The marketing blitz for Madonna’s Material Girl line for Macy’s is being pegged as a hotly innovative back-to-school campaign, with a once-“secret” celebrity face and nifty website with videos and an ingenious, insightful blog written by Lourdes. But JCPenney’s marketing team thinks they know where the real sexiness of the Internet is at — and it’s not blogs, it’s haul vlogs. You remember — the videos of the girls who go shopping at the mall, come home and sit down in front of their webcams, and show YouTube viewers what they bought? JCPenney gave six haulers two $500 gift cards each in exchange for making JCPenney haul videos averaging ten minutes in length to run on the chain’s website and Facebook page. The haulers can say whatever they want as long as the language isn’t inappropriate.
Penney’s executive vice-president and chief marketing officer Mike Boylson spoke to WWD:
“Hauls is the next evolution,” Boylson said. “They’re starting to replace bloggers.”
Oh God — Penney’s thinks we’re passé. But we can surely start doing hauls for you of all the magazines and miscellaneous papers, mini-bottles, and nail polish in our cubicles. You know, if budget allows us to invest in webcams, that is.
