Once upon a time, the cell phone only was a portable telephone. You could talk and you could listen. Convenient. Simple.

Then came text messaging. Then Internet access and music downloads.

Now, because of technology, the cell phone is becoming an all-purpose entertainment device, allowing for streaming video and television shows.

Also worth noting in this evolution is that the cell-phone-turned-entertainment-device is the next and newest frontier for advertising. In the very near future, we likely are to begin seeing and hearing advertising on our phones. Call it the age of the cell sell.

Of course, the marketing mavens are looking for creative and unobtrusive ways to get both your attention and the contents of your wallet. Banner and pop-up ads like we see on our computer when we are using the Internet infuriate most of us and they're not very effective.

We can expect these new kinds of ads to be brief and targeted. How long will you tolerate a product pitch that you have to listen to or view before you can make a phone call? Five seconds? Seven seconds? Furthermore, research indicates that we like our ads to be entertaining.

Brief; targeted; entertaining -- that's quite a challenge, but more than 60 years ago, one company hit that magic Trifecta: Burma Shave. Although the last authentic roadside Burma Shave sign is reported to have been taken down in 1966, that advertising gimmick earned a desired place in American culture.

Burma Shave was a simple product -- shaving cream -- and it was the advertising that made it a much beloved product. The company would place four to six signs at short intervals along the highway, with each sign having a single line of a clever jingle that would reveal itself and the punch line as you would drive.

The jingles not only were about the product itself, but about safe driving and even morality tales. Drivers/customers looked forward to seeing the signs along the road ahead, hoping it was a jingle they had not seen.

When, recently, have you experienced that kind of advertising appreciation? Several samples: To kiss a mug/That's like a cactus / Takes more nerve / Than it does practice -- Burma-Shave A chin / Where barbed wire / Bristles stand/ Is bound to be / A no ma'ams land -- Burma-Shave / He tried to cross / As fast train neared / Death didn't draft him / He volunteered -- Burma-Shave.

At the peak of their popularity in the 1950s, little red Burma Shave signs were in 45 of the 48 states and there were about 7,000 of them. They would be changed at least once a year so drivers would regularly see new "material." Ultimately, Burma Shave and its signs became victims of product commoditization (it was still just shaving cream) as well as faster highway speeds, which made it difficult to read the little roadside signs. Ultimately the company was sold to Philip Morris who decided the signs were silly and discontinued them.

But smart marketers who are working on the "cell sell" might find some lessons to be learned from those entertaining little Burma Shave signs.

Opinions expressed solely are those of the writer. Mike Hoban, of Crown Point, is a senior consultant for an international leadership development and training firm. Send mail to him c/o this newspaper, or e-mail him at HYPERLINK "business-at-large@sbcglobal.net" business-at-large@sbcglobal.net