There’s 2.5 quintillion bytes of data in the world every day – but it’s nothing without a story
Nik Kontoulas, the founder of digital creative agency JustEggs (formerly known as Eggmobi), tells brands to remember that data in digital advertising is meaningless unless it is coupled with a great ad
When we started out, everyone was talking about media, audiences and data, but never the design. That was put on back burner because people didn’t know how to activate it. It was the biggest frustration when I worked in media sales. Data and media, on the other hand, are easily accessible and trafficked. So people put creative in the too-hard basket, especially with mobile.
So then I thought, “How do we make creative easily accessible?” The first step was to make sure our mobile-first interactive ads could work across multiple websites and platforms. In the past, a publisher would come in and build an ad but it would only work on their own sites. If you’re then buying five or six different types of ad units, you’ll have a nightmare in approvals. I said we need to be closer to the brand’s media and data, but doing that requires us to work with the brand or media agency. That means the finished product can run everywhere and scale across all platforms. It also means we can create a report showing how well our creative did across every publisher – giving brands a direct comparison.
People talk data, but there’s 2.5 quintillion bytes of data in the world every day – how much of that is useful without a story? Everyone is jumping on the bandwagon. Why don’t people talk about creative as much? Because it takes intel, skill and time to make creative. Data defines an audience, yes, but creative tells the story. Brands have to focus on making these disciplines work together and stop siloing them.
The way you use your mobile is different to your desktop. Take public transport and you’ll see the difference! Everyone is on the go, so you have to keep it short, simple and relevant. Also think about designing to a portrait shape: 94% of people hold their phone this way, yet most content is created in landscape.
To make ads more relevant, our team focus heavily on understanding and engaging the user. Research show that 84% of millennials don’t trust traditional advertising, so our take on it is ‘Why are we creating content that’s not relevant?’ So, for example, we could use a postcode to adapt a campaign depending on the weather. When we were commissioned by Samsung, adverts for a washing machine would appear on hot days, but on rainy days we would instead highlight their washer/dryer combo – because research suggests on a warmer day people hang their clothes on the line. You can also adapt by time of day. We did an advert for a fast-food restaurant where users saw the breakfast menu in the morning, lunch menu around midday and dinner menu at night. Common sense right?
Revolutionary stuff
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Might not be revolutionary but got a point that no one is actually doing it well… or actually even doing it
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Does good creative even work on platforms like mobile and tablet? I don’t take notice. Be interesting to see a report. I’m from agency and we are definitely leaving mobile creative to the end.
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