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Opinion | Features
Why is advertising so much better in New Zealand than Australia?
Ok, so this isn’t a new observation.
But it really hit home after I watched some TV ads for a kiwi supermarket yesterday that advertising in New Zealand is so much better than much of the crap that is being served up in this country at the moment.
Why is it that Colenso BBDO Auckland can turn something as bland as a supermarket chain into a brand I almost like, while Australian agencies succeed only in either irritating me (Coles) or passing me by unnoticed (Woolies) because the ads are so average?
My memo to your boss
So let me guess?
You really want to come to Mumbrella360, but you’ve got to justify the time and cost to your boss?
Good news! I think I can help.
Woz not great
In this guest post Tony Prysten argues that the thousand dollar price of seeing out-of-touch Apple co-founder Steve Wozniack on his Australian tour was a waste of money.
This week, for the cost of two iPads (yep, two) I went to the Woz Live conference in Melbourne. I was not impressed.
What the hell is transmedia?
From advertising campaigns to online video series, the term ‘transmedia’ gets quite the work out. But what does it actually mean? Cathie McGinn trawls the media landscape for a definitive definition.
Transmedia, all media and multiplatform are terms often used interchangeably when referencing modern storytelling techniques. Yet, depending who you speak to, there are distinct differences between them.
According to industry experts Encore spoke to, the key elements that define transmedia can be summarised as follows: platform, time, audience, adaptation, and creative collaboration.
Innovation is the remedy for the ailing magazine industry
With magazine circulations plummeting, FHM closing and rumours rife on future ownership of ACP Magazines, Paul Merrill says the only way forward is launching new titles.Eight years ago in the UK, nearly a quarter of all magazine sales came from magazines that were less than four years old. In Australia, the figure was slightly lower, but still significant. Today, the situation is very different. For a start there are so few new magazines. Yes, Masterchef briefly flared, and Top Gear made an initial impact. But Grazia and Alpha fizzled, and now ACP has shelved their plans to launch Elle.
More than a game: broadcasting the Olympics
The 2012 London Olympics will be the biggest televised sporting event of our time. Brooke Hemphill discovers the logistical challenges and technical requirements of producing the event.
From July 27 to August 12, the Australian media will go sport crazy as the Games of the XXX Olympiad, aka the 2012 London Summer Olympics, unfold. The games will be the most televised sporting event of our time as broadcasters look to master every manner of technology at their disposal.
The Voice - Australia's best example yet of social TV
In this guest post, Sputnik’s Rodd Messent has a theory on why audiences have taken to The Voice .I am an addict of Channel Nine’s hit show The Voice. Such is the extent of my addiction I seriously think my housemate might kick me out of our apartment for the semi-frenzied yelling and tweeting that ensues in our lounge room each time the show airs.It’s the first time in almost three years that such disagreement has resulted in less than civil behaviour towards one another, and it’s made me think it might be a microcosm of the large volume of online debate about the show and, correspondingly, an explanation for its success as a social TV experience.Why brands are the US Army - and culture jammers are the Viet Cong
In this guest posting, Dave Burgess, who painted ‘No War’ on the Sydney Opera House, claims that ‘amoral’ advertisers have copied his idea.
Culture jamming is a 28-year-old term coined by the San Francisco-based band Negativland, who declared that the ‘Studio for the cultural jammer is the world at large’.
Branded content is dead. Long live branded content
In this guest posting, Anthony Freedman argues why branded content is making a comeback.
A few short years ago, probably concurrent with the advent of the PVR, a new term emerged within the marketing communications industry; branded content. This was really synonymous with advertiser funded TV shows where programming was created by brands and deals struck with networks to broadcast them.
There were varying degrees of success with this model.
Shock advertising: 30 ads that would give Australia's ad watchdog a coronary
Is shock an underused weapon in Australian advertising, asks Robin HicksToday, Sydney agency The Cabana Boys used an image of a mouth sewn together to shock people with the idea that problem gamblers lie to conceal their habit. Is it the most disturbing image ever? No. Will it get banned by the Advertising Standards Bureau? No. But it did make me wonder why shock is not used more often in Australia – and not just by charities and government bodies. (WARNING: NSFW)
The making of ratings blockbuster The Voice
Jason Mountney goes on the set of Channel Nine’s talent search series, The Voice, to see how the format, based on an international franchise, has come together. What ingredients have gone into making this certified hit that’s rated more than two million viewers on three consecutive nights?
Mike Goldman has one of the toughest jobs on the set of the Nine network’s new talent show, The Voice. He not only has to narrate the show, but also keep the audience from losing their enthusiasm as they realise shooting TV programs takes a lot longer than the one-hour bursts they see in their lounge rooms. A lot longer.
Nine problems stopping The Global Mail from getting an audience
While it’s a shame The Global Mail has failed to make an impact on the media landscape, the signs have been there for some time.I love the concept of a well resourced, philanthropically-funded independent news site. Anywhere in the world, that’s a rare and wonderful thing. In Australia even more so. So I hope that Grame Wood gets to see his investment make a difference.
And I have no inside info on whether Monica Attard’s sudden departure is linked to the site’s failure to find an audience so far.
Regardless, here are nine areas they can easily start to address:
Journalism’s new model?
Does the launch of philanthropically funded news site The Global Mail signal a new era for journalism or is the model destined to be a passing fad, asks Cathie McGinn in this article first published in Encore magazine.With little fanfare, philanthropically funded news site The Global Mail launched in February this year.
The online-only title received a generous five-year funding commitment from businessman Graeme Wood, founder of accommodation website wotif.com, who donated $15million.
Five things that make a great suit
In this guest posting, Gareth Collins argues that the role of a great account manager is to make the work betterI’m surprised at how many suits I meet who don’t know their role in the advertising business. The question ‘what does an advertising account manager or director do?’ is frequently met with answers such as project manager, relationship manager, plate spinner or go between … and those are the nice ones.
Success is judged on the ability to manage a process, be strong administratively and get stuff done. And while a good suit needs to do all of these things brilliantly, if these are the traits that define a great suit, then I’m in the wrong job.
What the hell is transmedia?
From advertising campaigns to online video series, the term ‘transmedia’ gets quite the work out. But what does it actually mean? Cathie McGinn trawls the media landscape for a definitive definition.
Transmedia, all media and multiplatform are terms often used interchangeably when referencing modern storytelling techniques. Yet, depending who you speak to, there are distinct differences between them.
Seven axes Leckie’s ‘shit show’ Cougar Town
Seven boss David Leckie’s hubristic comments about the network’s ability to turn any show into a hit have ended with the embarrassing decision to axe Cougar Town before the end of its run.
Back in February, Leckie gave an interview to promote Matthew Johns’ new NRL show and told The Sunday Telegraph:
“OK, the Cougar Town, it’s a shit show but we promote it and we get nearly 1.4 million watching it. If we can promote Cougar Town, we can promote Matthew Johns. We’re going to promote the shit out of this fucking show.”
Recent weeks saw Cougar Town – which features Courteney Cox as a divorcee returning to the dating scene – slip from 708,000 a fortnight ago to a new low of 626,000 last week.
TV Tonight reports that Cougar Town, and How I Het Your Mother will be replaced on Thursdays by Criminal Minds, which Seven also runs on Wednesdays.
April 28th, 2010 at 10:47 am
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Comments
28 Apr 10
10:55 am
You mean people don’t want to watch a 40 something play out her insecurities?? It should have been a reality TV show THEN it would have captured eyeballs.
29 Apr 10
11:35 am
There are other things I’d rather watch a 40somerthing Courtney Cox play with than her insecurities… and THAT would certainly boost the ratings back up!
29 Apr 10
1:51 pm
The shower is just terrible. I barely made it through the first episode and definitely did not watch any subsequent ones.
29 Apr 10
2:26 pm
Annoyed that they are taking off the new eps of How I Met Your Mother because it ran after Cougar Town…it was rating well until they move it to a later time slot because of the “shit show” that was before it.
29 Apr 10
2:26 pm
Wish Ten would axe MasterChef
29 Apr 10
3:58 pm
It is going to be a very exciting ratings 2010. Master Chef is just holding up 10. Nine is truly back as a contender. And seven are dependent on feeding the Desp Housewife Audience to make in roads back into the ratings. It’s going to be a close race.
29 Apr 10
9:30 pm
Cougar Town is hilarious! I understand it doesn’t appeal to males (like the Matty John’s show… what a joke!) but the decision to cancel was a ‘shit’ decision by Leckie. Hugely disappionting. I think we have done the crime and medical shows to death so do they really need to be continuously repeated! I won’t be watching Ch7 on Thursday nights again.
29 Apr 10
9:43 pm
Very unhappy. This was a great show. Leckie is clueless. Axe him and bring in a channel 7 leader that knows what they are doing.
30 Apr 10
11:57 am
I wish I had one of those set top ratings boxes so I didnt have to put up with all the master chefs and Australias got talent crap. I swear there is a television consiracy against shows that I like!
I LOVED Cougar town and How I met your Mother, they better at least start showing them on 7two!!
30 Apr 10
4:48 pm
Typical, typical typical, another show finds a hard core following of 600,000 and it’s dumped. It may not be doing the big numbers, but it was still delivering a good audience.
At least Nine have finally realised that GO is more than capable of delivering an audience for programmes that deliver these smaller but loyal audiences. Hopefully 7Two will follow suit.
All I know is, thank god for the ABC, SBS and the launch of GO, as the core FTA channels continue to churn out more homogenous rubbish that appeals to the broadest audience.
30 Apr 10
11:28 pm
What we need is more cop shows, medical shows and reality tv shows.
More talent shows with very talented judges: like Kyle Sandilands and Danni Minogue.
In fact, that leads me to a point.
If Australia’s highest rating talent show is judged by Kyle Sandilands and Danni Minogue, what the fuck does that say about our country?
1 May 10
11:17 pm
Cougar Town never had 708,000 viewers.
Raw data showed that it actually was on in only 74 of the 1100 homes which have Oztam ratings boxes
If 3 people in each of those 74 metered homes were watching Cougar Town, then the total guaranteed audience was 222 people. Extrapolated data is unreliable and guesswork at best.
Oztam, Neilsen and McNair Anderson always admitted that the methodology and sampling variance affected numbers and when questioned directly admitted that (following from B&T) “no one really knows how many people are actually watching anything. We can only take a guess”.
Coles and McDonalds have what is known as “ASR” Accurate Statistical Reporting.
McDonalds ASR shows how many Cheeseburgers (for example) were sold across all stores in Australia during the previous 24 hours. It is accurate because money was paid for each item. Each cheeseburger was registered. The category total for that item for the 24 Jan 2009 was 367,600 including 15,439 that were sold as part of a Happy Meal.
If Oztam did the data, it would only have boxes in 90 McDonalds stores. Oztam would show that, based on extrapolated data sampling of 90 stores, 943,700 cheeseburger were sold that day, when we know that it was closer to 367,000
No one can say that 708,000 people watched Cougar Town. The only thing that anyone can say for sure is that possibly 222 people were tuned in – but then again, if each of those metered houses only had 1 person in it, maybe there were only 74 people tuned in.
One of them – wasn’t David Leckie.
1 May 10
11:22 pm
Oh please no, I’m sick of switching channels and finding the same cop shows, law shows or medical shows on every single channel. I agree that Cougar Town was boring, but there has to be something better than the fall back genres in its place.
Which is exactly why I love love LOVE shows like Sea Patrol and Packed To the Rafters
12 May 10
12:22 am
I actually enjoyed watching Cougar Town. I thought it was funny! To replace it with Criminal Minds (which is just ANOTHER bullshit crime spoof of CSI) is ridiculous!!! I seriously HATE how these networks cut shows mid-series because of ratings… And you wonder why people end up paying for Foxtel/Austar?!?! Because free-tv is absolute SHIT!
12 May 10
7:52 am
If TV stations had a better idea of what audiences would be attracted to specific shows, not only would they be able to monetise success from when it occurred (instead of having to wait a year in the crazy world of the current trading approach), but they wouldn’t have to schedule and then pull shows that disappoint not only those that don’t like the show, but the few that do.
12 May 10
10:08 am
@ Chris Walton…. Mate if you can find a formula that works that handy piece of stuff out then let me know. I will see to it that your name appears in a ranking list somewhere around that of B. Gates and S. Jobs. And for only a small % too! Trust me I’m in sales.
13 May 10
9:17 pm
I can tell you there were more than bloody 74 people tuned in. Maybe everyone didn’t like it, but I know a lot of people who did! I miss Cougartown giving me Thursday night TV satisfaction! It was a fun show, instead of murder, blood and death!!!
13 May 10
11:44 pm
@R.Mugobme – mate, we have. Give me a call.
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