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Opinion
After Harold
The ‘Harold rumour’ rarely goes away.
Last time round WPP was rumoured to be looking at buying Mitchell Communication Group. On another occasion one of the trade magazines hoaxed a rival into reporting that Telstra was the buyer.
This time, the rumour appears to have a great deal more substance. Read more »
Intelligent TV – the next big thing?
I was, I must confess, mistaken about last night’s Gruen Nation. Read more »
Masterchef: Homophobic? No. Racist? No. Ageist? Maybe
In this guest posting, Tactical TV’s Tony Richardson argues that Masterchef shows Australian TV audiences are ready for multiculturalism but not older faces
When the popularity of a TV show bumps the prime minister and the leader of the opposition to an earlier time slot, you know you have a phenomenon. Read more »
Bad enough the SMH iPad app is just a PDF, forcing a print subscription is insane
So yesterday Fairfax launched its Sydney Morning Herald iPad app. The strategy – designed to shore up print – and the execution – already derided by users as a “glorifed PDF reader” – are both laughable.
If there were ever doubts that Fairfax is two companies pulling in different directions, then the handling of the iPad app dispels them. Read more »
Is a kettle boiling a good ad?
So would you watch a kettle boiling? The weekend magazines carriedied an unusual ad.It was a plain, unbranded address for the url Life is too short.com.au. Read more »
Guest post: Why Sensis believes in the cause
After Mumbrella criticised the Facebook campaign by Sensis to give socks to the homeless, we invited the brand to explain its thinking. In this guest posting, Sensis communications manager Danielle Horan explains the background to the idea
The debate about the intention behind the Sensis 1234 Warm Up campaign certainly unearthed a range of differing opinions. Read more »
Hungry Jack’s – something to sing about
I often enjoy giving the Hungry Jack’s ads a kicking, so it’s good to see a new one where there’s an interesting idea. Read more »
The big election question
As an occasional media commentator, I’m sometimes asked: ‘Tell me Tim. Given that politicians want to engage the electorate beyond the hardcore politics junkies, would it be a good idea to schedule the leaders’ debate at the exact same time as the final of Masterchef, arguably Australia’s favourite TV programme and likely to be the most watched show of the year?” Read more »
Why this is NOT the Twitter election
If you read the last few days’ papers, you would think that the Twitterati will decide the outcome of the election. Read more »
Paging the fun police
While any brand has to worry about the legal implications of running a contest, there does come a point where the entire thing looks so unappealing it may be worth going back to the drawing board. Read more »
Oh PETA
This ad is a tough watch.
If you don’t want to see seals being clubbed, then don’t watch. Read more »
Sensis – social responsibility isn’t about patronising the needy about their socks
I wish I could put my finger on what it is that makes this social issues campaign for Sensis feel so icky: Read more »
Old Spice: Best use of social media yet?
Today has been a good day. You know those very rare moments where you see an advertising idea and you can recognise not only how good it is, but how it’s going to inspire other great work? What Old Spice did next is one of those moments.It combines great advertising, great writing, a huge PR idea and excellent use of social media as a two-way channel. Read more »
If that’s how paywalls work then we’re utterly flipping screwed
So tonight, for the first time, I went behind Fairfax Media’s pay wall.
Based on that experience, if the future of journalism is paid content then every one of us working hacks is utterly screwed. Read more »
Media Watch picks an odd target
I’ve got a nasty feeling I’ve finally gone native.
Much like Stockholm Syndrome where kidnap victims come to adore their captors, journalists have always been susceptible to a similar syndrome. Read more »
Social media, big agency style: ‘You could enter a picture of your cat playing in his kitty litter and win 7 grand’
Regular readers will by now be more than familiar with the great Toyota Yaris social media live pitch.
Fair to say that the various efforts are seeing different degress of success.
And while Saatchi & Saatchi’s effort – a film making competition with the not-entirely-original challenge of making a video featuring the brand – has met with a less than enthusiastic response, there is a silver lining for the agency.
An email has gone viral in the last few days.
It reads:
From: Rob
Date:
Subject: Clever Comp
Hey creative people
I’ve got something that you’ll (or your housemates, brothers, sisters, artistic friends etc will) be nterested in.
It’s a film comp in aide of promoting Toyota Yaris.
“A film comp? I don’t have the time!” you may say, but listen up. So far, NO ONE has entered and it has been open for more than 10 days and closes 1st December. Voting is done on hits and comments so if you’re in first you have a huge advantage. And you don’t have to make an ad, just put a Yaris in somewhere a la the ‘number 8′ or ’spring’ in Tropfest or something
First prize is $7,000. $3,000 for second and $1,000 for 3rd. At this stage, you could enter a picture of your cat playing in his kitty litter and win 7 grand.
Details are in the attachments. If you win, I’d love an all carbon fibre road bicycle for Christmas.
Cheers y’all.
-Rob
Happily since that email went out, there’s been a dramatic response. There’s one entry on the site now:
November 17th, 2009 at 6:26 pm
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Comments
17 Nov 09
6:46 pm
Shit I don’t have a cat.
17 Nov 09
7:16 pm
yeah nah
17 Nov 09
7:49 pm
I particularly like how they misspelled ‘Yaris’ in the vid title. At least we know it wasn’t an agency back-up vid. Unless that’s what they WANT us to think….
17 Nov 09
10:38 pm
Love the weird gratuitous crotch shot at the end (or was that aiming for the badge?). Real talent in the editing booth.
18 Nov 09
7:49 am
Sorry but this is quite obviously done by the agency, which is fine to show the kind of style they are after but if it wins any of the awards then is really will be a sad state of affairs.
18 Nov 09
1:27 pm
Wow. I learned something. The windshield washers on a Yaris don’t work properly!
18 Nov 09
1:55 pm
“there’s been a dramatic response”
“There’s one entry on the site now”
heh. i like.
18 Nov 09
5:06 pm
Well, there’s two now! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p9NNVGSp4tY
18 Nov 09
9:56 pm
@Ray – is this your entry? I Like it
21 Nov 09
9:49 pm
Holy dooley.
I saw this same viral for Honda in my early days on the net around 96 or 97.
except it was much better done. Not only is this slow, and obviously a seed video to kick things off, but it is also derivative from a ground breaking viral from around 1999 for the Honda ‘joy machine’ HRV
Now, let me just go and google Honda viral and see what I can find.
Hold on.. googling..
Ok, back – took 20 minutes to find it but http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=no30FqpOeNQ
Part of a very famous series of early viral work that began to define the category.
I laughed in 1999.
I think maybe I’ll do an entry.
22 Nov 09
3:20 pm
I think someone somewhere got the words ‘Social Media’ mixed up with ‘Run a Competition for Prize Money’.
As implied in your title Tim ‘Social Media Big Agency Style’ has nothing to do with community, conversation or engagement. I was running ‘upload a video on this theme’ competitions at the BBC ten years ago – and this is a million miles from effective community engagement.
Finally publishing the email says so much about the ‘bottom-barrel’ editorial nature of this blog which of course is why it is flailing behind most of the other Australian media blogs http://www.personalizemedia.com/topozblogs/. C’mon, keep off the wannabe videos and lets have some editorial depth Tim.
22 Nov 09
4:13 pm
you often hear that ‘you learn more from your mistakes than successes’ as a line in advertising … from this toyota have probably learnt a lot which you could argue is a good thing … especially given the financial investments made.
23 Nov 09
10:26 am
Hi gary,
Thanks for your comments – and for the link to your blog which appears to aggregate the local blogs from AdAge’s Power 150.
I must confess I haven’t paid much attention to the AdAge Power 150 recently, but having taken a look, I notice that Post Rank was introduced a while back as a key metric and we’ve not been ranking on it at all.
I think that was a technical glitch which I’ve now (I think) fixed.
So I’m very grateful for you drawing my attention to it so I can fix it. It’ll be interesting to see if that takes us back up the list.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
23 Nov 09
1:24 pm
Wow you are a bitter camper aren’t you Gary! What the hate towards Mumbrella?
23 Nov 09
1:54 pm
Gary,
You sound like a lovely man.
23 Nov 09
2:15 pm
Gary you’re smarmy condescending attitude, and self importance reminds me of another blogger. Hang on ….
24 Nov 09
4:46 pm
here’s another…
http://www.youtube.com/group/c.....tQHJ8d_Fn8
29 Nov 09
5:24 pm
Dear Toyota,
I hope you’ve enjoyed this exercise. You’ve managed to highlight a true channel weakness in one of your fulltime agencies!
Why would Saatchi’s even play this game?
‘Wolfie’ gets consumers to touch.
‘SYD vs Melb’ attempts brand ownership of an already estabished rivalry.
‘Snob Scrilla’ unique creative, unique product use.
‘Clever film Comp’ wins the Dr Pepper award- made an impact in the 90’s but now noone cares at all…
H
30 Nov 09
8:01 pm
Gary, you have a very narrow definition of social media.
Sounds like you did some cool work in the 90’s… anything since?
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