Nice poster for Puma and &Union

Spotted this poster for a series of gigs held by Puma at &Union. I’m a big fan of &Union for its excellent service and original concept (kind of a beerhall for hipsters). The poster is pretty cool too.

For a review of & Union check out Relax With Dax.

Marketing to a 3.5 second attention span

My generation (gen x) supposedly has an attention span of 3.5 minutes (the average length of an MTV pop video). The web has reduced this to about 3.5 seconds I reckon (about the length of time to read and digest a twitter post). Marketing to the internet generation requires new methods (sticking a 30 second spot on a flash video is not going to be the answer obviously).

I did a talk to the IABC last night on online pr which covered some of this (in brief these were my suggestions):

• Content needs to have immediate and easy appeal or at least offer enough of a tease to suck people into a longer engagement (the Best Job In The World campaign is a great example timed to break just as the northern hemisphere goes back to work in the middle of winter the offer of escaping to be caretaker of a tropical island has immediate appeal that’s easy and relevant to consume).
• Communications should be in short snacks of information and aim to draw people into a longterm relationships/communications – the marketing industry is built around intensive campaigns that are often short-burst this may need to change to be really effective
• We need to consider where our message is being consumed (at home, at work while avoiding doing tasks or increasingly on the move)
• Consumers are now talking back (via Twitter for example) assuming your marketing plan is to have a conversation with them its going to have to be a longterm commitment (its going to look weird when you suddenly shut up once “the campaign” is over)
• We need to understand the currency that works with web consumers they expect to be paid for their attention with something of value: free stuff, genuine entertainment, an ego massage/traffic to their web stuff
• Despite web 2.0 asking consumers to generate content for a brand is a big ask and requires a suitable incentive (most user generated content campaigns seem to struggle)
• I’ve posted on this already this week but the tone needs to be conversational and not ad copy (no one wants to talk to an ad)
• As more and more people are competing for attention there is a rapid arms race of ideas happening to cut through the clutter things often need to be unexpected and random (hence marketing getting more and more surreal/wacky)
• Ideas need to be micro targeted – the idea of hitting everyone with a massively viewed viral piece is pretty unrealistic these days – many consumers are buried in online communities around specific interest groups. Maybe its better to target smaller groups and use language and content appropriate to them (e.g. target bands and their followers or communities of mothers)

Ask not what your consumers can do for you ask what you can do for your consumers

Thought for the day: People don’t want their worlds to built by brands – they want to build their worlds themselves. But obviously they don’t have the access to cash that brands do.

Most brands spend tens of thousands talking about themselves and just get lost in the clutter . The ones willing to support their consumers achieve their own dreams, create their own stuff, have fun at events without feeling like they’re walking in an ad are going to win attention (and graditude) far more surely?

10 things brands could consider doing (amongst many more):

1. Paying for an up and coming bands tour expenses (maybe give them a branded tour bus?)
2. Bring in some overseas DJs/bands – maybe helping out some of the local festivals to bring over bigger acts (yes i know some brands do this already)
3. Pay for a local band to go and tour (and make it) overseas (maybe they can make a blog of their experience hosted by the brand?)
4. Holding creative workshops (e.g. t-shirt design, photography, djing, cup cake making)
5. Paying for everyone to get in for free to a popular club night?
6. Holding free cinema nights of classic movies people have always wanted to see on the big screen (star wars? the shining? breakfast at tiffanys?)
7. Providing decorations for matric dances
8. Sponsoring a recycling service
9. Free pizza to office workers that have to burn the midnight oil (in a cool branded box)
10. Putting on free transport to big events (e.g. music festival) or discounted taxis on a friday night

Great examples of brands that do this already include Levis gigs and Red Bull’s Music Academy i’m sure a few more…

Collaboration is the new rock and roll

I think alot of the blandness in marketing these days comes from inability of the people involved to collaborate with one another. This basically leads, at least in South Africa, to campaigns that are too focused on traditional print and tv ads and that don’t work efficiently when ATL strategies are handed to other agencies (web, pr, activations etc).

The blandness comes from a relatively small isolated pool of individuals that have been trained in a certain way coming up with campaigns that everyone else is suppose to “integrate” with…

So I was quite interested in Wieden + Kennedy’s Platform spin off which seeks to bring non-advertising creatives in to collaborate on projects with the agency.

Platform is a future creative talent platform, which will hire, teach and work with a diverse mix of people, from around the world. We will recruit talent from the arts, sciences and technology backgrounds who will work together to solve business problems through creative solutions. You will learn by doing which means being involved in everything from building prototypes, enabling and assisting in research development to curating your very own event space and programme.

I think local marketing could really benefit from a more collaborative approach that used creativity from non-traditional sources early on in campaign development. I’m pretty sure if you can put a group of people from different backgrounds in a room together and come up with solutions to problems without having an agenda to create an ad campaign or a pr campaign etc we’ll be much more likely to get some truly original work

Deloitte Media & Entertainment Predictions for 2009

Deloitte recently released their predictions for the media & entertainment industry. As you might imagine it is somewhat gloomy particularly for traditional media industries struggling to get to grips with digital distribution (e.g. print media and the music industry). However there are some silver linings in there:

Quick fix digital entertainment (not including music sales which are considered pretty much screwed):

the last two times the economy experienced a downturn, movie ticket and DVD sales went up. It is likely that people will continue to indulge themselves in the small pleasures of DVD consumption, interactive game-playing, online entertainment, books, social networking and television while eschewing big-ticket items such as cars, refrigerators and computers.

Advertising:

Advertising, which is a critical revenue source, is both under threat and faced with incredible opportunities. The traditional advertising segment has been struggling for some time and will continue to struggle into 2009 with the conclusion of the U.S. presidential election and the turmoil in the automotive and financial sectors, which are among the top advertising spenders. Online advertising is growing fast, as evidenced by 26 percent growth in 2007.³ Yet with some advertising budgets locked into longer term contracts, the ability to shift more advertising spend online could be limited. Mobile advertising, which to date has failed to gain traction, could offer the much-needed growth opportunity in 2009.

Advertising budgets will go down, but guerrilla marketing and other innovative platforms for reaching consumers may thrive.

Guerrilla dance routine hits London station

The ad industry has been trying to figure out a way to exploit flash mobbing for years and may have finally figured it out in Saatchi and Saatchi’s new ad for T-Mobile. Liverpool Street in London has seen a fair few flash mobs in the past so this could have felt a bit done. However from the teaser it looks like this is a full on old school musical routine and actually pretty cool.

via Brand Republic

Atheist Bus Ads

Quite a curios row has broken out in the UK over an atheist ad campaign on buses. The ads say “There probably is no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.” The media storm generated by the ads by far out reaches the actual ads. Obviously they’ve caused outrage amongst christian groups (although some  see value in it as its created a platform for discussion). Bizarrely complaints have been made to the ASA (ads standard authority) on the grounds that the ads claims are unsubstantiated.

Hanne Stinson, the chief executive of the British Humanist Association, which launched the campaign, said she “pitied the ASA if they are going to be expected to rule on the probability of god’s existence. However, if they do investigate we will be very happy to respond”. (The Guardian)

In a new twist the creator of the campaign Ariane Sherine was asked to give the first ever atheist Thought for the day on Radio 4 a slot usually reserved for religous leaders.

The Bubble Project

The Bubble Project is a global movement started by a disgruntled ad guy (another one…). The idea is to add blank speech bubbles to dull/unsavoury adverts and let passers by write a comment in the bubble. Usually something subversive (as in the ipod ad above). Kind of like a real world comments box on a blog post. Another example of how the one way stream of marketing is becoming a dialogue.

Current TV did this excellent insert on the founder.

The rise of Uniqlo

Uniqlo, the Japanese fashion retailer, is currently cruising almost effortlessly through the economic gloom while most of its competitors are lowering the life rafts. Sadly we don’t have one in South Africa yet but I have fond memories (and a rather fetching flat cap) from visiting the London store. This is my take on their success.

The stores:

Cool but often quite simple products, sold in a clean, minimalistic environment with great Japanese style service (even the stores not in Japan).

Product innovation:

Uniqlo recently launched the Heat Tech range of clothes including thermal underwear which converts moisture into heat. This not only gives the company unique products but also great PR value from inventing something that simultaneously sounds like the future and makes something as dull as thermal underwear sound cool.

Quirky marketing:

Uniqlo have really got the power of PR and appealing to the blogosphere with some fun off the wall marketing activity.

Robot assistant:

Uniqlo recently “employed” a robot store assistant in its New York branch. Ok so its a bit of a gimmick but one with immense PR appeal – and besides he does look damn cute. The little guy even writes his own blog (bless).

Human vending machine:

Just as whacky but also a very successful PR stunt Uniqlo in New York created a human vending machine to launch the new Heat Tech range. It’s basically a big box with (slightly bad) mimes inside it giving out free products.

And some ads:

Their ads have the same playful, slightly crazy feel to them.

They’re so The Gap of the noughties…