Congrats to Tony Mizzell, my first advertiser!

Radford High School didn’t graduate any fools in 1971; you can’t put anything over on my classmate Burl. He noticed right away, and commented back here:

The really big news — your blog has a display ad!

I responded to him:

Yep, my very first. That’s the Papa ad. Soon as I have a Mama ad, I hope they’ll have lots of baby ads.

As you see at right, Tony Mizzell, candidate for Columbia City Council, is my first advertiser. This is due in no small part, I’m sure, to the fact that Tony knows what he’s doing. Tony is the vice president for interactive marketing at Chernoff Newman. So of course he’s going to make a savvy move like this.

I congratulate him on his acumen, and for being the very first to take advantage of this exciting new advertising venue. May it bring him lots of additional exposure. And folks, if you happen to live in his district and you run into him, be sure to tell him you saw his ad here.

I also want to congratulate Tony for winning the endorsement of my friends at The State. He was the recipient of the very first political endorsement since I left the paper. While reserving judgment on who should win that race, I told Warren and Cindi that I thought they did a good job on the endorsement. It did just what an endorsement should do — it presented logical reasons for their choice, inviting readers in the 4th district to think harder about their choice, whomever they vote for. You should go read it.

Personally, I’m just starting to focus on that race. Today, I had coffee for about an hour and a half with Leona Plaugh at the Woodhill Starbucks. I’ll write about that sometime this weekend. I’ll be meeting with Tony for breakfast Tuesday, and I’m trying to get something set up with Kevin Fisher. Those three are the best-known candidates for that seat, which is being vacated by Kirkman Finlay III.

9 thoughts on “Congrats to Tony Mizzell, my first advertiser!

  1. Burl Burlingame

    A lot of newsroom people look down on ads. I don’t. People who advertise are also part of communities and display ads are the most direct way of getting the word out. A kind of “consumer news.”

  2. Brad Warthen

    You’re absolutely right. And news people who look down on ads have a serious lack of understanding of the fundamental dynamics of their universe.

    When ads go away, you know what happens? You lose your job. Believe me. You run into any news people who don’t understand that, send them to me and I’ll ‘splain it.

  3. Elliott

    Congratulations on the ad. I think you have very loyal readers. I hope the advertisers realize this. I read the newspaper daily when I am at home. I read your blog daily whether I am at home or not.

  4. Kathryn Fenner

    I disabled Ad Blocker Plus, just for you.

    Y’know, the Tart doesn’t have blockable ads. They are an integral part of her website. I have no desire to block her ads, either, nor yours. I just got tired of the wiggling mortgage ads, and the like.

  5. Anne

    I don’t “do” wiggling ads. They make me crazy! Mine are like Brad’s – there if you want to click on them, but I hope not too distracting. (Well, distracting enough – my goal is to promote local business and I want people to take a look.)

  6. Kathryn Fenner

    @ Anne–Yours are all so pretty! Plus, and this is a point for Brad–they often link to a discount!

    How about getting business lunch purveyors to offer your readers exclusive (or not) discounts?

  7. Kathryn Fenner

    –and some of the Arts organizations whose heads are Rotarians might be persuaded to offer discounts on admission/subscriptions to your readers…

    Restaurants and coffee places could run a BradWarthen.com special…

    Look, I have patronized several establishments solely because I read about them on The Shop Tart. A special gives me incentive to actually do what I might have been meaning to do for a long time. The business gets a new customer, or one that might have dropped away, and you get a click.

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