.
In a month of too many celebrity passings, people took a moment to honor the bearded infomercial hawker. Searches on Yahoo! were so massive on Sunday that his name "billy mays" bypassed even "michael jackson." (Cumulative queries for Jackson's music, biography, and so on, however, continue to overwhelm the Web). Mays' searchers wasn't just old couch potatoes. Everyone from teenagers to 50-somethings joined in.
Media outlets also paid their respects. CNN called him "handsome in a Brawny Towel Guy sort of way" with a "sunshiny attitude." The Los Angeles Times reminisced about how he joined in video parodies of his infomercials with his own joke spots. AP repeated Mays' favorite story of giving away OxiClean as wedding favors.
Unlike spammers or telemarketers, the former football player did more then get people to sit up and watch (and sometimes order). Mays specialized in solving the nagging aggravations and pet peeves modern society, and he managed to do that with the sheer force of his normal-guy charisma, volume turned up to maximum.
Discovery Channel plans to honor him July 1 with a marathon of "Pitchmen," a reality series that started April 15. Mays would probably be pleased with another posthumous tribute: Along with searches into his biography, family, and beard, people also checked out his products.
Below, the top 10—and please note, even though Shamwow lookups also saw an online surge, that's that other guy.
Top 10 Billy May Product Plug Searches on Yahoo!, June 28
- OxiClean (stain remover)
- Kaboom (all-purpose cleaner)
- Orange Glo (wood cleaner)
- Impact Gel (shoe inserts)
- Mighty Putty (epoxy)
- Awesome Auger (garden digging tool)
- Big City Slider Station (hamburger press)
- What Odor? (deodorizer spray)
- Zorbeez (all-purpose cleaning cloth)
- Hercules Hooks (wall hanger)
The Blackest Friday of All
When the legend of capitalism is studied millennia from now, will future economists recognize discount sales as the slippery slopes that they are? After all, once you knock 50% off a price tag, it's going to take that and then some to get shoppers to come back again.
And don't retailers know it. Every year they churn out massive discounts and incentives to inspire the increasingly crazy shopping that occurs once we've stopped eating turkey. This time around, though, consumers and retailers have been playing a game of chicken in this woeful economy.
So far, needy desperation had led to discounts well in advance of the holiday season, leading to spikes for that awkward term, "pre-black friday sales." Black Friday may sound like the title of a low-budget holiday slasher flick, but in this sequel not all buyers have fallen victim to incremental cuts, and many may be holding out for the bitter final markdown.
Indeed, intense online vigilance continues to show a pent-up need to buy: Cumulative searches for sale-related terms ("day after thanksgiving sale", "walmart black friday") and sites tracking them ("theblackfriday.com," "tgi black friday") are 38% higher than the same 2007 shopping period.
True, the Sacramento Bee claims "big early markdowns could rob Black Friday of some of its traditional oomph." Then again, the New York Post reports that shopping centers expect Thanksgiving sales to be higher... but profit margins smaller. Search activity may be leaning towrds the Post's slightly more optimistic outlook: Would-be shoppers have been scouting out way more stores in advance than last year, such as:
• Wal-Mart, Toys R Us, Sears, Target, Circuit City, Kmart, Menards, Macy's, Meijer, Apple, Amazon, Fry's, Kohl's, Home Depot, Office Depot, Shopko, Best Buy, Lowes, Staples, Sam's Club, JC Penney, Old Navy, Costco.
Naturally, part of this increased online activity could due merely to savvier consumer behavior about checking for sales info online (especially finding those ads so conveniently "leaked" in advance).
Or perhaps consumers realize that this year, they don't have to pay the real Black Friday prices: nasty crowds, dwindling inventories, and mall overload. Instead, they can bide their time or, as they've been already doing, walk away entirely. In this game of chicken, the retailers have already blinked, and may be preparing for the crash as well.
The Goods on Obama and McCain ... On Sale Now
Victory sometimes comes at a price.
Tough financial times means hawking at every opportunity, and retailers have wasted little time in capitalizing upon Election Day results. Barnes & Noble started a one-week sale of president-elect Barack Obama's three books at 34% off (but not as marked down as other political books at 40% off). The AP reported that his memoirs crept back up into Amazon's top 25 list. "Audacity of Hope" ranked as a Borders digital download bestseller.
Without campaign momentum triggering impulsive patriotic shopping, common wisdom dictated that Nov. 4 was the last big sale day for winners or losers. At least, that was one pitch that Washington Square News reported, as one vendor urged a customer, "Young lady, you've been waiting for this day for 150 years ... Spend some money on history, people!" The next day, however, "Barry Merch" was selling like gangbusters on some New York street corners. Searches on Yahoo! also show a demand for "pop art barack obama shirt" (and a few anti-obama ones as well).
Online presented a mixed picture: The store.barackobama.com started their half-off clearance sale. Independent, for-profit online vendors selling McCain-Palin goods, however, hadn't marked down their items on Nov. 5, including the line of "I'm 'Joe the Plumber'/Don't Tax Me" bumperstickers." (A Jane version is also available.)
John McCain may have lost his bid for the Oval Office, but over in eBay, his singing dancing doll doppelganger received six bids, while the McCain and Obama bobble-head dolls pulled in 10. However, only one offer came for a signed Sarah Palin glossy, and none for four signed McCain books "priced to sell," nor the 2009 calendar featuring the Alaska governor with a gun slung over her shoulder. On the other hand, a signed Obama first edition went for $710 (free shipping), and a signed Michelle Obama baseball with a painting of the first lady sold at more than $200 after a 29-bid tussle.
Kathy Grannis, the media relations manager at the National Retail Federation, points out in a phone call that discounting usually happens after a sporting event or the Olympics. Euphoria, however, could extend the shelf life of election goods. "Those who are happy about the decision may invest in new merchandise to show their support in public," Grannis says. "If it's discounted, who's to say they won't buy a couple for their family or friends."
Retail or discount, the price matters less than the fact that Obama merchandise exists in such artistic plenty. The Philadelphia City Paper asserts that "the left has never really embraced [political] merchandising in the same way." Nowadays, political visages, such as the omnipresent Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara, have been fair T-shirt game. "Pop culture usually has a lot to do with what consumers buy, whether it's a sports event or an election event," Grannis suggests. "Consumers are influenced by broadcast media."
Buyers and vendors, however, see it as buying a moment in history. People rushed out to snap up newspapers, from national papers to local editions ... and some promptly marked up the resale value as high as $2,000. (Print may be a beleaguered medium, but they frame better than a Web page.) How long the craze lasts may depend upon how long Obama can maintain his celebrated status. In the meantime, buying political favors is one way to help the economy.
Filed under: Politics, Elections, Presidents, Sales
We Paid Good Money for These Leads
"These are the new leads. These are the Glengarry leads. To you, they're gold. And you don't get them. Why? Because to give them to you would be like throwing them away..."
In "Glengarry Glen Ross," Alec Baldwin reminded us that, when it comes to sales, it's all about the leads. The Buzz agrees. Whether out of optimism or desperation, salespeople come to Search for help in tracking leads down.
Searches on "mortgage leads," "insurance leads," and, of course, "sales leads" are all strong. More interesting, however, were the variety of queries on "mlm leads." Multi-level-marketers (e.g., Amway), it seems, are always on the make.
Below, we rank the top 20 "lead" searches. These aren't the Glengarry leads, but based on your record, you don't deserve to look at those anyway...
Prepare for the Fight
While Black Friday isn't an official holiday, its strong performance in Search shows that, to many, the right to wake up at 5 a.m. and purchase a clock radio at 50% off is just as important as any constitutional amendment.
Not surprisingly, searches are soaring on "black friday 2005," "black friday sales," and "black friday ads," not to mention "day after thanksgiving sales." Why do we (and by "we," we mean "you") fall prey to the hype every year? Simple -- it's hard to resist a bargain, even if clogged parking lots, surly cashiers, and broken bones are often part of the (or)deal. Of course, not everyone buys into the manufactured madness. Searches on "buy nothing day" are up among those who'd rather avoid the carnage than fall victim to it. Damn uppity hippies.
Switching gears from sales to sustenance, pizza restaurants are also experiencing super-sized searches. Apparently, the last thing folks want to do on the day after Thanksgiving is cook, so it's the pizza-delivery guy to the rescue. Domino's, Pizza Hut, Round Table, and about a dozen others are each oozing with partially hydrogenated buzz. Yum.
top movers
| Rank | Subject | 1-Day Move |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ford 400 | Breakout! |
| 2 | Indonesia Ferry | Breakout! |
| 3 | Jordan Chandler | 3481% |
| 4 | Evan Chandler | 2322% |
| 5 | American Music Awards | 1841% |
| 6 | John F. Kennedy | 1529% |
| 7 | Turkey Stuffing Recipes | 1361% |
| 8 | Liam Hemsworth | 1172% |
| 9 | Lou Dobbs | 1142% |
| 10 | Hendrick Motorsports | 888% |
top leaders
| Rank | Subject | Move | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Black Friday | +340 | 1290 |
| 2 | NFL | +489 | 670 |
| 3 | Jennifer Lopez | +451 | 515 |
| 4 | New Moon | -67 | 250 |
| 5 | American Music Awards | +236 | 249 |
| 6 | UFC | -36 | 239 |
| 7 | Miley Cyrus | +66 | 169 |
| 8 | Hulu | -11 | 154 |
what's the buzz?
A subject's buzz score is the percentage of Yahoo! users searching for that subject on a given day, multiplied by a constant to make the number easier to read. Weekly leaders are the subjects with the greatest average buzz score for a given week.
For more detailed information, visit our FAQ.