applicationing, creating, developing, evidencing

Walking the World Cup Talk: How Marca.com is holding it’s own in the Age of Evidence by adding value to it’s World Cup-following readers

brilliant World Cup interactive infographic courtesy of Littlewood (or more specifically Littlewood's mate) hosted here… I'm not going to pretend that I'm massively into the World Cup (I'll get excited when we play). I am however going to pretend that I'm massively into infographics and how they can add value to how we absorb and engage with the world…

you can track the entire competition…

or just focus on the upcoming fixtures for your country… etc etc etc…

the point, is that the site – www.marca.com – really takes it's football seriously… and the investment in this little number is a great example of walking the talk, or as I like to put it, evidence-based marketing…

because whilst the application is a great way of navigating your way through the World Cup, its also a brilliant way of marketing… marketing by the best, oldest, and arguably most effective method of communication… yup, word of mouth (or in it's modern guise) word of mouse.

those of you paying attention will also notice that it's very social-friendly too… the Like and Tweet buttons in the top right of the application currently show it having 32k and 5,414 advocacies (couldn't think of another word to go there) across Facebook and Twitter…

and that's a lot of connections and click throughs sparked, not by an ad saying 'Marca likes / does / loves football' but rather through the provision of a bit of evidence that proves it, whilst at the same time making the World Cup just that little bit better for its fans. not a bad day's work for a media brand living in the age of evidence – and not a Rooney ad in sight.

creating, making, marketing, planning, publishing, sampling

More than a Calling Card: how Daemon Group is creating collateral fit for the Age of Evidence

the cover of Daemon Group's calling card; THINK 02 Issue 2

you meet a lot of people in this business, most of whom leave you with a warm feeling, a couple of action points that you promise to yourself you'll do, and a business card. no so the Daemon Group, the day after a meeting with whom, I received a magazine designed, written and produced by the agency.

it's a collection of thoughts and analysis of everything from design concepts to social issues, taking in behaviour and international reportage on the way… and it's a pretty great read.

the stats on social, just one of several articles on the changing communications landscape

the idea of a more personal calling card isn't necessarily new; moo have been providing the best of ways to personalise and add character to your 'keep in touch' collateral… nor is the idea of the company magazine…

but what stand's Daemon Group's effort apart is the sheer commitment to quality… the quality of the not only thinking, writing, and production, but also the quality of contact… the magazine was delivered fresh to my desk the morning after my meeting with Richard, the group's chief executive. the commitment to following up the meeting with me was matched only by the commitment to the collateral delivered.

the two big implications for brands and the planning of marketing communications are clear. one, invest in quality collateral… don't say you're passionate about what you do, have collateral that proves it. don't gesticulate on the quality of your thinking, have collateral that demonstrates it… buying media space that tells people how good / fast / impressive / [insert USP here] you are, is for a time now long gone by…

we live in the age of evidence.

claims, counter claims, and statements no longer cut it. in the age of evidence it's what you do that counts, what you produce that get's noticed. in the age of evidence reputations are built on what you craft and deliver to make your case to the world.

the second implication for brands is to have good, considered connections planning. the too-often used phrase that means, simply, to have a plan for how you create and manage connections with people. Daemon Group's magazine means nothing to me whilst it's sat on their Chief Executive's coffee table. how much of what a brand actually does remains locked up? hidden behind policy doors and content management gates. brands that love their collateral set it free, fueling connections with people…

because that's what the best communications planning, at it's core, is… what evidence can we create that proves the truth about what our brand is and represents; and how can we ensure that the right people encounter that evidence in relevant and meaningful ways?

I'm grateful that in a complicated world, which sometimes seems to move faster than I can keep up, a magazine landed on my desk to remind me how elegantly simple it all really is. the challenge isn't to keep up with a changing communications landscape; the challenge is to remember that you can.

oh, and there's an article on Mr Potato Head too – who doesn't love that…

brand extending, creating, realtiming, social media-ising

It’s a crazy world, but I wouldn’t have it any other way: me and a pair of limited edition adidas’ that I was never destined to own

its a beautiful Friday evening in Sydney, but before I head out for a few drinks for Zaac's birthday, I'd like to tell you a story. its a story about a great brand, and about how the world of communications works now; but more than that its a story about me and a pair of trainers that I will never now own. and why thats OK.

it begins last Saturday, when Size sent an email to their mailing list. on that list was my friend @fraser201 who, upon seeing that contained in that email were some of the most amazing trainers he'd seen an a good long while, forwarded the email on to me. he knew I'd like it, you see two of my favourite things in all the world are trainers and Star Wars. and there on the Size email were those two things. together. in one place. Star Wars limited edition trainers. and they were glorious.

so I turned to Google and got a few results from Star Wars and various trainer sites, but notably saw a result from @adi_originals. so I promptly hit TweetDeck and fired off a Tweet to adidas, and heard back almost immediately…

@adi_originals re StarWars collection, awesome stuff!! when are the orange Xwing hightops hitting Sydney? and where can I get them?

@cwstephenson The Skywalkers will be available at our Sydney Originals store. Give them a call: http://ow.ly/URy3

following their link, I got to their Town Hall Originals Store website and placed a call. the wonderful Chrissie picked up. she explained that there were strictly limited numbers and that they'd go on sale on a first come first served basis on Friday. in the diary Friday morning went and I did the polite thing and sent a Tweet back to adidas:

@adi_originals nice one, thanks – looking forward to picking up some Skywalkers on Friday http://bit.ly/7yNUGw

and so the week passed. and when I wasn't working or going out or up to no good, I was thinking about a limited edition pair of adidas Star Wars Stormtroopers, and tweeting about them to @fraser201 and @willsh. Friday morning, this morning, couldn't come soon enough.

I however, could have come considerably sooner. too late, I was. I simply got there too late. by the time I got to the store there was already a queue and as, one by one, people entered and left the store, the limited editions, one by one, left the store with them. very soon there weren't any left for me.

I'm not angry or pissed off. I guess I'm just a little blue. somewhere in and around Sydney there are limited edition adidas Stormtroopers being worn, or admired, or stored in a safe, but none are being worn or admired or stored in a safe by me.

please don't feel too sorry for me. there's more where they came from. the first transport may have gotten away but battle will recommence in a month's time… the prize? these little puppies…

but thats not the end of the story, because towards the end of this morning the following popped into my Twitterfeed:

@cwstephenson What did you pick up? May The Force Be With You: http://ow.ly/WDgu

adidas remembered. not just that I was interested in their products but that I was planning on getting some this morning. four days after our Tweet exchange – an eternity in a world that's converging into RealTime – they remembered and sent me a message. perhaps its just me, perhaps I was feeling needy, but I find that pretty remarkable.

play my story back again… here's how it went down: a retailer sent a mailer out which was forwarded to me via someone in my network so I searched then tweeted, then tweeted some more, then went to a store and missed out but then received a tweet which contained a link to the below rather amazing ad which I clicked on and watched.

the ad came last.

after all the product development, partnership building, new news generating, social networking and direct communicating, I watched an ad. and ad designed not to make me go and by something. quite the opposite. an ad as an affirmation. a validation of the journey that I'd just been on. "thats why I love this brand" is the response it so deservedly earns.

because in all of that story, in all that maelstrom of communications and connections, at no point was any media bought. at every step along the way it was earned; earned by a brand creating something that in the end I wasn't even able to buy.

its a crazy world, and I wouldn't have it any other way. good weekends all…

brand extending, charging, creating, selling

Demanding Supply: What the Sydney Festival can learn from adidas and Star Wars

the Becks Festival Bar @ The Barracks [source]

so last night I spend a brilliant evening jumping around to Big Black Voodoo Daddy & Black Joe lewis and the Honeybears at the Becks Festival bar (above). its all part of the Sydney Festival, which opened on Saturday with Al Green performing to about 200,000 people in the Domain.

but here's the thing – I had to buy my and Jonathan's (hi Jonathan @jonnyp) way into Big Black Voodoo Daddy et al, because all the tickets had been and gone months ago when they were first released. it seems to me that there for a city the size of Sydney the festival just doesn't seem BIG enough… there needs to be more stuff, more to do, because the demand is currently far outstripping supply. …and thats the thing about supply and demand – the more there is of something, the more we want of it:

Induced demand: When supply shifts from S1 to S2, the price drops from P1 to P2, and quantity consumed increases from Q1 to Q2 [source: Wikipedianess]

I love the counter-intuitiveness of this. the more you create of something the more people want it. the problem however is that at the same time the value of the commodity goes down – but only if the commodity in question is homogeneous.

this is the great opportunity for something like the Sydney Festival – you don't make it bigger by making more of the same; in order to protect value you need to produce more of the different. more venues, more spaces and places, more 'differentiated scale'. in this the festival can learn much – and a big thanks to a heads up from @Fraser201 on this – from adidas and Star Wars… yeah, I know…

in December of last year adidas announced the creation of an originals range inspired by the Star Wars universe, its been trending up ever since:

there's three very smart things about this, the second two of which relate to really brilliant understanding of induced supply. the first thing to say is that in no way shape or form will adidas ever have to spend a penny in broadcast advertising of this range: its existence will be all the marketing collateral they need. but thats not whats really interesting about what adidas are doing.

I had a quick conversation with the lovely Chrissie at the Sydney Originals store this morning, who informed me that the range isn't all being released at once, rather its being phased over three months. thats the first smart way of increasing supply without compromising price; phased supply over time.

secondly, not all lines will be equally available – some of the lines will be general release and fairly easily obtained, but others will be strictly limited, some down to two pairs of sneaks per store. thats the second smart way of increasing supply without compromising price; variable availability. the entry levels for demand are different – individuals with heavy demand will invest more time and energy than those with lower levels of demand but the value equation for both will be similar.

both the Sydney Festival and adidas' Star Wars range can teach communications a thing or two too: imagine that the theory of induced demand applies to bought media… an increase in the volume of advertising impacts has resulted firstly in a fall in the value (real or perceived) of brand communications and secondly, an increase in the demand for brand communications… advertising has gone from the Immortal to the Immediate:

from the Immortal to the Immediate; Michelangelo’s Sistine ceiling (top) took four years to paint, current economics wouldn’t favour its commissioning today. Banksy’s Tesco Flag (bottom) took a little more than four minutes

it couldn't be less about doing a few things well; fewer bigger better needs to be thrown out with the noughties. rather its about doing lots of things well enough. on which I'll let you enjoy the awesomeness of the below… they're on phased release from now till March, form orderly queues please…

advertising, creating, internet, praising

How to watch a music gig in an online banner: how Boondoggle and Axion brought utility to the ad space

Nick Dickson pointed me in the direction of this lovely little video which tells the story of how Boondoggle brought music to the web for their client Axion. whilst I'll let the video speak for itself, its worth considering for a moment the elegance of the creative solution…

I've talked often and at at times at length on a theme of "we media and advertising people got this amazing thing to play with called the internet but we screwed it royally by applying 20th Century broadcast thinking to what was a two-way engagement platform, etc" …what the above bit of creative thinking shows is a beautifully crafted way of doing what we should be doing… bringing utility to the web

as I type this I'm listening to some tunes courtesy of the joy that is Spotify, an ad by Diesel has just done a similar thing – I caught a snippet about how they've created a branded radio station on the platform to showcase new music. thats utility too. and its a brilliant thing.

Clever mac banner ad from Amit Gupta on Vimeo.

source: Amit Gupta

all this reminded me of the Windows Apple banner wars from a while back, and whilst the efforts of Apple were an attempt to creatively use the space that is the banner / sky, its still an ad.

the gig in a banner concept goes a simple but crucial step further… by being there on users' not advertisers' terms, its adding value to my time on the internet – not distracting me from it. it deserves every one of the five Cannes Golden Lions it picked up.

creating, experiencing, outdoor, user-generating

Digital and OOH collide in Dublin: what happened when Playhouse and Daft.ie turned a buliding into a digital playground

Dancers from Playhouse on Vimeo.

so about to head for the weekend and XFactor but just picked this up on the twittersphere and thought it was a rather delightful thing to end the week on. from the 24th of September until the 11th of October, Dublin's Liberty Hall is being transformed into a giant 50 metre, low resolution, TV screen. the best bit – anyone can join in… members of the public are being invited to create animations that will be displayed on the building as part of the project.

brilliant example of digital spaces and places being amplified in the real world. echoes of the HBO project but with an added open invitation for anyone to showcase their creativity…

here's hoping that they're investing in amplifying it… desktop applications that show what's going on in real time, lots of YouTubeness, and perhaps some kind of digital book that captures and showcases the best examples.

more of this kind of thing please… and if you want to get creating then click here.

creating, praising, thinking

Thought of the day: What Eddie Izzard can teach brands about having a positive marketing attitude

"I don't feel I'm a capitalist, I feel I'm a creativist. Capitalists make things to make money, I like to make money to make things – I love making things."

Eddie Izzard – Live from London (available on iTunes)

I was listening to Eddie Izzard's Live from London podcast – recorded at the apple store in Regent St – recently and was rather taken by the above quote. Izzard was meditating on the theme of the banking crisis and observed that he was, in his judgment, a creativist.

its a great thought but what's even more powerful is the logic flow that sits behind it. think about it. brands and marketers that consider themselves to be in the business of making things to make money will, I suspect, end up behaving very different from those with a mindset of 'let's make money so that we can make more things'.

let's use marketing investment not to make money as an end in itself but so that we can make more (interesting, exciting, imaginative, engaging, challenging, fun) stuff as a result. of course lots of businesses work like this – ROI from one year is reinvested into the next – but its indirect and not by any means guaranteed.

besides that what I think is more important is the attitude, the mindset that this thinking gets you into. yeah, hell lets do some successful communications and make shedloads of money. but let's be explicit about why we want to make money… we want to make money so that we can increase a brand's presence in the world; not by being in more places more often and seen by more people, but by the creation of more things. things created with people, by people and for people, that add value not just to brands but to our world.

from today I'm not a capitalist either. I'm going to be a creativist. and I'm going to be in the business of making money so that I can be the best and most interesting creativist I can be. thanks Eddie.

copy-writing, creating, designing, outdoor, praising

Keep Calm and Carry On – the History of a Poster: and what brands should learn from the elegance and simplicity of its resonant slogan

I popped into The Only Place for Pictures on Upper Street over the weekend and came across the history of the Keep Calm and Carry on poster that's been in and around for a while. fascinating history and a reminder that simple, elegant copy writing can lodge long in the consciousness, finding new and evolved meanings over time… what brands would give for slogans with this degree of resonance so long after its original inception.

I've copied the full text from the note in the shop below, enjoy…

in the spring of 1939, with war against Germany all but inevitable, the British Government's Ministry of Information commissioned a series of propaganda posters to be distributed throughout the country at the onset of hostilities. it was feared that in the early months of the war Britain would be subjected to gas attacks, heavy bombing raids and even invasion. the posters were intended to offer the public reassurances in the dark days which lay ahead.

the posters were required to be uniform in style and were to feature 'special and handsome' typeface making them difficult for the enemy to counterfeit. the intent of the poster was to convey a message from the King to his people, to assure them that 'all necessary measures to defend the nation were being taken', and to stress an 'attitude of mind' rather than any specific aim. on the eve of war which Britain was ill-equipped to fight, it was not possible to know what the nations's future aims and objectives would be.

at the end of August 1939 three designs went into production with an overall print budget of £20,600 for five million posters. the first poster, of which over a million were printed, carried a slogan suggested by a civil servant names Waterfield. using the crown of George VI as the only graphic device, the stark red and white poster read 'Your Courage, Your Cheerfulness, Your Resolution will bring us Victory'. a similar poster, of which around 600,000 were issued, carried the slogan 'Freedom is in Peril'. but the third design, of which over 2.5 million posters were printed, simply read 'Keep Calm and Carry On'.

the first two designs were distributed in September 1939 and immediately began to appear in shop windows, on railway platforms, and on advertising hoardings up and down the country. but the 'Keep Calm' posters were held in reserve, intended for use only in times of crisis or invasion. although some may have found their way onto Government office walls, the poster was never officially issued and so remained virtually unseen by the public – unseen, that is, until a rare copy turned up more than fifty years later in a box of old books bought in auction by Barter Books in Alnwick.

shop owners Stuart and mary manley liked the poster so much that they had it framed and placed near the till in Barter Books. it quickly proved so popular with customers and attracted so many enquiries that in 2001 Stuart and Mary decided to print and sell a facsimile edition of their original poster which has since become a best-seller, both in the shop and via te internet.

the Ministry of Information commissioned numerous other propaganda posters for use on the home front during the Second World War. some have become well-known and highly collectible, such as the acrtoonist Fougasse's 'careless Talk Costs Lives' series. but ours has remained a secret until now. unfortunately, we cannot acknowledge the individuals responsible for the 'Keep Calm' poster. but it's a credit to those nameless artists that long after the war was won people everywhere are still finding reassurance in their distinctive and handsome design, an the very special 'attitude of mind' they managed to convey.

Primary source of information: Lewis, R.M., 'Undergraduate Thesis: The planning, design and reception of British home front propaganda posters of the Second World War'. written April 1997. accessed April 2007.

Barter Books, Alnwick Station, Northumberland NE66 2NP, England

Postscript: since the 'Keep Calm and Carry On' poster was rediscovered in Barter Books in 2000, it has become a national icon. to read about the ongoing story of this remarkable survivor, click here.

creating, remixing

The ultimate video remix?: How Marco Brambilla is bringing civilisation to NYC’s Standard Hotel

a Relentless blog post pointed me in the direction of the above video installation by Marco Brambilla. it's a video collage featuring 400 video sources molded together into one image which runs the length of the lift shaft of the Standard Hotel in New York. 1920 pixels across and 7500 pixels vertically track your ascent into heaven or descent into hell. depending on your direction of travel.

it has to be a contender for the ultimate version of the remix. William Gibson and Lawrence Lessig would be proud. the efforts of four hundred who have gone before remoulded and melded together to form something new, elegant and utterly mesmerising.

this is the kind of thing that more comms briefs should be delivering; pieces of conceptual art produced for comms objectives that can then be explored online or amplified through broadcast. starting, creatively, at the end point of the plan (ie the TV ad or the print execution) means you miss the opportunity to think about where those executions come from. rarely have I seen investment of time and effort in the creation of an original piece from which a variety of ad executions (in a variety of media) could then derive. I hope and expect that to change.

in the meantime click HQ, full screen it, sit back and enjoy…

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