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Opinion | Features
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Why aren't more media companies offering job sharing to get experience back in the door?
With the media industry churn and talent drain a constant issue Lucy Formosa Morgan asks why more companies aren't open to job sharing.
There’s rarely a shortage of applicants for coordinator positions however when it comes to recruiting experienced middle / senior level people, the talent bank seems to dry up. Agencies can struggle to fill vacancies for months or end up having to recruit from overseas. So if we have plenty of juniors that we’re devoting time and money to training up, where are they going? Why is there such a shortage of good talent out there? -
Marketers are the ones whose reputations are most at risk if they are complicit in scam advertising
With questions being raised over the integrity of some awards entries in recent weeks, former creative director Darren Woolley says scam can be as damaging for marketers as the agencies involved.
Scam awards entries have come to industry attention again, following the most recent Cannes Lions Awards. In the process, several high profile advertisers have been associated with their agencies’ entries. But what are the implications for the advertiser?
It is a standard response that advertisers are not really interested in creative awards. But the fact is that marketers are human and those that have healthy and close working relationships with their agencies actually enjoy seeing them being recognised, especially for work they may have created together. -
Terry Savage defends debated Cannes Lions entries saying 'Super Bowl ads run once'
In a Q&A conducted by email, Terry Savage, chairman of the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity, defends the integrity of the competition and answers questions around scam ads following an investigation by Mumbrella into a series of ads from Australia entered into the Press category which ran just once in regional media.
What is your definition of scam?
"We require the work to have been approved by the client and to have used paid Media in the execution, if there is a query we get validation via the agency the client and the Media schedule that the work has run and complied within our entry rules. In the case of self promotion and NGO that is not the case." -
Australian Women's Weekly editor on how its latest cover has changed industry attitudes
The cover of the July edition of the Australian Women's Weekly features the image of ultra-marathon bushfire survivor Turia Pitt, a move which surprised many in an industry driven by image. Editor-in-chief Helen McCabe spoke to Miranda Ward about how the cover came about, and its effect not only on the public, but also the beauty and fashion industries as we.
The July cover of the Australian's Women's Weekly has done more to market "what the heart and soul of the magazine is" than anything else the magazine's editor-in-chief Helen McCabe has done in her five years at the helm.
Speaking to Mumbrella about the July edition which featured Turia Pitt, a survivor of the bushfire that swept through an ultra-marathon in Western Australia's Kimberly region in September 2011, McCabe said the cover is "a really strong signal to market that this magazine is committed to Australian women, quality stories, independent journalism, long-form story telling and quality writing. -
If you don't want to enter real work into awards, then fuck off and be an artist
In this guest post, awards jury veteran Matt Batten, a former ECD of Wunderman Australia, argues that the practice of scam advertising - raised by Mumbrella in recent days - hurts the whole industry.
Reading from 10,553 miles away – that's 16,983km in the metric – I'd like to commend you on your dogged determination to find answers to the burning questions surrounding some of Australia's most intriguing Cannes Lions winners this year.
Some say that this is the way of the world (at least our small part in it) and that creativity should be let free upon the award shows regardless of whether or not it was a legitimate response to a brief or a proactive project to help solve a genuine business problem for a real client – or a made-up ad for a brand that had no idea of its existence. -
Does culture really eat strategy for breakfast?
Good startups often point to their culture as a driver of their success, but Eaon Pritchard asks whether that culture can be derived without a clear strategy?
Culture, in an organisational sense, is usually interpreted as the collective behaviours, attitudes and beliefs that — when mixed together — create a particular set of norms within said organisation.
Obviously there can be ‘good’ culture and ‘bad’ culture. -
Five things Wicked Campers needs to do online right now
Wicked Campers has been in the midst of a media controversy over the last few days. Sebastian Vasta takes a look at how the brand could better manage the online and media crisis.
The latest cry to end Wicked Campers’ misogynist toilet humour is certainly not the first time the budget backpacker van company has been in trouble.
But it’s certainly the loudest the online outrage has ever been. -
Cut here: Reshaping the ABC
After the ABC unveiled its first round of cuts after having its funding cut in the last budget Ben Goldsmith of the Queensland University of Technology looks at how it might look in the future, in this cross-posting from The Conversation.
Monday’s announcement that the ABC will make 80 positions redundant is just the latest move in an enforced process of change to the public service broadcaster. It has a long way yet to run.
The announcement finally put the lie to Tony Abbott’s election eve pledge, live on national television, that there would be “no cuts to the ABC or SBS”. In concert with other recent announcements, it seems clear that public broadcasting – and in particular the ABC – is squarely in the government’s sights. -
Lost dog - can you help us find him?
Adland is an industry that likes to give back. Today, we're asking you to help us find this dog.
You can find out more about Windblown Dog's history below: -
The future of Facebook is forensic
Marketers should stop using Facebook as a mass reach tool and start thinking about conversions not conversations argues Jack Smyth. Forget conversations – the future of Facebook is forensic By now you’re probably sick of the same articles recycling the same Facebook statistics. Over 12 million Australian users, spending on average 8.5 hours every week and so on. We all know Facebook offers massive reach. -
Two stats about Netflix that should scare Foxtel and Quickflix
With US streaming site Netflix poised to enter the Australian market next year Andrianes Pinantoan from Pocketbook crunched some numbers to see try and ascertain what the local pay-TV market already looks like now.
Netflix is set to enter the Australian market, but that doesn’t stop a few enterprising Australians from accessing it now. Actually, it’s more than a few. -
Family Feud's return confirms the state of game shows in Australia
In this cross-posting from The Conversation Matthew Wade argues the return of Family Feud shows Australia's TV networks are not interested in testing their audiences intellectually.
Family Feud returns to our television screens tonight as part of Ten’s desperate scramble to remain a viable entity, and is scheduled to compete with Seven and Nine’s main news bulletins at 6pm.
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An open letter to the staff of DDB Sydney and Saatchi & Saatchi Sydney
In this open letter, Mumbrella's Tim Burrowes reaches out to the many excellent staff working at the award-winning agencies DDB and Saatchi & Saatchi.
So last week, you may have noticed we gave some coverage to your Press Lions-winning work on behalf of McDonald’s and Panasonic. Congratulations again.
Some of you even got a namecheck in the credits.
I’m talking to you, -
You want fries with that? Creative careers are still out there, for now
Young people from poorer backgrounds looking to get into careers in creative industries could be amongst the most hard-hit by the government's new 'earn or learn' social security policies argues Ruth Bridgstock, senior lecturer at Queensland University of Technology in a cross-posting from The Conversation.
The old jokes about creative arts and humanities graduates serving at the local fast food outlet are hard to put to rest – they speak to long-held concerns around the value of creative degrees, and to worries that students of creative arts programs aren’t employable when they graduate. -
25 things that have changed about journalism during my quarter century as a hack
Mumbrella's Tim Burrowes began his media career 25 years ago today. He reflects on the changes journalism has seen during that time.
A quarter of a century ago, I was feeling pretty nervous.
A shy 18-year-old, who tended to blush if somebody spoke to me, I'd somehow mumbled my way into my first job in newspapers.
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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.
I’ve almost suggested as much msyelf.
But actually, we’re only half way there. This is not going to be an Obama-style social media-led uprising.
Social media has two potential types of influence on the outcome of an election – firstly, accelerating and magnifying the news cycle, and secondly – and potentially more powerfully – activating the advocates.
The first part is now just a fact of communications, but the second relies on planning and engagement from the political parties. They should have got serious about that months ago – this time round, the major parties have left it too late.
So inevitably there will be some gaffe that goes crazy on Twitter. The speed with which Gordon Brown’s Bigotgate blunder spread on Twitter was a classic example in the UK election.
But less so the planned, focused use of social media demonstrated so well in the election of Barack Obama.
Where social media – Twitter, maybe, but more so Facebook – becomes a huge potential tool is in not just getting getting out the vote, but turning these supporters into an informed and engaged army.
In the US, Sarah Silverman’s The Great Schlep persuaded engaged young Jewish people to travel to Florida and talk to their grandparents about voting for Obama. The state swung from Republican to Democrat.
But that kind of engagement relies on creating your army long before the battle is called so they are already listening when you need them. It’s a bit late to raise your army as you are already charging into battle.
When the PM only started tweeting a fortnight ago and Labor only embedded social media capabilities into its own website a week ago, that’s far too late.
Even chucking up an ad on YouTube and hoping it goes viral and gets you some free media will only get you so far. Particularly if it’s boring, and especially if the song is as bad as this one for the Liberal Party:
The best any party can hope for this time is to not make a mistake that kills them when it gets sucked into the Twitter news accelerator.
Next time round, they may be able to use social media in a positive way. But they’ll have to start now.
Tim Burrowes
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Comments
19 Jul 10
3:44 pm
Agree Tim, its all too broadcast and same-same. Neither party is talking back to any of the voters and debate rages on all the social channels they’ve set up with no responding. It all smacks of social for social’s sake. I’ve done an analysis of the net sentiment Liberal vs Labor up until last night, and there’s not even a point between them. http://www.digitaltip.com.au/i.....h-fitness/
19 Jul 10
4:04 pm
Dude… the song sounds like “stand up Australia, stand up, for RE-ELECTION.”
19 Jul 10
4:21 pm
Obama’s campaign laid out in the easy to understand detail how social media can help to get a rank outsider elected to the most powerful political job in the world.
Surely it’s not that hard for even half aware pollies and/or their parties to get the potential power of social media. AND that it should extend beyond some lame tweets and even more lame YouTube videos.
The UK election and now, seemingly, the Australian election demonstrates that political decision makers don’t get it and perhaps feel that what happened in the US was an aberration and it won’t work here.
Hopefully, we’ll be blown away by a candidate that does get it and does do a meaningful job of leveraging social media in this election. If nothing else, it’s a pretty good way to stand out from the pack.
19 Jul 10
4:27 pm
Check out ninemsn for people response to the question..Tweetrace – Which party Really gets Twitter? http://news.ninemsn.com.au/nat.....home-state
Seems like only Kate Ellis has any understanding, yet ninemsn users think the Libs have a better understanding. Hmmm! What does this say about the 9msn audience????
19 Jul 10
4:35 pm
Come on Bob Brown, get on Twitter, at least you talk sense.
19 Jul 10
4:39 pm
That Sarah Silverman clip is hilarious. I laughed embarrassingly loudly at my desk and everybody looked at me.
19 Jul 10
4:40 pm
Spot on Tim. Build your community before you need it. This applies to brands as much as it does political parties and dare I say both are as guilty as each other i.e. wanting instant results via one-way blasting of messages.
Genuinely engaging people and building trust and respect takes time and considerable effort (both on and offline) so little wonder the major political parties aren’t yet ready to take full advantage of the social web.
19 Jul 10
4:52 pm
But but but…don’t both parties have advertising heavyweights advising and handling their campaigns?
And surely those icons of the advertising world would know how to build communities using social media?
19 Jul 10
5:00 pm
Tim, landed in Sydney Saturday morning from London and had to chuckle about the whole “Twitter election” the TV networks were wanting us to believe.
I blogged about this at http://lc.tl/auelection and compared the hype to what happened in the UK for the recent general election.
Andrew Grill
I’m here for 2 weeks so will be able to see first hand if my theory is correct.
19 Jul 10
5:05 pm
As I outlined on Twitter earlier today, http://twitter.com/martinwalsh/status/18892804463 the fundamental difference in Australia is that the politicians and political parties don’t have a strategy; they simply have a checklist and then hope for the best. And, hope is not a strategy!
The politicians and their consultants do not understand that Social Networking is NOT Social Media Marketing. You will never succeed if you simply have an approach of ticking a checklist of social networking sites.
I also see lots of people from time to time comment about the Obama campaign but they are misinformed and keep perpetuating the myth that Obama succeeded because of social media.
The Obama campaign succeeded because of email first, mobile second and social media marketing third. It was strongly supported by ATL and therefore it was a great 360 degree marketing campaign which used digital marketing in the most effective way to support the campaign goals and objectives. The team who led the Obama campaign has stated this on numerous occasions but it keeps getting lost in translation.
Social technologies are not simply Twitter, Facebook, MySpace and YouTube. It is blogs, forums, communities, product reviews & ratings, RSS, chat & WIKI’s, social media newsrooms, social media press releases, social bookmarks and widgets to name a few.
As Tiphereth points out social influence marketing is about engagement and conversations. Social Influence Marketing is not just another monologue broadcast channel and yet so many marketers (and politicians) continually treat Twitter and Facebook as an RSS feed to broadcast yet more messages.
We’ve moved on from the Conversational Marketplace pre 1949 to the era of Mass Marketing Advertising circa 1949 to 2000 we are now in the current era of Conversational Marketing 2001+. But it seems a lot of people cannot grasp the fundamental changes in consumer behaviour underlying these new rules. If you don’t understand your target audience, where they are and how they use the social technologies then you will fail.
I won’t even go into the art of storytelling and content but simply stories sell, facts and figures don’t and this is particularly true across digital marketing.
Lastly, influence is not about the number of followers a person has or the volume of their tweets or status updates or blog posts. True influence by its very nature is the power of that individual to influence another person’s behaviour or opinion. Sadly way too many people are also using the wrong KPI’s to measure social influence marketing and are spending way too much time on speaking and or engaging with the wrong people.
This failure to understand the power of digital marketing and social influence marketing is probably the single biggest lost opportunity of this election.
19 Jul 10
7:13 pm
TWEET OFF! How dumb of prime media promoting another media over their own.
No wonder more people spend more time online than watching TV or reading newspapers. Think about it. Your client spends $10,000 for a spot in ACA and then ACA tell their audience to go online for more about this story. No wonder clients are leaving TV and Press advertising in their droves. FREE TV, newspapers and radio need to take a good look at themselves. Or they wont be here in this form in 10 years tiime. So then you can forget about your kids becoming news readers and reporters. They will be boring BLOGGERS on Twitter with no income.
19 Jul 10
9:27 pm
@Carole Ann Goldsmith – he is on twitter @SenatorBobBrown
20 Jul 10
10:00 am
@martinwalsh couldn’t agree more. My blog post with an example the social media “gurus” missed. http://jimboot.com/the-twitter-election. @tim I agree I dont think the parties will harness the power of online but individuals may.
26 Jul 10
2:48 pm
What election…
27 Jul 10
8:00 pm
I really think the social media buzz , especially twitter is a bit too hyped – I mean Kevin was all over twitter and look what happened to him – people vote for whos making the best policy decisions NOT on their twitter skills.
30 Jul 10
8:03 am
The usual content of Twitter hashtag streams like #auselection are pretty ignorable but where it does come into its own is when politicians appear on tv programs like #qanda or in a #debate and you get immediate feedback on their performance. Similarly the #insiders tweet stream attracts are a fair selection of larrikan commentators. Journos admit they monitor (and participate) in the tweet streams and this can in turn feed into their articles the next day so in this sense I would say Twitter has an impact. Facebook I would say has had 0 impact.