Author Archives: Chris Stephenson

X_Factor-tipping

X Factor Tipping: results after weeks four and five

X-factor_tipping_results
two weeks to update and what a couple of shockers they've been.  the week before last saw Austin go out after Daniel wasn't in the bottom two despite has murdering of Don't Leave Me This Way.  wrong, wrong wrong.  still, after week four Mediation was up 10 points to 60.

then this weekend saw the unbelievable as Laura went out when she was up against Ruth.  now there's no way should she have been in the bottom two, but the reality is that being behind that piano seemingly cost her…  the singing wasn't up to her usual standard and you're only as good as you last performance.  unless of course you're Daniel in which case you can put in a performance that wouldn't get you very much on SingStar and still apparently survive.

regular readers of X-Factor Tipping will recall that if one of the acts you nominate to stay is in the bottom two, 5 points are lost.  if
one of your nominated 'stay' acts is sent home 10 points walk out the door.  Mediation had (of course) Laura as one of it's acts to stay and so lost 5 points and is now down to 55, with the results standing as follows:

1. Emma 80
2. Maria
75
2. Richard
75
4. Davey
70
4. Lizzy
70
4. Nicole
70
7. Nuala
65
7. Paul
65
7. Philip
65
7. Simon
65
11. Carole
60
11. David D
60
13. Mediation
55
13. Jason K
55
13. Jason W
55
13. Stu
55
17. Bree
50
17. Dale
50
19. Nick
45
20. Laura
35
20. Tom 35

it's not looking good people.  cheer however has been brought about by the storm of protest that has followed Laura's exit, and specifically the nature of said exit.  I don't think that there can be any doubt whatsoever that Louis' vote was tactical – he wanted one of the biggest threats to his one remaining act gone, so voted Laura off.  where, oh where is the justice?

it's especially pleasing to see our Culture Secretary Andy Burnham leading the charge.  in Parliament today he commented that whilst MPs "should resist that temptation to comment on editorial matters", (I'll remind him of that one day) he added that "the temptation is great in my case, having seen the wonderful
and talented Laura White very harshly voted off X Factor on Saturday"  …interesting times people, interesting times.

you can view the clip of Burnham's comments by clicking below…  enjoy.

Burnham_on_White

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branding, promoting

Red Cups have arrived: how Starbucks attach themselves to winter festivities

Starbucks_red_cups
'White is out for the season' according to Starbucks who today roll-out their red cups across the land.  in store promotions as well as press campaign have been reminding us all that Gingerbread lattes et al will once again be available from today and for the duration of the season.

I don't want to like this, but you really can't help but admire the simple communication which not only taps into the very physical markers of darker nights and colder mornings, but also the emotional anticipation of the festive season to come.

as far as Chrimbo commerciality goes its right up there with Coca-Cola's trucks and the now (very quickly established) M&S effort.  and quite right too…  brands – whether you like it or not – are part of the Chrimbo spirit.  some brands are as emotionally connected to Christmas celebrations as the products they sell are to the physicality of it all.

it may just be a red cup, but the emotive place it comes from means much more.  it's a signal, a kick start, an announcement that holidays truly are coming…

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cinema, experiencing

Surviving the BFI IMAX’s SAW marathon: why too much of something can be just as tough

Saw_movie
it was the Spice Girls who observed that "too much of something is bad enough, but something's coming over me to make me wonder of too much of nothing is just as tough"  …well it's not.  you really can have too much of a good thing.  on Friday Mediation spent an all-night marathon in the company of Saw I thru V.  one night, two beers, three friends, four cans of Relentless and all five Saw movies in one sitting.

it all kicked off at 11pm on Friday night when Mediation and another 300 people gathered at the BFI IMAX near Waterloo.  the next nine hours of our collective lives was spent watching the five movies which collectively are the most successful horror series of all time.

whether I'm just getting too old for this or whether it came off of the back of a busy week, (or maybe it's because the fourth and fifth movies of the franchise are pants in comparison to the first three) it was tough old going.  I confess that my eyelids took over a short way into episode four but managed to rally to make it thru the silliness of the fifth …and shortly after 9am Mediation emerged blinking into the grey winter light of Saturday morning.

the whole thing is utterly ridiculous of course, but it has to be said there is a genuine buzz when consuming content in the company of others who love said content enough to miss a night's sleep to do so.  a buzz that is heightened – to a degree – by the venue and staff who do their damdest to keep the spirits up and the coffee flowing.

they could do more to make the experience more of, well, an experience – but for that that matter so could brands…  the evening was a great opportunity for an energy drink or vitamin supplement to do some sampling and attach themselves to the experience of the event.

so opportunity missed this time round, but don't worry – the next all-nighter is already planned for May, where the IMAX will be screening all three Lord of the Rings movies in one go.  now where did I leave my detachable Orc-ears?

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ad funded programming, broadcasting, selling, television

‘Together we’re stronger’ is the message as ITV takes an optimistic tone at the 2009 upfronts

Britannia high
as optimistic as it gets: ITV's Britannia High

'together we're stronger' was the message to media agencies at last week's 2009 upfronts presentation on the Southbank.  and strong is indeed what ITV is going to need us all to be.  with Tesco now openly talking about Q1 2009 being an 'Ice Age' in consumer spending, all media owners are bracing themselves for tough conditions ahead.  the message from ITV is simple: TV is the most effective channel for brand building and behaviour change, commercial TV is more popular than ever, and in real terms the cost of airtime is the same as it was in 1992.  that and a billion pound commitment to the programming budget to boot.

it's all compelling stuff and ITV has plenty to be pleased about; ITV2 and ITV3 are the top two MC channels, over 80% of the schedule is UK original programming, and (with Kangaroo still in the pipeline) itv.com is starting to make some strides in online for the corporation – we were informed that three alternate endings to the Liam storyline generated 650k views in one weekend.  who knew.

upcoming programming looks good (you can view the reel here) and includes the remake of The Prisoner with Sir Ian McKellen, and Demons (an early Saturday night partner for Primeval).  ITV have also recently locked down a deal which will see Sage ad-fund the return of the Krypton Factor, with Julian Smith, Planning Account Director at ITV, commenting that it marked "the biggest ad-funded and multi-platform programme ITV has
commissioned and the first one to appear in ITV1’s prime time schedule".

Mediation asked Peter Fincham – ITV's new Director of Television – why it had taken so long for an AFP to make it into primetime.  he noted that commissioning lead times are often very different to those of brands, and that keeping an audience and a brand happy aren't always the same thing.  but the main barrier seemed to be cost – with a Q&A panel adding that brands often baulk at the price tag that comes with making your own show.  this is probably fair and true, and a new approach that starts with what the schedule needs rather than what advertisers dictate is a good starting point – no brand wants to invest in a programme that is simply not going to rate no matter how on-brand it is.

one of the stars of the show was Sunday nights new effort Britannia High (above) which despite buying pretty much every 6 sheet on the underground was severely trounced in the ratings by Antiques roadshow on BBC1 (its viewers may be – according to Fincham – a "coach load of old people", but that there quite a big coach).

part of the problem with Britannia High has been the marketing.  not sure that a 6 sheet campaign really cuts it – especially with a show like this.  my guess is a lot of people just didn't know what to expect, that's not a position a new peak-time show on ITV wants to be in.  it would have been so easy to run some kind of audition-concept format in the run up to TX that would have also explained what to expect.  suspect that it will have momentum but it's an opportunity missed for the channel.  you only get to launch once.

one other gripe is that ITV do rather want to seem to have their cake and eat it…  they're very happy to deliver mass audiences (and so they should), but their targeting ability was demonstrated at a channel level (see below), with ITV1 equaling optimism and ITV2 fun and younger etc.  solid positionings but in a multichannel world you can get more precise targeting elsewhere for less.

ITV_channelsstronger targeting delivering effectiveness (source: ITV upfronts presentation)

the case study for targeting was Harveys' sponsorship of Coronation Street which has generated 3.5m red button interactions with the brand.  a great result but hardly the best example of a targeted proposition.

all in all though a confident performance from the corporation.  here's to the optimism holding as the chill of an economic ice-age starts to bite.

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X_Factor-tipping

X Factor Tipping: results after week three

X-factor_tipping_results
right so there is SO a pattern emerging…  I needed a good week and didn't get one.  I'd nominated Daniel and Rachel (who as it turns out was amazing on Saturday) to go.  got one right.  again.  and the one I nominated didn't go so only 15 points.  gutted.  but to that pattern; my nominations to go so far have been:

week one : Girlband and Ruth …no, Ruth was safe
week two : Girlband and Scott …no, my week one nomination (Ruth) was in bottom two
week three: Daniel and Rachel …no, my week two nomination (Scott) was in bottom two

so I'm predicting correctly, but I'm a week ahead of the game; which means the clear nominations for my bottom two in week four should be Daniel and Rachel.  we'll see.  but in the meantime to the results: every single competitor predicted that either Daniel or Scott would be going except Dale…

but the antipodean one's error was spectacularly outdone by Paul and last week's
leader Davey who both picked Scott to stay.  not in a million years was Scott safe against the girls – we're looking at an all-Cheryl final let alone an all-female one…  that said, Scott so should have stayed, not because he's good (he's not) but because he's a darn sight better than Daniel who should have gone.  we all know what bought him one more week.  next week – for sure.

scores as they stand after week three:

1. Jason K 60
1. Nicole 60
1. Philip 60
1. Simon 60
5. Carole 55
5. Davey 55
5. Nuala 55
8. Mediation 50
8. David D 50
8. Emma 50
8. Richard 50 
8. Stu 50
13. Bree 45
13. Dale 45
13. Jason W 45
13. Lizzy 45
13. Maria 45
13. Paul 45
19. Nick 30
20. Tom 25

one last word to Louis' break-down at voting.  bless.

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X_Factor-tipping

X Factor Tipping: results after week two

X-factor_tipping_results
aargh.  really annoyingly I got the results for week two correct… only I got them correct last week.  my week one votes for Ruth to be in the bottom two would have stood me in really good stead.  as it is, a comfortable 20 points for Mediation brings total points after week two to 35.

1. Davey           50
2. Philip           
45
3. Carole          
40
3. Paul             
40
5. Mediation    
35
5. Dale             
35
5. David D        
35
5. Emma          
35
5. Jason K        
35
5. Nicole          
35
5. Richard        
35
5. Simon          
35
5. Stu              
35
14. Bree           
30
14. Jason W     
30
14. Lizzy          
30
14. Nuala         
30
18. Laura         
20
19. Nick           
10
19. Tom           
10

need to have a couple of good weeks to break me away from the pack and start challenging the leaders, who I'm convinced have insider info…  for nominations this coming week, I'm thinking deffo Daniel, Scott and Ruth in the firing line…  we'll see.  for now, it's a (predicted) farewell to Girlband…

healing the world Girlband-style… what were they thinking?
X_girlband_out

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advertising, branding, innovating

How not to make ads: why randomised communications don’t work

Ad_generatorthe Ad Generator is a brilliant application created by Alexis Lloyd, a a multimedia designer, information architect, and new media artist, who describes how…

"Words and semantic structures from
real corporate slogans are remixed and randomized to generate invented slogans.
These slogans are then paired with related images from Flickr, thereby generating
fake advertisements on the fly. By remixing corporate
slogans, I intend to show how the language of advertising is both deeply meaningful,
in that it represents real cultural values and desires, and yet utterly meaningless
in that these ideas have no relationship to the products being sold."

it's a fascinating idea, and it completely works as art (and even as a nifty screen saver if browsing in Firefox you press F11), but the product doesn't cut it as ads.  the assertion is flawed; the idea that "these ideas have no relationship to the products being sold" is from an age long-ago abandoned, if indeed it ever existed.

John Grant in After Image articulated that, instead of relying on the traditional (image-based) approach, brands should direct their efforts at building
shared meaning and learning as the basis for marketing.  this was after 'image'.  and you can't randomise words and pictures to create shared meaning and learning.  as Faris would observe; brands are ideas, and people have an intrinsically participatory relationship with ideas.  not with random words and pictures.

as for me, I believe that the role for brands is twofold: that brands give people reasons to be loyal to a product or service, and further that brands provide an affirmation of our purchase decisions.  as such, adverts are what brands say.  you can't create that from the ether.  whether or not you resonate with and believe them is another thing, but you can't random up an ad.

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advertising, broadcasting, researching, television, viewing

Getting more out of the ad break: how ITV prove the extent to which content affinity is transferred to advertising

ITV_event_research_2
some new research from ITV attaches some numbers to what we all – should – intuitively know.  the network's Event TV research, which can be viewed here, quantitates the simple theory that "compelling content generates higher levels of interest and awareness" in advertising.

the research looked at 'event TV' – programming that is anticipated, time-sensitive (ie less likely to be time-shifted), and which often involves ritual behaviour (getting the pizzas in for example).  what most defines such programming however is the extent to which it is a shared experience. 'true fans' – those more likely to seek-out additional programme content and talk about it – are also those most likely watch in groups.  the shared experience doesn't of course stop there – they are very much aware that the same broadcast is being watched by millions of others at that very moment.

ITV_event_research_shared_experience
watch with other (source: ITV)

the research goes on to quantify the extent to which such fans are less likely to flick over when the ads come on, and therefore more likely to watch the commerciality that is the break (eg true soap fans are 97% more likely to watch the ads during their shows than their non-fan equivalents).  finally, it demonstrates the extent to which affinity for programmes seems to be transferred to ads, with fans of TV shows having more positive opinions of the advertising in breaks throughout the show.

it must be said I find myself asking what this actually tangibly means for planning and buying.  the benefit for ITV is clear; this research makes the case for the justification of investment in event (and therefore often peak-time) programming.  but this airtime is oversubscribed as is – further encouraging agencies to plan into this space will only lead to further premiumisation (I know that's not a word btw) of said airtime.

that quibble aside, this is not only a solid bit of research to add to our collective canon, but is research brilliantly presented in the form of a video-diary of a day ('sofa-Saturday') in the life of a household from the perspective of the TV.  you can view it from the above link, I recommend it.

it also highlights the extent to which viewers will track desired content across platforms; there's an interesting multi-platform (transmedia) opportunity for a campaign that wanted to acknowledge and capitalise on the multi-platform relationship true fans have thru their content.

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X_Factor-tipping

X Factor Tipping: live finals – week two

X-factor_tipping
after a poor showing in week one, Mediation's looking to do better this week.  X Factor Tipping is simple – every week until we get to the final five Mediation has to pick two acts I think will
survive (yes’s) and two acts that you think could
be sent home (no’s)…  week two's tips are as follows:

X_alexandra
first vote to stay remains with Alexandra.  amazing performance last week and she hasn't even hit the ballads yet.  in a class of her own.

X_laura
staying with her once again I'm saying Laura.  high hopes last week were more than met with an awesome performance.  another safe bet I reckon.

X_girlband
my first tip to go is once again Girlband.  Britain is clearly not in the mood to crown a girl band this year and reckon it will be the sing off once again for the ladies.  to be fair they should have gone last week – this one is an inevitability methinks.

X_scott
the toughest choice this week is who to tip to join Girlband in the bottom two.  ultimately it came down to Dan – who really, really cannot sing for toffee, or Scott.  and I've gone with the latter because Dan's back-story will keep him in for a few weeks yet and Scott must be cried out by now…  Xtra factor was more like a tourism ad for the US last week, with Scott doing an admirable if increasingly distracting impersonation of Niagara Falls.  enough.  Sayonara Scott.

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advertising, broadcasting, experiencing, television, viewing

Things I’ve learned about TV ads; courtesy of a Night of the Adeaters

TV ads sometimes get a bad press; often seen, unfairly, as the blind refuge of the creative process.  they're blamed for narrowing creative thought into a pre-determined construct that's allegedly irrelevant in a digital age.

well a night with the Ad Eaters is more than enough to demonstrate otherwise.  what occurred to me last night, as I sat watching several hours of TV ads from around the world, was how perfect the audiovisual short is for communicating a brand – or indeed any – idea.

it's no surprise that the 'TV ad' became the common currency of the advertising agency.  indeed one can't help but think that even in the absence of a broadcast model that reinforced the TV ad construct, the short AV piece would have emerged as the vessel of choice for brand ideas.  forcing clarity, relevance and conciseness, it may come to be seen as the 20th / 21st Century equivelent of the cave painting or Aesop fable.

there was as much joy and pleasure in seeing again BBH's Underwater Love for Levi's (above) or early Smirnoff efforts, as there was in seeing for the first time some of MTV's campaigning work or an Audi ad with a dog chasing a car in the snow…

some other things I learned last night:

  • most of the best ads are for cars.  fact.
  • it's impossible to make a good fragrance ad.  fact.
  • some brands have the right to set agendas and others just don't
  • an audience of ad types loves a bit of worthiness – ads for the UN Development Fund were guaranteed a splattering of applause.  as the lovely Jon A puts it: "the skill of communication is like the skill of swordsmanship: it can be applied in play or in war, for better or for worse".  we collectively aspire – it seems – to do the formers.
  • it's impossible to aggregate ads around a city – "ads set in Paris" just doesn't work as a filter

all in all a very cool evening.  if there's one observation it's that the filtering could have been better.  an evening like that is essentially acting as an aggregator – so Ad Eaters has to work as hard as possible to be the best aggregator that they can be.  not doing so will only undermine future efforts – and contribute to the feeling of watching a very extended version of Tarrant On TV.  only without Chris Tarrant.  and not on TV.

Kudos to the IPA, CBS and Metro for sponsoring, and a big thanks to David at Metro for facilitating…

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