Another Planning Blog…

I was perusing the web and reading the Hall and Partners site when their “Fresh Meet” blog link caught my eye. And I’m glad it did. Not simply because they’ve used the same design template for their blog – although it’s a sign of great taste, for sure! No – they had a pecha kucha night, used the term “how meta” and plenty more – just in one of their posts! And there’s plenty more to read on there.

Go here to see the full line up of speakers from that pecha kucha night, but just in case you’re too lazy for a full helping, absolutely watch this talk from Paul Barton (of Brooklyn Brothers). In this, he talks about the need to really define the business task before getting all twisted up in looking at your proposition. And that’s simple, smart thinking we should all listen to. Far too often, we all leap into the task of solving the brief, rather than worrying about what the problem was in the first place and finding a truly disruptive way of tackling it, reframing it or simply interrogating it properly before we begin.

I’ll boldly assert this now: You cannot lose by spending time really understanding what it is you’re trying to achieve. At the very least, whatever comes next will have genuine purpose. More likely than not, though, you’ll actually give yourself the thrust to find something far better in your strategy.

Nice piece of outdoor from Sky Arts for Pink Floyd – wish I’d seen it live!

In their words…

Sky Arts pays tribute to Pink Floyds iconic Dark Side of the Moon album cover, recreating the acclaimed artwork over Primrose Hill, London, yesterday to celebrate the screening of Pulse: Dark Side Of The Moon Live, the bands 1994 live performance of the album at Earls Court, which will be screened on Sky Arts 1 HD this Friday 23rd October and again on Monday 16th November.

Created using a pyramid structure, LED lighting and four powerful 10W white light lasers, the iconic spectrum was beamed across the London skyline.

Writing my last post drew me to visit the “Never Hide” youtube page again, which I haven’t done in a few months (or more).

I’ve posted about this campaign a number of times, but then it’s good, so why not?! And they’ve added more to it. From the beginning, they’ve taken a ‘be prepared for some to be niche and some to go mass’ approach to adding content to YouTube, and it’s really worked. What now exists is a channel worthy of spending some serious time on – with everything from the light-hearted fun of “guy catches glasses with face” catch, through the product demo that is the “super chameleon” (albeit damn watchable still), the darkness that is “cow gives birth to a dude“, or the sheer arty joy of “color goes pop“… see here for all those films.

They haven’t stopped there, though – there’s a FaceBook page which gives fans all the latest news. There’s a Flickr site with all the movie posters on it. I didn’t find a Twitter user, but that might be bad searching!

Love it. Truly love it.

Visible Measures publish this chart weekly – tracking the most watched videos online – which is effectively a measure of viral videos, although some of the very best weren’t written to be ‘viral’.

What piqued my interest was the presence of some advertising spots that aren’t at all new, as commented on by Abbey Klaassen in this article on Ad Age. In particular, T-Mobile ‘Dance‘, Cadbury ‘Eyebrows‘ and Evian ‘Babies‘… embedded below, in case you haven’t already added to the stats! Not one of these was written as a “viral film” in the old sense of the word. But they’re good enough that people are interested in watching them even after they’ve finished on air. And with over 200 thousand people watching weekly (since that’s what it takes to make it in to the top ten), they’re adding good reach and/or frequency to the campaigns.

The reason I ask whether this could become an effectiveness measure is slightly different, though. I’m sure people have used the ‘online viewers’ measure to prove the added reach/frequency or ‘eyeballs’ gained, but have they used it as a more qualitative measure of being genuinely great? Because lots of ads go into this top ten (Nike’s ‘today was a good day’ and Microsoft’s ‘Laptop hunters’ for instance), however few stay in the ranks for 20+ weeks – and that kind of lasting impact seems a lot more effective than any “500 thousand people watched it online” quote.

In a totally separate league, there is the work for Ray Ban “Never Hide” campaign – since it set out to be a viral piece – with all of the low budget limitations and the need to capture pass-on viewings; after all, this film didn’t have the advantage of being able to gain momentum on TV first. And it’s been repeatable, with the catching taking on new forms over time… so it’s a campaign of viral value, not just a one-off. I mention this as well, since it held in the charts for ages, and even re-appears again this year.

Whether written for TV, or written for online viewing, they all have one thing in common… The message (or explicit advertising part of the ad) is subtle – allowing people to enjoy something that is content, with entertainment value and a degree of “how the hell did they do that?”. Not a bad thing for us all to aim for in our quest for effectiveness…

Clearly I’m biased, since this is TBWA work, but I love the power of the “We’re For Dogs” campaign for Pedigree and this is a great little addition…

They’ve created a “Dogs Rule Day” (yesterday, so the timing of this post is a bit late!) and formed a Facebook link for people to show their support. There’s also a website that you can’t see if your IP is UK-based, annoyingly. But will work elsewhere.

I was asked by Carlos (the Brazilian blogger) to name my favourite campaign. And asked for the opportunity to name 5 – which is a total cop-out, but I wanted to do an “over the ages, by decade” pick. And, as you go back through older ads, it’s relatively easy to pick a corker for each decade.

My four from the past were:

60’s: Union Carbide “Chick”

70’s: Fiat Strada “Handbuilt by robots”

80’s: Apple “1984”

Sweet campaign for the new Beatles Rockband – and I’m relieved to see it’s available for PS3 as well as XBox!

Click here if the embedded version isn’t working.

There’s links to see the banners that ran… Go here. And then check this one out.

Wise words (sponsored by VW) from the disciple of the dude… Playing online and in movie theatres – fantastic work from DDB London.

Click here if the embedded version isn’t playing.

Spotted this on the tube this morning – and it got me thinking…

Because, for starters, you have to have that planner fight in your head: “Is this a clever, brassy, double entendre… or is it echoing the sentiment of the cynics?” And I’ve been chatting to people about it all day (or, at least, the whole day so far). When you see the endline and logo on their own, it’s much more hard-hitting, but much more questionable. Have a look…

Because this is what it ends on when you’re watching a cross-track projection of the ad (think of a powerpoint version of the whole ad and that’s kind of what you get in the projection version).

I had a look at the site – would they keep the line there? Or is it just on this ad?

Well, right now, it’s not made it across to the site, which has this logo and line…

Now, I’m instantly more comfortable with this – there’s no threat of misunderstanding. It’s bland and painless and doesn’t touch the sides on the way down. There’s no hint of bold, either – it’s simply dull. It’s what “they would say, wouldn’t they” rather than anything that makes you stop, or think, or reconsider anything you’re about to do.

So, after much discussion and much pondering, here’s what I’ve realised…

1. This is the first time I’ve thought about Dixons in years.

2. This is the first time I’ve talked to other people about Dixons in forever.

3. I went to the site, I told people about it, and it’s burned into my head.

In other words, it’s genius.

It’s bold and brassy and it’s a great thought for Dixons – it’s beginning to echo “It’s a Skoda, honest” memories in my head.

1 in 5 of all UK adults agree that they prefer surfing the Internet to watching TV. According to TGI Net Q109 (Oct 07 – Sept 08), Q1 2009.

This stat (and many more) is tucked away in a new tool from Google. Check it out – a planners dream!