New digital agency Nucleus: We don’t buy the social media bullshit
A new strategy-only digital agency will launch in Melbourne this week claiming one of its jobs will be “breaking down the bullshit barrier with social media”.
Nucleus Digital Strategy has been founded by MD Anthony Baker, who most recently was GM at Melbourne digital agency Immersive, and director of strategy Chris Fiteni, previously an account director at Clemenger BBDO Melbourne.
The agency officially launches on Friday “providing nothing more than candid strategic advice”.
Baker said that he sees both clients and brands as potential clients. He said: “At the moment we’re helping Telstra, mainly by playing around with public policy stuff.”
He said that social media would be a small part of what the agency did. He said: “There’s a fair bit of breaking down the bullshit barrier with social media. There’s too much bullshit about social media. Not much of it is commercial anyway – it’s a very small portion of the marketing mix.”
He added: “We dont want to do execution at all. There are enough agencies around doing that and they are becoming commoditised.”
November 9th, 2009 at 12:06 pm
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Comments
9 Nov 09
12:12 pm
I see their position of avoiding execution extends to their brand design as well.
9 Nov 09
12:17 pm
+1
9 Nov 09
12:19 pm
fair enough, but all i can think of right now is of their sad bastardisation of helvetica…
9 Nov 09
12:25 pm
tweebs – and also to their Web site: http://www.nucleusdigitalstrategy.com – but no doubt there is an awesome strategy behind the lack of one
9 Nov 09
12:38 pm
I can see clients lining up for “candid strategic advice”. They must be sick of getting the “serious” or “professional” kind. Oh yes, I can imagine lots of clients wanting them to “play around” on their business. FFS.
9 Nov 09
1:14 pm
Oh wow. Their logo is appalling. Reminds me of those password fields that ask you to input some random text to avoid being spammed by web bots.
9 Nov 09
1:25 pm
Funny stuff guys .. especially comment one.
9 Nov 09
1:31 pm
And you have to trademark something before whacking a TM on it (in the right place as well)..
Immersive? Never heard of them, and Google hasn’t either.
9 Nov 09
1:40 pm
This sounds suspiciously like a provocative statement to get some press.
a. What serious digital agency (strategic advice only or full service) would NOT include social media in their suite of solutions.
b. What serious client would even talk to a digital agency that publicly ridicules social media.
#newagencylaunchfail
9 Nov 09
1:47 pm
Now we know what Lynton from The Apprentice is getting up to.
9 Nov 09
1:59 pm
Wow- this bit of PR backfired for them didnt it.
9 Nov 09
2:03 pm
Also- Pink Bear- its the number 1 result- what are you on about?
Google Search FAIL
http://www.google.com.au/searc.....=firefox-a
9 Nov 09
2:22 pm
Great to see they are visually backing up their brand promise – their logo is as bland as their strategies promise to be!
9 Nov 09
2:23 pm
In fairness it’s a couple of juicy soundbytes in a very short interview. Not sure if it’s fair to judge the outfit from that. The people in question obviously have some credentials to have held those roles.
And I think it’s a fair call to say that it’s important to “break down the bullshit barrier” around social media’s integration into marketing campaigns. It can be done well and it can be done badly. And it should be done with a measurable ROI objective at the end of it. Not just because it’s the new black.
9 Nov 09
2:23 pm
Is it possible that they’re just taking the piss?
9 Nov 09
2:23 pm
I thought they might have come up in this search:
http://www.google.com.au/searc.....=f&oq=
I should have kept it simple. My bad. I thought Immersive would have been too common a word to bother with.
9 Nov 09
2:55 pm
Oooh, i just got off on all those big words; nucleus, bullshit, candid strategic advice, public policy and aaahhh, commoditised! Sign me up, I want to be immersed, whoops immersive, no? Immolate, no? Emulate? Okay, fuck it then, just have my nucleic washed, digitised and vomitized, I mean strangelised, no, whatever… tweet, twit, twat!
9 Nov 09
3:11 pm
most strategy is bullshit
9 Nov 09
4:12 pm
Wow! Marketing FAIL!
That logo! My God, keep your 4 yr old off the computer!
Well, some good points addressed badly! Good luck!
9 Nov 09
4:59 pm
I think you might be on to something, perhaps not entirely – but to some extent.
9 Nov 09
6:06 pm
The logo makes me feel sick
9 Nov 09
8:15 pm
Fiteni never worked at Clems – what a fake.
9 Nov 09
8:50 pm
Perhaps check his LinkedIn – Clemenger Group
9 Nov 09
8:53 pm
Lets see what they come up with – they might be onto something
@Davy Adams – good call of the situation
10 Nov 09
3:30 am
There is definitely room (and a screaming need) for an agency that focuses on strategy and moves away from a tactical approach based on individual disciplines. Its one of the prime reasons why I created interactive Mix, and he is right that production is being commoditised, especially at the low end, but rather than focussing on ‘the ‘bullshit’ of a media type, surely the focus should be providing a joined up digital marketing strategy. Clients have had enough of being presented with technology and are now looking for people who focus on providing solutions that will give a clear ROI.
10 Nov 09
3:59 am
If Nucleus was around the 1890’s they would have said “the telephone is bullshit.”
10 Nov 09
8:31 am
@ Evil Banker, To be fair, I don’t think they said that social media is “bullshit”, just that much of what masquerades as strategy is bs. Surely that’s true! @ Tim Nicholas if you read the article you’ll see that they *don’t* say they won’t include social media in their strategies, just that it isn’t the main game. Reasonable comment, wouldn’t you say?
10 Nov 09
9:21 am
As a client the amount of times I’ve been sold the social media line – make some cool widget, game, app, video so people can share it on ’social media’ – is as remarkable as it is lame. Social media is primarily for people to interact with each other, not with brands, branding, or our ‘cool’ shit. The tiny percentage of stuff that cuts through is as brilliant creatively as it is strategically, and we all know that combination is rare. Taking the easy ’social media’ option off the table, or even reducing it as a core focus may actually stimulate some solid thinking around innovative digital strategy.
10 Nov 09
3:44 pm
their actual release is here, its a bit more illuminating than just the grabs here. probably answers some of the things raised…http://www.nucleusdigitalstrategy.com/pdf/nucleus_mediarelease091109.pdf
10 Nov 09
6:45 pm
How cute. Execution is a commodity.
God knows we wouldnt want to commoditise marketing and advertising.
That would be truly awful.
Imagine being able to measure and trade marketing assets versus the nonsense that exists now of claim and counter claim about superior strategy.
Motherhood motherhood motherhood motherhood. Grow up you children.
11 Nov 09
1:29 pm
“There’s a fair bit of breaking down the bullshit barrier with social media. There’s too much bullshit about social media. Not much of it is commercial anyway – it’s a very small portion of the marketing mix.”
What about the bs in traditional media?
- Telling people that millions watched Idol based on a tiny selection of ‘active TV users’ having boxes on their TV’s with channel 10 switched on but were out doing the gardening and did not watch a thing is surely not true clarity to an advertiser?
BS in all media needs to be addressed as online becomes more and more accountable and independent tools like say Analytics from Google allows us to know exactly how many people visit a website etc traditional has a lot to do here although online also needs to be transparent too…
It would be good to have an agency to focus on cutting out the bs in media(.)
Good luck with the launch Nucleus.
12 Nov 09
9:43 am
Not taking social media seriously, oh dear that sounds like advertising agencies several years ago regarding digital! Big mistake boys, I think you need to read some more case studies maybe from overseas on successful marketing using social media.
“We don’t buy the social media bullshit” kamikaze statement!
13 Nov 09
2:23 pm
This is rediculous, I am sorry but there is a time to be ‘Candid’ but attracting new business by cuuting through the ‘bullshit’, hmm I say you are full of Sh*t yourselves.
Anyone who discounts the value of social media is clearly, look at Facebooks penetration and expected growth, there is no other single entity ont he planet that should be as respected.
16 Nov 09
11:01 am
Ha ha, this must be a piss take as nobody would let the drunken spider that fell in the ink pot crawl across PhotoShop to produce such a crap logo and also crap fonts!!!
If this is serious then I’m sure the big clients would want to endorse and align with black and white imagery with no imagination………..
I know there is a gen A on the way and for a 2 year old the logo isn’t too bad