Archives: Advertisements

The quickest way to turn off a good segment of potential buyers is to make a stupid typographical or grammatical error in your ad...

Macon Mitsubushi New!: An actual ad for a Mitsubishi dealership that appeared in The Macon Telegraph. At least they spelled it right in their URL!
Quality Website Desgin New!: An actual banner ad spotted on Lockergnome.com back in 2006. Seriously, how did they miss this?
Athen's Best Student Living New!: Not sure where precisely this Athen place is, but apparently its best student living is at River Walk. From a kiosk at the Tate Student Center at the University of Georgia.
No lates fees: Spotted while surfing the web back in May 2005. They may have no lates fees, but it's the late fees you've got to watch out for...
Cool screeensaver, click to download.: An interstitial ad seen while browsing a group on Yahoo Groups. The comma splice is bad enough, but I guess this 'screeensaver' must be particularly worth checking out because of that extra 'e'.
In a prefect world, you are always professional — found by Amy Goldstein: Nobody's 'prefect', I guess. Not even Corel.
Click here to see a DVD sneak peak: From a banner ad on ifilm.com. What, does this mean there's a mountain of Babylon 5 DVDs out there somewhere?
Shoot the ganster and get a free laptop: Yet another banner ad. I'd gladly shoot the ganster, if I knew what in the world a ganster was.
...it may be infeceted with Adware or Spyware: From an ad for an anti-spyware product spotted on some site or another. Infeceted... sounds even more disgusting when it's spelled that way.
Air Force Reserve Intellegence: Oh, the irony. Pointed out in this Fark.com post; it's since been corrected, but I saved the evidence for posterity.
Don't Pay To Much: From a local TV ad for mobile homes. Then again, I shouldn't expect 'to' much from an ad for mobile homes...
...the nation's largest accredited univeristy — found by cheekybaby: From a University of Phoenix banner ad. Great claim to fame, but I wonder if they're the largest accredited university as well.
Asociate's, Bachelor's, Master's — found by cheekybaby: Another University of Phoenix banner ad. I'd rather go for the Bachelor's or Master's; not only are they more prestigious, they're spelled correctly.
Get a roomate: What, is that like a friend for your pet kangaroo?
Fresh roses, sweat treats, and more — found by Gairid: From a Google AdWords ad for Wal-Mart. Ewwww...I don't want any sweat treats, thank you.
At Webdate, you can meet thounsands with just one click!: Obviously not the best dating service for us compulsive proofreaders.
Better, Stonger, Faster — found by halomouse: From an ad displayed in AOL Instant Messenger. Anyone else reminded of "Stong Bad"?
You been selected to receive 2 FREE Star Tickets...: I don't know about you, but I really hope that this ad's proofreader been fired.
Kappa Sigma Batchelor Auction: A local fraternity posted numerous copies of this flyer in the university dining hall. Too bad they can't learn to use a spell checker.
Subfeature, small photo: Somehow, this inexplicable line of text found its way into a promotion on the Macon Telegraph's website.
Who says Germans make the best luxery cars — found by Nyperold: Who says sentences don't end in question marks? Who says "luxury" has an "e" in it? Obviously the writers of this ad do.
Your Today's Lucky Winner! — found by Nyperold: Further proof that some internet advertisers are just clueless on several counts.
Bian Venidos Amigos — found by Nyperold: I don't know about you, but I'd have second thoughts about eating at a Mexican restaurant whose grasp of Spanish isn't exactly bien.
But It! Sell It! — found by Nyperold: For shoppers who are as stubborn as goats?
Elluding / ellusive — found by Sarah Brand: I guess correct spelling is just as elusive for these advertisers as wealth is for their target market...
Improve you're system stability: An actual "fake user interface" ad I found on the web a while back. This type of ad is annoying and insulting enough already, and bad proofreading only makes it worse. (In addition, note that they're not even consistent with their bad grammar!)
Fax this application to 000-000-0000...: From a local auto dealership ad. Try as I might, I keep getting an operator when I try to fax this...
1 Individul Side — found by Nyperold: A coupon from a Kentucky Fried Chicken ad. Yes, it's only a minor typo, but what's odd is that the same word was spelled correctly in the ad's other coupons.
Daily Triva: From an ad spotted on various newspaper sites (originally animated, but presented as stills here). You'd think they'd know better, wouldn't you?
Grab a mint julip: Another ad spotted on various Knight-Ridder newspaper sites. Amusingly, it was corrected within a day or so, but we've got the evidence... (And no, I don't drink, but even I know it's spelled julep.)
Recomended — found by Amy Goldstein: An ad from the website for the iMesh file sharing software.
Get less busy signals: From an ad for the Microsoft Network internet service. Call me prescriptivist, but this just doesn't sound as good as 'fewer' here...
Your're a winner - Congratulation! — found by Nyperold: Oddly reminiscent of some badly translated Japanese video games, isn't it?
$500 Off: A forgotten superscript can drastically change the value of a coupon. (And I'm tempted to redeem this at face value, too...)
Colombia County — found by Nyperold: From a cellular phone ad distributed in Florida. The country in South America is spelled Colombia; the Florida county, on the other hand, is spelled Columbia. Any questions?
The Elivish kingdom — found by Sundragyn: As the contributor writes, "I suppose that's where the Elives live."
...student loan debt in exess of $10,000...: You'd think that, for something targeted at college students, they'd attempt to do some cursory proofreading.
I have been want extra income — found by Sundragyn: The grammar here is reminiscent of Zero Wing, and interestingly enough, this ad was found on Zany Video Game Quotes. (Oh, and also, the contributor is Canadian. So much for targeted advertising.)
Survey Savvy ad — found by Nyperold: "No you want be a millionaire"? "Every survey the take"? "Keep checking back for more survey companies will be add soon"? My head hurts.
What did Lucy call here son? — found by Nyperold: A pop-up window displayed while surfing various web sites. I'll leave the comments to the contributor: "I suppose they could have phrased it, 'On I Love Lucy, what did Ricky and Lucy call there son?'"
What's Home Simpson's wife's name? — found by Nyperold: Another pop-up window. Yes, we know it's supposed to be Homer, but still, the thought of the Simpsons' house having a wife is just too good to pass up... (And as the contributor joked, would it be named "Mobile"?)
Moutainside: DaimlerChrysler identifies the song which is played in a recent Dodge Ram ad. Too bad they can't spell it.
I am over 25, live in the US, and looking for a date: Sure, that's nice and all. But I'm much more interested in girls who understand parallel sentence structure, thank you...
No Credit Card Committment: From a banner ad for the Hotwire travel service. Again, I ask: Do these ad writers ever use spelling checkers?
We can adjust the spicy... — found by Nyperold: From a newspaper advertisement for a Chinese restaurant in Florida.
Pinãta — found by Eric Sleator: I'm not even going to attempt to guess how this would be pronounced with the tilde there.
They Heard Gergia Singing: My lovely home state misspelled not once but twice in an ad spotted at radio-locator.com.
See Important & Conditions — found by Nyperold: To paraphrase Arthur Dent from The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy, this is obviously some strange usage of the word "important" that I wasn't previously aware of.
Dont Click Here: OK, since I care about grammatical integrity, I wont click your stupid banner.
Kid's Eat Free — found by Nyperold: Kid is eat free? No...wait...maybe "kid's" is possessive? Wait, that can't be right either...
Hard Work Has It's Rewards: Also from the Marriott Courtyard guest info booklet. Apparently this particular ad can be found in Marriotts nationwide... [Sorry for the poor quality; my camera wasn't wanting to focus very well at the time.]
Need features Eddie: From a department store ad. Apparently Eddie never gave this guy the list of features.
No Securuty Deposit — found by Nyperold: To quote the contributor, "they got stuck in a secu-rut." *groan*
Disapear — found by Nyperold: A banner ad for UBid. Apparently the letters in their ad are disappearing just as fast as the deals...
This great deal, won't last! — found by Nyperold: Another UBid ad. Apparently the missing "p" from the previous ad mutated into a comma and came here instead.
Free shippping: Another ad for egghead.com. I wonder if they do their shipping through a partnership with "Scrippps"-Howard?
Watermelon Captial: From a newspaper ad by the Cordele, GA Chamber of Commerce. The typo might be excusable, if it weren't repeated later in the ad. Also note the reference to "enterainment".
#1...Among Consumer Electonic Category Leaders: A banner displayed during a browsing session at egghead.com. I suppose Egghead's somewhat let down that they didn't place number one in consumer electronics as well...
Nursury — found by Nyperold: A banner ad selling X10's "Big Brother" surveillance camera. Perhaps they should have used one of these cameras to monitor their oh-so-diligent proofreaders.
Experienced litary agents: A classified ad from a local newspaper. I don't know about you, but I'd be somewhat leery of writing for these guys. Also note the misspelled "catagories".
Do verticle stripes really slim?: An AltaVista banner ad spotted while surfing the web. What's even scarier is that an AltaVista search for "verticle" produces over 16,000 hits...
Check the weather at your in-laws — found by Ellmyruh: OK, so it's a run-of-the-mill missing apostrophe. Still, I can't help but think that the weather at one's in-laws is 98.6°F and humid.