Coke. Let Fans Be First.

Februar 16th, 2010 • Comments Brands, Social, Strategy
Tags: Brands, coke, Experimental, Fans, Lifestyle, Presentation, Social Influence Marketing, Strategy, Trends, visual

As my everyday work revolves around modelling a brand’s reaction to the social revolution it’s particularly interesting to watch big established companies opening up. It’s simple to socialize threadless or Zappos (well they are social from the start) but how about the big players? How about Coke – the stereotype of a modern brand. How do they react on the active user after having spent zillions of ad dollars for more than 100 years.

This deck describes Coke’s approach to social. ‘Fans first’ is a deck by Coke’s Group Director of Interactive Marketing Michael Donnelly – a man who is well known for trying out new things. Even though I do not agree with Culture Buzz’ claim “this deck tells all“, it at least defines a new, broad social ecosystem for Coke. An ecosystem in which a brand has to follow its users instead of the other way around. Personally that’s my key takeway from these slides.

And here is the deck – Coke. ‘Fans First’

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Old Spice. The Most Effective Commercial in the History of Everything.

Februar 14th, 2010 • Comments Ads, Brands
Tags: Ads, Brands, Creativity, Funny, Ideas, Old Spice

I have to admit, I really love traditional advertising once in a while. Old Spice shows how it is getting done: Create a strong idea, and execute it brilliantly…wow. I am sure, this is the most effective commercial ever – even though it makes me feel woefully inadequate. High five Old Spice. It’s diabolic and I love it.

In Stores Now. Nerd Barbie is here.

Februar 13th, 2010 • Comments Brands
Tags: Barbie, Brands, Lifestyle, Mattel, Toys, Trends, World

Times are a changing. This morning Mattel announced the arrival of Barbie’s 126th career which is Nerd Barbie (basically). Barbie’s new job profile was chosen as result of a global poll asking fans whether they want her to become Architect, an Environmentalist, a Surgeon, a News Anchor, and a Computer Engineer. Two new careers were chosen among this list – Nerd Barbie was launched together with News Anchor Barbie. Read more about at Chipchicklets.

adidas. Preparing the Social Push for NBA All–Star Weekend.

Februar 5th, 2010 • Comments Brands, Experimental, Social
Tags: 180, Adaptation Marketing, adidas, Agencies, Brands, Cool, Creativity, Dwight Howard, Experimental, Ideas, Riot, Sharing, Social Influence Marketing, Strategy, TBWA, Tools, We like

For about three years I worked on various adidas accounts here at my employer, Neue Digitale / Razorfish. That’s why I’m pretty interested to watch what the brand is up to when it comes to new digital (mainly social) concepts. In fact, the days of big digital presentations are over are getting reinterpreted at adidas HQ, Amsterdam.

On NBA’s All-Star Weekend Orlando Magic Center Dwight Howard takes the lead in a push by 180/TBWA Riot and adidas to socialize….umm…..big shiny ad productions. They will air a 30-second spot starring the basketball god which unlocks more Howard-related content the more it is shared. Additionally it will be intertwined with the website and a Youtube channel.

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Audi’s Green Police. Didn’t They say Hitler?

Januar 30th, 2010 • Comments Ads, Brands
Tags: Ads, Audi, Brands, Fail, Germany, Ideas, Philosophy, PR, Social Influence Marketing, Strategy

Let’s start an intellectual experiment.

Think about e.g. an ex-spouse in your life and now think about any object in your appartment. Can you associate it with him or her somehow? You probably can. Take the old vase in your living room and you will probably find a connection to your ex who loved flowers so much. Most likely you will be able to link the TV set to her preferences for ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ and so on…But why should you do that? Especially since you will be able to link pretty much anything to pretty much anything after thinking about it for a while. Plus, simply put, while you actually might not want to think about your ex-spouse anymore at all?

Well, that’s what self-proclaimed guardians of Political Correctness do on the web 24/7. They love to think about all kinds of connections because there is not one thing which makes them as happy as making up a good old PR disaster.

One information in advance: I am German and I work for a digital agency with Audi International on the client list (not PR, not Audi USA). This is just accidental and not the rationale behind this article. I am professionally not at all engaged in any Audi project even though I like the cars. I simply react on this article by Danny Brown, entitled “Audi and the Super Bowl Social Media Shit Storm“.  This is the story: In an attempt to spearhead a social media intiative, Audi USA (keep that in mind, it is important) had invented the so-called ‘Green Police’. It comes with a Super-Bowl ad, a Youtube channel and the inevitable twitter account. This is the more or less entertaining ad:

Did you realize it? No? Audi has just committed a major act of Political Incorrectness, according to Danny.

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Slightware. The difference between a campaign and a conversation.

Dezember 22nd, 2009 • Comments Brands, Social, Strategy
Tags: Adaptation Marketing, Agencies, Brands, Campaign, Conversation, Diagram, Social Business Design, Social Influence Marketing, Trends, visual, World

Kenneth J. Weiss’ book Slightware is a book on the challenges brands face in nowaday’s complex marketing realities. Reader praise the book as a great compendium about today’s marketing. Plus it comes with quite a bunch of great pictures info visualizations. I found this one particularly interesting: Campaigns vs Conversations. No, it is not completely new. But it summarizes a couple of key properties in one visualization. Info visualizations – a great way to promote your blog, book or whatever since 1853.

Transmedia. An introduction to diversity in storytelling.

Dezember 12th, 2009 • Comments Ads, Brands, Social, Strategy
Tags: Ads, Brands, Cool, Philosophy, Presentation, Social Influence Marketing, Storytelling, Strategy, transmedia

In a world in which old and new media collide, Transmedia storytelling becomes a functional necessity in brand communication. The term was defined by Henry Jenkins in his 2006 book Convergence Culture:

Transmedia storytelling represents a process where integral elements of a fiction get dispersed systematically across multiple delivery channels for the purpose of creating a unified and coordinated entertainment experience.

It is storytelling across multiple forms of media with each element making distinctive contributions to a viewer/user/player’s understanding of the story world (see Henry Jenkin’s blog). Even though I disagree with the word storytelling as THE defining factor for in this brave new media world, I agree with it being an important asset.

Digital Strategist Gunther Sonnenfeld has summarized the topic in this deck to Miami Ad School. It’s a deck that talks to advertisers in the first place, but I like it, nevertheless .

Great Ads. Que Sera, Sera?

Dezember 10th, 2009 • Comments Ads, Brands
Tags: Ads, Brands, Creativity, Funny, Idea, We like

Absolut. 25 years in fantastic ads.

Dezember 7th, 2009 • Comments Ads, Brands, Classics
Tags: Absolut, Ads, Branding, Brands, Classics, Cool, Creativity, history, Lifestyle, Print, visual, We like, World

My friends at Creative Criminals have published this fantastic compilation quite a while ago. But it is still worth taking a look at: For over 25 years Absolut vodka has run a simply überinspiring advertising campaign. The well known bottle of Absolut is formed in the shape of a tradtional Swedish medicine flagon. It may be hard to use for bartenders but the shape was an inspiration for their print campaign which just does one thing: Position the product as hero.

Check out the ad compilation here.

Logos. The Battle for Blue.

November 16th, 2009 • Comments Brands
Tags: Branding, Brands, Logos, Strategy, visual, World

Even in the classic brand design business differentiation seems to be unwanted hard to achieve. Check out this great info visualization by Wired Magazine which I found on Phil’s Flickr account.