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Opinion | Features
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.
The top seven...most patronising pieces of communication
Sometimes brands have big ideas. Sometimes marketers get so caught up with a grandiose idea that instead of finding engaging ways to sell breakfast cereal, they start to believe their own rhetoric. And sometimes it’s just lazy marketing. Here are my top seven inadvertently patronising pieces of communication…
1) Last night thousands of women gathered in Sydney’s Centennial Park to take part in She Runs the Night, an event created by Nike.
TV audience measurement – why big isn’t always beautiful
In this guest post, Chris Walton argues that the media industry needs to take a new approach to TV tradingThere has been a significant amount of coverage recently about how successful The Voice has been. Indeed, audience figures of 2.6m+ people are very impressive these days. Based on reports, this is apparently double the size of audience that Nine was hoping for in the lead up to the programme launching.
Soap listed as the top digital agency
Soap is Australasia’s best digital agency according to a new ranking published on online advertising creativity site Bannerblog which differs wildly from a similar exercise carried out by Forrester Research last year.
The assessment includes awards won, the agency’s management of its own reputation and the quality of its work.
Three of the top five digital agencies are NZ based. The top five:
- Soap AU – 79%
- Resn NZ – 76%
- AIM Proximity NZ – 74%
- Tribal DDB NZ – 72%
- Tequila AU – 71%
More than 50 agencies were covered. The full results can be seen on Bannerblog. The survey was carried out in association with Campaign Brief.
Although Bannerblog is partly the work of Soap’s Ashley Ringrose, he was not on the panel of eight creatives who gave marks to the agencies.
The list is almost a direct contradiction of an assessment of Australia’s digital agencies carried out by Forrester Research in July last year. Using a different methodology, that survey listed reported that “Amnesia Razorfish, HotHouse, Hyro, and the White Agency lead the pack”.
Amnesia and The White Agency asked not to be included in the Bannerblog survey, while Hyro came last in the ranking with 21% and HotHouse was second from bottom with 23%.
The worst ranking full service agencies were The Furnace and MercerBell.
The other agencies that declined to be rated were Host, Webqem and Deepend.
February 17th, 2010 at 11:19 am
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Comments
17 Feb 10
11:31 am
I like the part where “the quality of its work” is third in the list and “campaign effectiveness” is nowhere to be seen. Ah well, at least “awards won” and “the agency’s management of its own reputation” (really?) are in there.
Top quality stuff, Bannerblog.
17 Feb 10
11:40 am
Sounds about right. Hyros work has been dropping of late, and I haven’t seen anything good from hothouse lately. Surprised at the number of highly ranked NZ creatives. Would like to see the self-excluded agencies add themselves back in next time..
17 Feb 10
12:02 pm
The fact that Bannerblog decides the best digital agency based purely on creative says it all. Note also that it was only judged by creatives.
17 Feb 10
12:16 pm
Hi accountant – I’m not sure they would claim it as any more than “best for creative”. Forgive me if that’s not clear from the headline.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
17 Feb 10
12:24 pm
The only telling thing is the quality of Forrester’s reporting. Seriously, when was the last time you heard anything good come out of their top listed agencies? It was ridiculous.
17 Feb 10
12:41 pm
I’ll write a longer response when I get a chance but I just wanted to flag quickly that Bannerblog’s work and Forrester’s work do not contradict each other as they don’t attempt to do the same thing. More to come.
17 Feb 10
12:58 pm
OK, I haven’t spoken to the Bannerblog team about their method or their intentions, so if I’ve misunderstood anything, please jump in and correct me.
That said, here are just two of the reasons why it makes no sense to compare the two activities:
# Forrester quite deliberately looked at 6 digital agencies in great detail. We never attempted to or pretended to map the digital agency market as a whole. The quote about 4 “leading the pack” is accurate, but out of context. It refers to the 4 agencies that lead the studied pack of 6.
# Meanwhile, Bannerblog as far as I can tell aimed to chart the entire digital agency landscape, or at least a large part of it. This is a worthwhile but completely different endeavour.
# Forrester spoke to the clients of each agency about their experience of working with the agency and the ROI achieved. We examined business processes and technical competencies and contract conditions and pricing and so on and so forth. Yes, we also gave our opinion of each agency’s creative process — but we did not attach a number of creative in our final evaluation as we focused on measurable differences between agencies.
# Bannerblog not only evaluated creative but gave it a weighting of 85%.
These are two interesting studies with completely different outlooks. They are so different that it makes no sense to say they contradict each other. It would make much more sense to say that if you happen to be considering any of the six agencies that Forrester studied, then the two reports complement each other.
17 Feb 10
1:55 pm
“The fact that Bannerblog decides the best digital agency based purely on creative says it all”
- bannerblog didn’t decide anything. the judging panel did
- actually 85% on creative – not purely
“Note also that it was only judged by creatives”
- correct and it never said anything other wises. creative does tend to make up a big percentage of what our/these agencies do. [ but not all parts ]
are you sure your an accountant? your numbers seem to be way off
looking forward to the other 5 agencies taking part
[and any new or additional ones as well]
the addition of technical next time will be very interesting. will be great to see if the order moves around much
there’s quiet a lot of smaller agency’s performing extremely well. great to see
17 Feb 10
2:15 pm
@ukalipt you can’t spell
17 Feb 10
2:16 pm
Headline should read: “Shock result, Soap listed as top digital agency on a blog run by Soap’s owners”
17 Feb 10
2:24 pm
quite rite @____________
17 Feb 10
2:24 pm
Don’t believe everything you read.
17 Feb 10
2:32 pm
But maybe it would be more objective if @ukalipt disclosed that they do in fact work at Soap next time they post an opinion?
17 Feb 10
2:39 pm
does it really matter.
my name is matthew willis and i work at soap. i have worked at amnesia as well. i do work in conjunction with hyro regularly and have many friends who work in a lot of the agency’s on the list.
i didn’t post here as anonymous or as i don’t work at soap.
i always post on every forum i ever use as well as my twitter, flickr, xbox gamer tag, everything as ukalipt and will continue to do so
ps. i am a shocking speller
anything else??
17 Feb 10
2:59 pm
Heading is slightly misleading – Perhaps a more balanced report next time would be better to claim such a headline heading. In any case contrats to the creatives in the top 5 for their…creative
17 Feb 10
3:00 pm
congrats even
17 Feb 10
3:23 pm
It’s kind of like when Handy smurf won the ‘2 inches of blue thunder’ award the year that Papa smurf, Smurfette, Heafty and Brainy smurf decided not to enter. We are glad you won mate … but are we really there yet?
17 Feb 10
3:24 pm
Congrats Soap.
From a clients perspective, you guys are fantastic and deserve all the accolade.
Looking forward to working with you soon.
17 Feb 10
4:01 pm
I cannot comment on Soap being on the top of the list, however, I have seen their work first hand and it’s good. No question.
We’ve pitched against them a number of times, sometimes won, sometimes lost.
However, I am dubious about some of the other agencies on the list…
17 Feb 10
5:04 pm
Have at it Matt, err, ukalipt.
17 Feb 10
5:43 pm
Nice one Brad, Ash etc.
And typically the anonymous nastiness begin. Sorry Tim but Mumbrella has become the industry equivalent of drink spiking.
17 Feb 10
5:44 pm
Well done Soap! Stellar effort.
I have to say that I was surprised to see that Resn came in second though. Based on what I know of Resn, I would have expected them to top the list with flying colours.
Could someone from Bannerblog explain how it is that Soap topped the list?
Did it come down to number of staff that Soap have over Resn?
17 Feb 10
6:41 pm
If AIMIA Award finalists are anything to go by, Soap are deservedly ‘hotter’ creatively than Resn right now. Soap = 10 finalists, while Resn = 3 (see http://mumbrella.com.au/aimia-.....iled-16089 )
Not that AIMIA Awards are everything, but a pretty impartial and fair judging process overall.
17 Feb 10
8:05 pm
I think it’s a good start. The methodology and participation will improve over time. Soap is out in front and I’m sure with the inclusion of a few others like Deepend, the Whites and Amnesia (as well as others), it will re-shape the map next time.
It would be great if this has the effect of stirring everyone up to try harder this year – to do better, more creative and more effective work.
To the anonymous whingers and moaners – please stop it, you’re hurting everyone. How about you just aim to do better than Soap this year.
17 Feb 10
9:24 pm
Can somebody pass the soap?
18 Feb 10
11:06 am
lol at The Furnace coming in as one of the worst ranking full service agencies. Not surprising.
19 Feb 10
10:46 am
Like what Shaun has said, this should simply be retitled to “Top Digital Creative Agency”.
Agencies do not just deliver creative interactive solutions but business solutions, some of which just happen to be driven around advertising and/or creativity.
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