God Made Me Think Good.

I was at How Stuff Works, looking up how ab exercises work, and a banner ad for Regent University popped up in the left corner. Apparently, Christians do a lot of ab and core work.

Well, their tag line of sorts is "Online. Christian. Learning." I just... I... well first, having the words "Christian" and "Learning" in the same sentence is just wrong. Perhaps they figured that and that's why each word is its own sentence.

Take out "Christian." Online. Learning. That just sounds dumb. Yes. I know I'm learning. That's kind of the point of a University. And make a sentence somewhere! If they had said something that matters aside from the obvious, like "Online. Christian. Muslim-free." I think it would have been a better ad. And is "Apply to your future today" even grammatically correct?! There should be a comma after 'future.' What they wrote means I'm applying to a today that is in the future. And I get what they're trying to say, but applying to your future isn't grammatically solid. It should be "apply for your future." My future is not an institution. This also implies that I can be rejected from my future. Their sentence thus means that I should apply to an abstract thing that exists in a future now.

And just because I'm a marketing and design guy, I'm going to make fun of their actual image. Did they take that photo with a cell phone? It's suffering from so much compression blocking that the two people in back are either melting or suffering from Downs. And the ad itself is as compelling as yogurt! Let's face it guys, the only thing you really have going for you is your Christian bent. You should make that the focal point of the ad because that's what you're really selling. You've got no history, no fame, and your distinguished alumni list has such luminaries as "National Middle School Principal of the Year, Sharon Byrdsong." I would put CHRISTIAN and ONLINE in huge letters.

Man! God may have created the Heavens and the Earth, but he teaches grammar, marketing, and web design really poorly.

I was also surprised to see this ad at How Stuff Works. I always figured that the point of religion is avoiding too much knowledge about things. Ah well. Those wacky religious types. Always catching you off guard.

Oh, and the free issue of Christian Leader Magazine, you're saying that people would otherwise pay for it?