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Opinion
No - advertising has not beaten culture jamming at its own game
In this guest post, an activist argues why advertising has not subverted culture jamming - and why Australia would be a better place without ‘visual pollution’At a photography exhibition now on the Sydney Museum last week, a question was put to a panel of experts. Would our cities be better without any advertising. The answer was a resounding “yes”.
This didn’t really come as much of a surprise. After all, the panel were culture jammers – activists who subvert mainstream media, altering the message of an ad to tell a story of their own.
Think popular, not premium: Why the Henry & Aaron 'It's a snap' video went viral
In this guest posting, YouTube’s Karen Stocks says why she thinks CIT’s gory-funny ‘It’s a snap’ ad was a hit.One of this week’s viral hits on YouTube is a science fiction-themed ad for the Central Institute of Technology in Perth. The skit-style video commercial features CIT grads-turned-YouTube stars Henry & Aaron, who magically jump from one CIT department to the next with a snap of Aaron’s fingers. The comedy takes a distinctly darker turn when Aaron’s teleporting skills start going horribly wrong – with gruesome results.
The video holds a couple of lessons for marketers.
Mumbrella360 - call for curated sessions
I must confess that I didn’t enjoy Mumbrella360 last year.
Having staked our credibility and indeed (although I didn’t like to think about it at the time) the company, on Mumbrella360 being a success, the main thing I actually experienced over the two days was a growing sense of relief that it wasn’t shit.
The Woolworths virtual store is not the future of retail. But it is a good PR stunt
So last night I dropped by my local neighbourhood Virtual Woolworths.It’s located at Sydney Town Hall station – conveniently enough, almost directly underneath my local neighborhood Real Woolworths.
As you’ll see from the wobbly iPhone video I shot, it was a relatively lonely experience. But it was Sunday night.
How not to use Twitter: lessons from Qantas and Westpac
The likes of Qantas have a long way to go before getting to grips with social media, argues Axel Bruns.For major brands, the road to social media infamy is paved with what seemed like good ideas at the time.
Just this week, Qantas succeeded in having Twitter suspend the well-known spoof account, @QantasPR, claiming users would mistake it for the real thing.
Is Big W the beginning of the bounceback for Saatchis?
Google may prove me wrong, but in the entire time Mumbrella has existed, and very possibly for my entire editorship of B&T before that, I can’t remember ever writing the headline “Saatchi & Saatchi wins…”
So today’s appointment by Big W is a big deal.
Traditional agencies are driving away their digital superstars with their old ways
In this guest post, Daniel Monheit argues that Australia’s creative agencies will never be able to hang on to digital talentIn 2010 Steve Jobs was invited by James Murdoch to speak at the annual News Corp management retreat. Jobs issued a blunt, critical assessment of what newspapers were trying to do in technology: “You’re going to find it hard to get things right, because you’re in New York and anyone who’s any good at tech works in Silicon Valley”.
And that’s when it hit me. The reason why Australia’s best traditional agencies, working with the most prolific clients and the biggest budgets cant manage to put out anything remotely passable as decent digital work.
Anyone who’s any good at digital works at an agency that actually believes in it.
What does Fairfax's Media's data dump actually mean? And what's going on at ACP Magazines?
Although I rather like stats, there are a few days a year where they become a little overwhelming.
Radio ratings releases offer eight such days annually. Over the space of a couple of hours, the data drops for the five main metro markets. Generally the phone starts ringing within 10 minutes, from station bosses aiming to give their interpretation of those numbers. It becomes a game of keeping them on the line long enough to sift through the data to try to discover the real story you need to ask them about. Within minutes a blizzard of press releases follow too.
In truth, the press releases mostly get ignored in the race to write the story. Then they’re mostly ignored because the story is already written.
And twice a year, a similar exercise surrounds the release of the monthly magazine sales figures,
When the powerful buy into the media, can the media still scrutinise the powerful?
Economist Richard Denniss of Australian National University argues in a post that first appeared on The Conversation that the public needs to decide if it cares who owns the media.The mining industry is used to having its voice heard in Australian public debates, so it should come as no surprise that mining billionaires such as Gina Rinehart and Clive Palmer would consider buying up a bigger slice of the Australian media.
While the estimated $20m spent by the mining industry on television advertisements opposing the introduction of a mining tax was the most visible example of the industry’s determination to influence the public it is, in fact, just the tip of the iceberg.
The keyboard warrior of Twitter
In this guest post, NBN staffer Scott Rhodie writes an unofficial, personal view on his experience with a hostile Twitter critic.Last night I had a strange incident. While on Twitter I noticed someone saying that Australia’s NBN is already outdated. I wrote a small note back explaining they were incorrect.
And their response? The lovely gentleman (whose Twitter profile says: ‘Father of 5 kids, Loving Grandfather of 10 Grandchildren,and 2 Great Granddaughters. love to give heaps to Pollies and Poofters’) said to me: “Go and lick Gillards C*** out U commie Prick”
What's in a name?
In this guest post, Moensie Rossier wonders about the power of names for brands and marketers.
Brands have been having a bit of fun with names lately, not to mention a fair bit of success. Interbrand just named a headhunting firm Cloak & Dagger. And ‘Share a Coke’ showed how much power there is in a name.
The Coke campaign effectively short-circuited the usual mechanics of communication. It undoubtedly stroked people’s egos. But, I believe, its success stems from the fact that it directly and automatically affected people’s behaviour, rather than doing so indirectly by shaping attitudes.
Best ads from Super Bowl 2012
The Super Bowl is all done and a team from North America won. But as well as some sort of sporting event, it’s the world’s biggest advertising showcase. See the best of them right here… and please tell us what you think.
How to debunk media myths
In this post, UWS’s Ullrich Ecker, John Cook and Stephen Lewandowsky argue that cognitive science can help PRs form strategies in managing media misreporting.
A growing cohort of commentators has bemoaned the descent of contemporary political “debate” into a largely fact-free zone.
How about simply focusing on what consumers want?
In this guest post, Peter Mountford argues that brands should think more about what is really going on for consumers
Who here is hoping their favourite brand of toilet paper is going to be organizing a flash mob on their way home from work today?
What the Optus web copyright victory means
In this analysis first published on The Conversation, RMIT’s Marita Shelly examines the implications of Telstra’s defeat over the online rights to the AFL broadcast deal
This week’s Federal Court ruling that Optus customers are able to view sporting matches minutes after they are streamed live without breaching copyright is a landmark decision that alters our understanding of copyright law, and has significant implications for the AFL’s broadcasting rights deal.
NAB Break Up campaign ‘undermined’ by rate cuts
Bankwest has launched a tactical press campaign that attacks the rate cuts of rival NAB, the bank behind the award-winning Break Up campaign.
The campaign – created by Host – launches as newspapers including The Sydney Morning Herald rounded on NAB for holding back on rate cuts, a move the Herald wrote “appears to undermine NAB’s multimillion-dollar advertising campaign in which the bank declared it had ‘broken up’ with the other major banks”.
The Bankwest ad uses the headline from the SMH story, ‘NAB cuts rates less than RBA, rivals’.
Today, an article in The Daily Telegraph stated that: “Having cast itself as the ‘more give, less take’ bank, NAB chose to take more and give less this week by keeping five basis points of the 25-basis-point Reserve Bank reduction – in contrast to ANZ, Commonwealth and Westpac, which all passed on the full rate cut.”
NAB Break Up, created by Clemenger BBDO Melbourne, is arguably Australia’s most successful campaign of the year, having won awards such as the PR grand prix at Cannes and two grand prix at Spikes Asia.
NAB CMO Sandra de Castro, who engineered the campaign, had not returned Mumbrella’s calls at press time for comment.
November 4th, 2011 at 12:51 pm
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Comments
4 Nov 11
2:17 pm
Well who is surprised that NAB can’t walk the talk? Really, this whole Break-up campaign was a concocted (albeit well-executed) bit of fluff from the beginning, and while it might be considered “the most successful campaign of the year”, well that’s within the industry.
John and Joan Public are just living their lives and noticing that NAB are a bunch of tools like all the others big banks – no wait, NAB are worse because they passed on less of the rate cut than the other tools. And the rub is that NAB are saying they are not like the others and they offer “more give, less take”. NAB are setting themselves up for a kicking after pushing this break-up message, and the media will be all over it when they don’t deliver what they promise.
Remember the old quote “nothing kills a bad product faster than good advertising”.
4 Nov 11
2:19 pm
I didn’t like those NAB ads from day 1 because as a consumer used to the ways of the big 4 banks, the ads had ZERO credibility. Talk is cheap, and saying “We’re breaking up with the other banks” is meaningless until they prove it over the long term. Once again, actions speak louder than words, and they’ve just cancelled out their own campaign with their greed.
4 Nov 11
2:29 pm
errr, I’m not exactly a fan of the big banks but isn’t NAB’s rate cheaper than the others today?
4 Nov 11
2:46 pm
Yeah – if you saw the twitter spat about rates between netbank and nab, NAB’s is still cheaper. Fair play to the other ad agencies having a crack at it though.
4 Nov 11
3:11 pm
NAB’s rate was cheapest out the of big four before the RBA cut and I think still is – what’s the problem here?
4 Nov 11
3:23 pm
Facts facts facts – when has advertising ever been interested in facts?
4 Nov 11
3:56 pm
Break up, take half. Seems about right.
4 Nov 11
4:05 pm
@jibberjabber the problem for NAB is they’ve lost control of the big four bank debate and their campaign is being used against them. they should have got on the front foot when they decided to keep some of the RBA rate cut
4 Nov 11
4:17 pm
that NAB’s variable home loan rate is cheaper is completely irrelevant – this message was subsumed by (entirely predictable) reams of bad press highlighting their hypocrisy in giving less and taking more.
As suspected by some when ‘break-up’ was launched, in most consumers minds, whether rightly or wrongly, NAB has now unequivocally proven that they are no different to to the other big banks
while most customers never believed they were different in the first place, any who did will trust NAB even less than its competitors
the ‘break up campaign’ has been a great example of 2 things:
1. the folly of pursuing a short term tactic that never fitted fit with longer term credible positioning for the business
t2. yhat even industry insiders can be fooled by a good PR for an advertising/communications campaign. More time has been spent promoting this campaign in trade publications than was spent on its creation, it seems.
4 Nov 11
4:25 pm
I agree with Rob, The BAB ‘Break Up’ campaign was nothing more than well executed transparent rubbish! If the big banks are looking for unique and compelling ways to reach into the hearts and minds and dare I say, the wallets of everyday Australians then all they need do is spend their marketing budgets wisely on providing useful, engaging tools for their target audience rather than blowing mountains of dough on FTA TV BS messaging. A good example of how to do this is the AIMIA award winning iphone app ‘Property Guide’ produced by The White Agency for ComBank.
Spare us the BS banks and get on with helping us, the consumers, make well informed decisions about borrowing and investing – thats all we ask and it IS that simple!
4 Nov 11
4:25 pm
ps..this is another example of why marketing should at least have dotted line reporting into PR. The Head of Corporate Affairs would only have approved if the bank’s future behaviour was going to be exemplary – which is of course impossible. The blanket press coverage has completely undone any good from the advertising and will turn it into a net negative for NAB.
It’s harder to imagine a larger FAIL – although Qantas’ recent advertising comes to mind
these companies must have money to burn…..
4 Nov 11
4:51 pm
All that great work brand thrown away in one corporate decision! Lets hope NAB and its agency realise that none of it can be saved. The public have moved on. And NAB aren’t back where they started before the campaign. No-siree, they’re now the one of the big 4 that tried to bullshit us that they were one of us. OK they’re still the cheapest rate, but they’re about to discover how deep the twin sins of not passing on an interest rate cut, and, pretending to be someone you’re not, cut in the Australian psyche.
4 Nov 11
6:50 pm
There were plenty of naysayers when Break Up launched.
Fast forward six months from now and I reckon the NAB will still be streaks ahead of the competition. One swallow does not a summer make.
4 Nov 11
7:33 pm
Is Bankwest really a ‘rival’ of NAB?
Or put another way, do you think NAB is losing much sleep over this ‘tactical press campaign’ which seems to comprise of one execution so far – so isn’t really much of a ‘campaign’?
5 Nov 11
5:26 pm
This ad seems completely out of sync with the style of advertising that BankWest usually undertakes.
I also think it’s convenient that Comm Bank’s rate doesn’t appear in the BankWest ad… cause… you know… Comm Bank owns BankWest and all.
Seems to me to be a bit of an attack by Comm Bank under the guise of their friendly WA based subsidiary. Of course, I could be completely wrong…
6 Nov 11
8:47 am
Brendon – having worked for 3 of the big 4 (and several of the “second tier”), I can say with some authority that the big banks are operationally very separate to their subsidiaries.
While they certainly don’t “attack” their own, they also don’t advertise under the others’ brand. The comm bank team would MUCH rather land a customer than for Bankwest to have them.