I know there's nothing new in this, but there's a lot of clients asking for these types of things - for carbon offsets for example, and this is the best one I've seen for a long time, that and it's a little more relevant to me in the short term - I got greenwash at the moment and I'm really, really confused.
It's also a world better than something like this..
Umbrella Today is another simple site from Thoughtbot that tells you if you need an umbrella today. You type in your postcode and it tells you if you need an umbrella. You can then schedule to have this news sent to your mobile.
Funny it already has a carbon copy Doineedanumbrella.com (sans mobile functionality) which has a higher search ranking.
These sites are part of a wave of simple one function sites that have been popping up. Such as
Marketing Magazine (Australia) & Julian Cole of The Population, have put together a list of Australia's Top 100 Marketing Blogs using the same style methodology as the AdAge Power 150.
I love the fact that Youtube have put this on their domain to make it seem even more real. The game looks like fun too. Glad to see someone hasn't forgotten about the good old platform game genre.
What I love best is you can actually throw the elements around the page once it's complete. I clicked around just to see and it was a nice surprise. The Wario Land Shake It official website is very tight as well.
LeBron James beating in a game of HORSE by a nobody
Watch this video as a contest winner beats NBA all star in a game of HORSE. In spectacular fashion!
This would be like me whipping Tiger Wood's ass in Putt Putt. What Lebron James has here (or one of his many sponsors) is an opportunity to redeem him self much like EA did with their Walk on Water shot. If Lebron leaves this video up without a response he'll fail.
Clemenger BBDO, Melbourne have launched a new campaign for Four N' Twenty pies called Magic Salad Plate. I actually hear about this on the radio first. (This is your basic food when at the footy. The aussie version of a hot dog at the baseball.)
Guys can pick up the plate for free by entering the unique codes on supermarket frozen packs.
Update: It's actually $5 + $5.65 postage and you have to buy two packs to get the codes. This seems a bit steep.
The website could use some help and why they embedded a video player instead of the Youtube link is a mystery. But it's all about the plate not the site.
While not as fun or collectable as the VB Boony Doll i think this is still a great promotion. You can see these at the next BBQ providing some laughs and more importantly a reason to choose Four N' Twenty over other frozen pies.
I eat Sergeants but will grab a pack to get my free plate this week.
You can read the 122 comments on the Campaign Brief blog about this campaign. Well maybe 20 comments are about the campaign and the rest are childish comments and name calling.
And I thought the election in Australia over did it with all the Facebook groups and Youtube channels
While I was in Brazil I asked if elections had been taken over by the web yet and it was a resounding no. No politics online yet. Are there any other examples of politics being bitten by the social media bug?
Schtock is meant to be the visual blog of someone who works for a large photo library. Here's the about page
About Schtock:
I work at a major stock photo company cataloging images. The majority of the stuff I work with will never see the light of day for no other reason than that most people don't know it's available to them. It's a shame which I'm trying to remedy with this site. As an amateur designer, I occasionally can't help but play around with the images I see floating across my desk on a daily basis. This site contains the results.
Who describes themselves as an "amateur designer"? The about text seems contrived and smells of a marketing cover up. The actual artworks are nice and designy. The type of stuff you see on FFFFound.
The Denver Egotist seems to have deduced that it's Corbis. So is this an official promotion or really just someone doing it for fun. If this was indeed someone just mucking around they spent longer on the HTML setup of the site than the actual designs. A Flickr account or simple blog template would have worked better for someone just mucking about. They also would not have registered the domain via a private register either.
If it is Corbis they are now in the awkward position that if they do admit they are behind it they look stupid for trying to fool us. This is sad as the idea behind the site is solid just the way they tried to sell it to the world is sloppy.
Getty Images also have a blog. 4 in fact. but they all seem to have little readership.
Over $184M was invested in Virtual Worlds in the 1st QTR of 08. Full article here.
Even if you take away the $100M invested in 9you this is a significant amount of cash. Not all these worlds are "Second Life" clones.
Second Life makers Linden Labs also talked about their second coming. Yeah I was surprised to that they are still in business. Here's some stats on usage.
Registered users is above 15 million. The more important number is the simultaneous users. That is now more than 68,000.
No indication if this is steady, dropping or rising.
It's not just virtual worlds making cash. Trism developer Demiforce revealed at a games conference that made $250,000 in 2 months via the App Store. Full article here. It helps they had one of the best games available and launched at the perfect time. But this is amazing for a 1 man development team.
Why do projects for clients when you could potentially release your own software to a spend happy consumer market?
ADMA Idols went off last night with a packed house and some real talent on display.
Foxtel won the band comp last night (and looked like a real band) while Soap picked up best dressed.
Mark put on a good show too although they had an Idol contenstant as a ring in.
Note: for entries next year. The later you go on the more drunk people are and the louder they cheer.
Come to San Fran and see the Star Wars Empire :) Throw in a super at the end for a Star Wars convention and you got yourself awards fodder. This is probably just fan boy stuff but it'd be great is tourism ads were like this.
Here's a recent example of how trying to save a few thousand dollars ends in FAIL for the brand. What a simple problem to avoid.
Someone should be fired. I wonder if any agencies have paid the originators of ideas that they have appropriated.
I heard EA paid the creator of the original video that sparked the video response below. Good karma there. It shows you don't even need to be fast. The response was 12 months after the fact.
Rather than actually write 500 words about "what it's like to be on the Cannes jury" I just edited my twitter feed down. I was a Twitter doubter but doing this at an event with significance seemed like a good use of the technology. It was a pain though. Every time we went anywhere I'd be on my phone looking down not interacting with people. It also cost me a bomb in SMS fees (damn international roaming).
I'll be following Cherp to see how an agency can just specilize in Twitter. Why not Facebook or Wikipedia?
This had me thinking of new guys on the block The Population.
Note: Claims of "firsts" are never fact checked when it comes to PR from advertising agencies, which is weird as an industry we're the ones most likely to bullshit.
You can read about the 4th Pure Social Media Marketing Agency to start in Australia and get insights from one of it's founders Julian Cole. The Population is backed by Photon so there's no shortage of good minds, clients and cash there.
This would be be similar to us at Soap spinning of an "advergaming agency" which we coudl probably attach a first to that aswell (well in Australia at least) but that would feel limiting. I guess Social Media Marketing is such a broad term and the Population will be mostly consulting and outsourcing any specific production required.
Does anyone else know of any nice marketing companies utilizing new technology or buzzwords as their business model?
The Coke and Mentos guys (EepyBird) have followed up their experiments with Sticky Note experiments. The budget for the videos is bigger (cinematography and direction is spot on)
I kept waiting for a brand of office supplies to appear at the end. Then I remembered that some people do stuff just for the fun of it or under the umbrella of "art" rather than "advertising".
Update: Their other videos (like the one below) are sponsored by OfficeMax and ABC Family. So that would explain the budget busting effort spent on the longer video above. Phew everyone has a price. I thought maybe I had become to commercialized.
This video stars the girl from Samurai Girl (oh dear) and this was taken from the Eepybird site
How do Samurai Girl and Sticky Notes go together? We premiered our grand finale video, "the Extreme Sticky Note Experiments", on ABC Family on September 5th during Samurai Girl.
Sorry the answer is "f*ck all". But we wouldn't have this video if it wasn't for ABC's money. Oh the video stars the lead actor from Samuari Girl who will also be in Fox's Dragonball. A Google image search explains the appeal.
Also interesting is that Samuari Girl is one of those event TV thigns that if it goes well gets turned into a series. Why waste all your money on a pilot no one will see?
In a first for Nestle, a new Kit Kat product variant is being launched entirely online. JWT and RMG Connect Sydney have created the digital launch for the new Kit Kat Cookies and Cream.
The Australian reports "The company will spend about $1 million, more than 70 per cent of which will go to social media websites such as MySpace, to promote the face of Kit Kat Chunky: a character called Hans Fagerlund. Significantly, Nestle confectionary will not use any traditional media to promote the brand. "
Nestle will spend about $1 million, more than 70 per cent of which will go to social media websites such as MySpace.
Source : The Australian
The JWT/RMG campaign has been created specifically for digital communication and the content has been created to engage, play and share predominantly via social networking media. The digital media mix includes social networking & video sharing sites, instant messaging, search, mobile and interactive video banner ads.
A five-part mockumentary called 'Chunga-struck' can be found on YouTube and other video sharing sites
In comments to The Australian, John Broome, Nestle's confectionery head of marketing said "that five years ago the money would have gone to television, radio and outdoor, but the internet and social media were now better for generating word-of-mouth among teens."
The comprehensive digital campaign features:
A 5-part mockumentary titled 'Chunga-struck - The rise and rise of Hans Fagerlund' YouTube & Vimeo in HD
A Chunga Championship multiplayer game - available on Facebook and Myspace Clearspring.
Maybe because I've been travelling lately I missed the initial buzz around this but you'd think a new Seth MacFarlane series sponsored by Burger King would have generated more interest.
The full show goes live Sept 10 and I can't wait. Below are two teasers for the series. There is also an official site for the show but with no new content until Sept 10.
I'm not sure of the BK deal usrups the one preivously announced here about distributing the shows 50x2minute episodes via Googles Adsense network.
Branded content based around small business doesn't exactly sound that exciting. Optus have begun a 12 week "reality" type show called the "Yes Coach" that will see 3 businesses get proper coaching and we'll watch them as they progress their business. The 3 chosen finalists all hit different segments, professional, tradies and family business.
This idea has been promoted quite heavily for the last few weeks with the first episode live and the 2nd to hit Sept 17th.
While the strategy seems sound, the execution is a little flat. Check the first episode. It's tiny! Like watching video on a postage stamp. I can't comment on the episode or embed it anywhere. The videos aren't even on Youtube. Hopefully by episode 2 they'll regig a few things. Optus branding is kept very low. This is one case where I don't think it would have mattered if it was overally branded. But kudos for not shoving the Optus logo in our face.
There's blogs and forums as well as business tips but right now it all seems like noones home. The forum is the only place with some community activity. And yes it's a business site so it's blue with a shite loa of text. Is there a rule that business people don't like images and love to read large amounts of text?
I really like the simplicity of this new Spring Valley campaign Save Your Sensible. The "Hitchhikers Guide" intro is spot on and the Papervision 3D character is very well done. I would have liked to seen more customization of my sensible but at least it is random.
This is by GP Y&R in Melbourne and like the Snickers Ugly Wrestling the SEO ofr this is terrible but it's well executed and quite humorous.
The integration with Facebook is spot on. It posts updates from your sensible and everytime another friend interacts with your sensible it posts this aswell. Thus creating a constant stream of alerts to check out the app. Currently there';s 455 active monthly users which isnt bad for a branded app that's just started.
The image above shows a sensible after I slapped it around a bit and after I fed it with some Spring Valley juice.
Here's the TVC campaign. The first one is the intro to the site which I feel has the most impact. Full credits for ads on the Youtube channel.
![sfw-porn.com_54[1].jpg](http://www.bannerblog.com.au/news/picts/sfw-porn.com_54%5B1%5D.jpg)
![sfw-porn.com_36[1].jpg](http://www.bannerblog.com.au/news/picts/sfw-porn.com_36%5B1%5D.jpg)
