Contest: Advertising Hall of Shame for June

One of the features we plan to start in June is a monthly "Hall of Shame" for publications that accept advertising for mills and less-than-wonderful schools.

So I'm proposing a little contest.

The idea is to identify the publication(s) with:

A. The largest number of less-than-wonderful school ads
B. The largest ratio of less-than-wonderful to legitimate schools
C. The biggest-name publication with a high ratio of less-than-wonderfuls in it.

The magazine needs to be no more than 3 months old, of decent circulation (i.e., not your grandmother's Doberman kennel newsletter), and if you win, you will have to supply us with a copy of the magazine if it's not easily located.

To enter, list in this thread the name and date of publication, which category you're entering for, and an exact count and ratio.

The winners (one in each category) can choose either lunch with one or more degreeinfo staffers if we're ever in the same place at the same time, or an advance copy of our soon-to-be-released "John Bear's Success in Distance Learning" audio CD.

If more than one person enters the same publication with the same date, the earlier entry will win.

The "hall of shame" publications (and top runners-up) will be prominently featured in a section of the DegreeInfo content site, along with the winning entrants who submitted them.

Deadline for submission (for the June awards) is May 26th at midnight, Pacific time.

Any questions, please email me.

Thanks!!

Chip

 

No one asked me, but . . .

I think a relevant factor here would be size or prominence of ads. For instance, USA Today, on a given day, will have 5 to 10 fake schools or non-wonderful schools advertising, but they are little classifieds in the back. The airline mags, increasingly, have been running big (1/6 to 1/3 page) color ads from the dreadfuls. And then there was the time that LaSalle, after the FBI raid, ran a full-page ad in USA Today (= $80,000) to rally support and rant about police state tactics.

Well, at least I have an incentive to visit DeLauer's wonderful open-24-hours news stand in Oakland and start browsing.

 

This is a really good point, and I was considering something of that nature, but couldn't come up with a very simple means of adding that factor to the calculation.

For those who want to play along, don't forget some of the less mainsteam publications. There are several large health-oriented magazines that constantly carry large (full page, sometimes 2 page) ads for unaccredited naturopathic schools, and have sometimes a dozen or more smaller schools.