January 24, 2006



Car Show Season

Good morning:

38 degress this afternoon, in the balmiest January (so far) on record in Minneapolis. Mush on:

CHRYSLER “CONNECTING CARS WITH PEOPLE” Have you noticed how car companies are making the car show season a bigger deal this year? Maybe I’ve just been loking more, but I’m seeing a lot of PR and ads around the Los Angeles Car Show, the huge Detroit Car Show, etc.
Organic developed a sub-site of Chrysler.com which is devoted to car enthusiasts. We’re in the middle of the “car show” season, the latest being the huge Detroit Auto Show.

This sub-site has all the interactive marketing whistles and bells, all to pull in an enthusiast, get them to register, and then feed them a personalized stream of news, photos, videos, games and contests, and forums.

Two interesting features: you can save photos from each of the car shows in your personal folder through the FlickR photo service, and second there’s an RSS feed you can sign up for which will let you know whenever there’s news about cars or shows you’re interested in. http://www.chrysler.com/autoshow/

STARZ “30 SECOND BUNNIES THEATER” Here’s a viral campaign from the cable movie channel Starz, to get some traction about their movie line up. Angry Alien, a very small LA animation house, has created a dozen parodies of famous films, all performed in 30 seconds or less by a troupe of cartoon bunnies. “Titanic” is pretty straight forward, but I had to laugh at the 30 second “Pulp Fiction.” The idea is that friends e-mail these to friends, and new ones are released the month that Starz is showing the film: http://www.angryalien.com/

MEDIAWEEK “FORD TEST DRIVES VOD” I can’t show you the application, but here’s a news article detailing Ford’s 90 day test of interactive television, the so-called “video on demand.” It’s basically like an interactive website, but with very high quality video blowing through the cable system, just like a movie channel. Cars, real estate and other big considered purchases will likely be the first to experiment successfully in ITV with cable systems. Given the extreme shortage of online automotive ad inventory, that’s just one more push for car companies and their agencies to figure out ITV as an advertising medium: http://www.mediaweek.com/mw/news/recent_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1001700129

TELEPHONICA “HELP KEEP OSCAR AWAKE” Poor Oscar stays awake all night, using his Internet connection because the rates are lower at night where he lives (in Brazil) As a result, he falls asleep at work during the day. In this advergame, you have to try to keep Oscar awake at the office, so he doesn’t lose his job. You can prop him up by clicking repeatedly on the mouse button, but do it too much and he’ll fall flat backwards. Dumb game, with universal appeal. Play-ability on a scale of 1-10 is about a 6. Check out the very cool URL they bought: http://www.zzzzzzzzz.com.br/

T:M INTERACTIVE “OMMA INTERACTIVE AGENCY OF THE YEAR” T:M Interactgive was named the Online Media Marketing Association’s “Interactive Agency of the Year” for work they’ve done with clients like American Airlines, Fossil, and Subaru. And their own site’s not to shabby, either: http://www.tm-interactive.com/tmi/

Have a great week. Thanks-RJ




January 17, 2006



Out of the box

Good morning:

STORMHEK “BLOG” Stormhek is a small Swedish wine company which grows wine in South Africa. If that’s not “out of the box” enough for you, they’ve used a corporate blog as the central piece of a marketing campaign which has doubled their sales in the past 12 months.
Here’s a 2006 prediction: Corporate blogs this year will become the “cost of entry” in many industries, the way search engine marketing was in 2005. This trend will get traction quickly with technology and other B2B companies, but soon there will be big success stories with consumer-facing corporate blogs. You don’t think Martha Stewart isn’t working on this as we speak? Any company with a personable CEO or industry expert, or a highly technical market niche can get this kind of thing going for a few thousand dollars. As we think about our clients, how many of them have “loyal enthusiast” customer bases who would love to puruse the lastest news, opinions, and links about snowmobiling, baseball, trucking, etc. etc? Drink up: http://www.stormhoek.com/

BLUDOT “WEBSITE” Bludot is a wonderful cutting-edge furniture design firm based in NE Minneapolis (and run by a couple of my neighbors.) They have created quite a stir in their business with houses built from pre-fab components, and styling furniture for offices.
Their website is something a spectacle—a lot of Flash, lots of features. It’s an agressive marketing tactic they use to get out their brand personality. They sponsor short film competitions, cooking contests, and show of sculpture and other side projects done by people in the firm. Great folks---sign up for the e-mail newsletter, which has all kinds of wacky fun things. Their site was designed by Visualde, an LA based interactive firm: http://www.bludot.com/intro_frameset.html

EMARKETER “KIDS AND TEENS: BLURRING THE LINE BETWEEN OFFLINE AND ONLINE” EMarketer has an interesting research report---which I haven’t bought, boss: $695---but the summary on its website gives the highlights. How about this: 40% of all US kids between the ages of 3-11 use the Internet every week. (I’ve got a 5 and a 10 year old, and yeah they’re on the American Girl or NeoPets Website almost every day) And for 12-17 year olds its over 70%.
Gaming is a big, big strategy that we need to do more of, for all markets, but especially when we’re trying to reach younger audiences. Below is another example of marketing gaming—for the British Heart Association. Here’s the overview of the eMarketer kids study: http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?1003750

BRITISH HEART ASSOCIATION: “OFFICE OLYMPICS” Here’s a bag of desktop games from the British Heart Association, to get you thinking about becoming more fit. They’re simple to play, and they each try to make a point about how you could be exercizing or eating better. I think this is solid straight ahead creative that makes a point in support of a client’s strategy. Unlike a lot of “informational” websites or print or brochure campaigns this one gets people interacting. We can do these kinds of games pretty easily, either with our own code, or by buying simple game software packages and putting our own creative in them: http://www.bhf.org.uk/thinkfit/officeolympics/

PS 260 “THE SHINING TRAILER” Ad Spoofs are rapidly becoming a full-blown art form on the Internet. the idea is that bored art directors and editors at agencies and production houses get together to create phony ads that are “the commercials we would make, if the client didn’t care.” PS 260, a production house in NYC, offered a bonus to the editor who came up with the funniest re-cut movie trailer. The winner, a spoof of Stanley Kubrick’s “The Shining” has been spamming around the Internet for the last month. It’s marketing of a sort—an ad for PS 260, the production house. Jib Jab, an LA animation house, made a big name for themselves in 2004 with a very funny satire of the Bush-Kerry campaign (http://www.jibjab.com/Movies/MoviePlayer_na.aspx?contentid=65&adp=1 for those who missed it) There are many more spoofs in this genre which are tasteless and at times even sick, but this one is just a hoot: http://www.ps260.com/molly/SHINING%20FINAL.mov

BONUS: GOOGLE VIDEO “RUSSIAN CLIMBING:” Google---Ruler of All They Survey---has just launched Google Video, sort of a world-wide bulletin board of video “stuff” from anyone who wants to post a video of anything. You have to look wide and long in Google Video to find truly good stuff, but every once and awhile something jumps out of the pile. Here’s one that’s making the rounds: some amped-up dude in Russia, who’s obviously a very agile gymnast, performing an astounding, goofy routine: watch him tumble, dive, climb up walls and spin off of rooftops, in what appears to be an incredible 8 minute journey over buildings, fences, cars and dogs. You gotta see this to believe it. It would make a terrific Nike commercial, for their rock climbing shoes, or whatever. Cool French techno-pop soundtrack. Hey, some things happen on the Internet just because they can, eh? Here’s “Russian Climbing:” http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=515642196227308929&q=russian

Keep climbing—RJ




January 10, 2006




Into the future!

Good morning:

Welcome back, and welcome to a new year. Here’s this week’s “High Five” from the digital frontier, with an extra TV bonus at the end:

“PANDORA” Apple’s iPod may be the future of music, but a new web service called Pandora could beat iTunes as the future of Music eCommerce. Go to the Pandora website, fill in the name of your favorite musical artist, and Pandora will create a virtual “radio station” for you playing music that people who love that artist would probably like as well.

You can sign up for a subscription at $36 a year, or you can listen to an advertising supported version which is rolling out over the next few months. There’s a dynamic Amazon.com ad playing with four different CDs advertised at any one time, rotating as the music changes. Click on the title of a song and you can either buy the album at Amazon or the song or album at iTunes!

And, and, you can make more than one station—one for your quiet times, one when you’re a slave to rock n’ roll. And, and, you can e-mail your favorite station to your friend to try. How many ways is this too cool? It’s “mass customization,” it’s advertising supported, it’s interacting based on personal preferences, it’s viral, it organizes the massively dis-organized wild west of popular music! Be the first one to talk about what everyone will be talking about in six months: http://www.pandora.com/

MAGAZINE PUBLISHERS OF AMERICA “READ ON” Pretty cool website for the MPA to convince people that magazines, unlike newspapers will not go the way of the dinosaur in the future. The home page is a picture of a woman lounging in a bathtub some time in the distant future. A half dozen hot spots feature the (imaginary) products she’s surrounded by, including the good old magazine. Drill into the site and you’ll find “magazine covers of the future,” thirty or so satirical takes on future editions of Playboy, The Economist, Seventeen. (sample cover story, from the future Smithsonian magazine: “The Beaches of Antartica!”) This site is supported by a media campaign, including a lot of (presumably free) online media on magazine Websites. http://www.magazine.org/readon/

MORTIERBRIGADE “COMPANY WEBSITE” Mortierbrigade is an integrated agency in Belgium, and this is their website. It’s got the typical “edgy” post-modernist thang going, but click on “work” and play around with how they show off their portfolio. Then click into one of the clients and look at how they have integrated text and animations to tell their story. Good ideas: http://www.mortierbrigade.com/

RUMOR HAS IT “RUMORMAKER” Jennifer Aniston and Kevin Costner star in a new movie called “RUMOR Has It.” Here’s a fun “Rumormaker” website where you can create your own scandalous RUMOR, including an “article composer,” then mail the resulting front page of “The Inquirer” to a friend. This kind of idea doesn’t cost a lot to develop and execute---the article composer is just a bunch of pull down menus, and in the background there’s an e-mail application. It’s more about the clever idea: http://www.rumormaker.com

FEDEX “EVEN AN MBA CAN DO IT” This viral site is ending up on a lot of “Best of 2005” lists, though to me it’s not particularly viral. A truly viral e-mail has more than funny, or even very funny. There’s got to be something subversive or absurd in a truly great viral e-mail, like subservient chickens or people falling out of buildings. As more mainstream brands move into the “viral” channel these days, the humor gets a little less edgy and the “viral” quality loses some of its infectious delight: http://www.relaxiwillmanage.com/

TV BONUS: This year’s showing of the “Best of British Advertising 2005” at the Walker Art Center didn’t disappoint, as usual. 90 minutes of very wry, dry, sly and fly creative. The grand prize winner this year was a goofy Peter Max-like animation for Honda, featuring hybrid car engines floating over a psychedelic countryside, while our very own Garrison Keillor (uff-dah!) warbled a tune called “I Love to Hate.” Yeah, well, I guess you had to be there. Here’s my favorite commercial, a funny, sexy etude about a young man and woman waking up in bed---it was created by Bartle Bogle Hegarty / London. (technical note: you may need to use the Foxfire or Netscape browser to get the link to work) Sexy commercial

Hey, thanks to Annalee Ulsrud for the Pandora introduction....Enjoy 2006! --RJ




December 28, 2005



The Best of 2005 in Interactive

Good morning & Happy New Year:

And welcome to the best interactive marketing of 2005.

2005 was a great, ground-breaking year for interactive. Broadband to the home broke the 65% barrier in the US this year. In upper income households it’s over 75%, and in the office it’s 80%. That big, fat pipe means lots of rich media and applications. People who have broadband average more than 15 hours a week online, and are three times more likely to shop online, according to Neilsen.

This year online media became a $16 billion business, double its size just three years ago—and that figure doesn’t count money spent on Websites. And creative executions finally began to deliver in the syntax and grammer of the interactive Internet itself—not just re-purposed television commercials and marcomm brochures.

In 2006 the change will accelerate. Online media buys will break $20 billion. Some segments, like automobiles and youth brands will agressively shift dollars from traditional channels to online. And this election year in the US may drive online marketing to new frontiers as both parties spend like drunken gold prospectors trying to get an edge with blogs, podcasts, search engine marketing and streaming video commercials.

So, flush with holiday cheer, we’re happy to deliver five more presents to you this morning, our “Best of 2005” in interactive media:

1. APPLE “VIDEO IPOD” Apple is moving so fast that they obsoleted their top selling iPod models after just 18 months! This iPod is the tip of a very fast, sharp arrow: the breakdown of broadcasting video. Within a few weeks of this product being released six major networks announced they would make TV shows and other video content available for sale by the show on iTunes: iPod Video

2. IKEA “DROMKOK ET ALLA” This wacky, wonderful Ikea marketing website is in Swedish, but it speaks the international language of creativity. Not only did they find a near perfect use for “frozen moment” 3-D photography, but they did it with wit and elan. One technical insight worth noting: the site went through ten revisions during its first month, as the programmers kept monkeying with the images and software, trying to get the loading time down. They got the over-all size of the site down from more than 10 megabytes to 4mb. And please note the beautiful, elegant 30 second “pre-load” animation, which begins the show with lovely, lightweight graphics and sound, while the big color images are frantically loading in the background. Skol: Dromkok Et Alla

3. VOLVO “LIFE ON BOARD” Britain remains a hotbed of great interactive creative. In this campaign, Volvo UK sent a half dozen filmmakers out around the world to film conversations going on while people drove in the new Volvo V50 wagon. Isn’t the car where many of the important and interesting conversations of your life have occured?

This link launches the “Life On Board” site, which, after an introduction, eventually comes to rest on a screen where you can click to see my favorite of the six films, (click on “See V50 movie”) ---a wonderfully personal montage of conversations by filmmaker Navin Rawanchaikul with people in Hong Kong, talking about “what will come next in my life?” Life On Board

4. VAYAGO “ELEVATOR” Vayago sells travel and vacation insurance in Europe. Maybe I’m alone here, but I just loved this viral e-mail video: five guys get on an elevator, as seen through the lens of a security camera. The punchline is a killer. Why this is great: 1. This piece has the absurd, sick humour that gets a viral e-mail passed along 2. It’s quick and to the point 3. Right up to the end, I believed it was real: (and keep an eye on the counter in the lower right hand corner) Vayago Viral

5. DOVE “CAMPAIGN FOR REAL BEAUTY” The triumph of the year. This ground breaking, integrated marketing campaign used a strong, well-thought out website as the centerpiece. It features a half dozen women who exemplify what Dove says is “real beauty,” the way women really are in this world---rather than the enemic, airbrushed Kate Moss esthetic of women that gets shoved in our faces every day by advertising.

What makes this a campaign worth remembering isn’t just the sexual politics, but that it’s one of the first examples of a consumer-facing company taking a social stand (for something other than a feel-good charity) and saying that this is where our brand will live. It’s risky, because Dove is a beauty product in a market where so-called perfectly beautiful people (women) are what your competition will be using to steal share from you.

A couple of points to notice: the website continues to publish new content every day—its an online magazine now. Plus a fair share of the content is coming from the audience. This is one of the models for 2006 of how a great integrated marketing campaign can work: Campaign for Real Beauty


Have a terrific interactive 2006!
Thanks-RJ