In China, Bayer has recently launched a website to promote its Saridon medicine usually prescribed to fight headache.
Of course language is an issue but I found the project interesting both for its tone of voice and, more in general, for the same use of the web for pharmaceutical marketing which sounded (at least to me) pretty new.
Are you ready to join the Swedish Army? And even if you are, are you good enough to pass the test? If you have enough time to wait for the site to load, make sure to check it out.
The experience is as impressive as scary. The mood is a mix of underground and KGB. The art direction and the attention to detail is simply fantastic. The test are challenging and entertaining. This website is simply more than a website, it's an interactive movie.
I realize this is very geek, but I really like it: in the UK Vodafone has launched a website which combines Google Maps and Twitter to build the picture of where British people are going to spend their summer holidays.
The initiative has been launched to spread the word about the fact that roaming charges across Europe have been eventually abolished by Vodafone.
Advergames are moving to Facebook or, better, are moving where people are. EA Games has just launched "Quick Challenge", an interactive Facebook application, to support the release of its new title: EA Sports Grand Slam Tennis.
Quick challenge is a revised version in a tennis mood of the popular game (among our granpas') "rock, paper, scissors". The gaming mechanism is therefore pretty straightforward: you pick an avatar (both Rafa Nadal and John McEnroe are available!), you select your three shots: lob, slam, drop shot and then watch it play out against your opponent who gets challenged within Facebook itself.
I'm not a big fan of global charities, like Unicef or the Red Cross, as I always have the feeling they invest too much money in advertising (money that could rather be spent on factual charity actions). I therefore have contrasting feelings also on the Our World, Your Move website which hit my mailbox today.
It's the first global online campaign by The Red Cross Red Crescent Movement which asks everyone to make the world a better place, starting with a small gesture. The integrated action kicked off about two months ago with the release of a beautiful one minute cartoon film.
Lately there's been a lot of talking about Augmented Reality, even Martina dropped some thoughts about that a couple of weeks ago, which i agree almost completely, being the most of these AR things going on right now pure eye-candy; i also even remember Dare's Flo Heiss writing something funny about this a while ago.
Videogames marketing is fascinating because brands like EA and Ubisoft always try to take the promototion game to the next level, playing smartly with new tools and ideas. The latest example is related to the release of Battlefield 1943. EA has just announced a worldwide community challenge that, when achieved, will reward players by unlocking a fourth map called Coral Sea.
The WWII Coral Sea map will be unlocked when the multiplayer community achieves 43M kills on Xbox Live and the same number on PlayStation Network. Players will be able to track the progress of their respective console communities at www.battlefield.com/1943.
Love the idea of challenging consumers to get together in order to receive a community reward.
In the US Lexus has launched a digital lifestyle guide in cooperation with Urban Daddy, a website and email magazine dedicated to "what you need to know".
Althought the idea of a lifestyle guide is definitely not new, I like the fact they've tried to make it a bit more personal and interactive, allowing people to find the right spots according to their entertainment needs.
Augmented reality is the idea of the month. Even if it has been out there for at least a year or so, in the last month the buzz around it has literally exploded. A lot of marketers are excited by the wow effect augmented reality can generate, but fortunately another good number of bloggers and marketers have a more realistic approach to the idea. Advertising Lab writes "Augmented reality is the new Second Life", SuperCollider blogs about "Augmented Reality, Second Life, and the trough of disillusionment".
I share their same feelings and concerns. It's a bit like QR codes as well. Everywhere in the world (a part from Japan and South Korea probably) there is a lot of buzz around them, advertising agencies sell them as "the coolest thing" to naive clients, but numbers are not there to support the investment. Augmented Reality could suffer of the same problems, since it strongly relies on consumers having a webcam, and be willing to spend five minutes to understand what the brand ask them to do to enjoy the experience. If you use augmented reality only to promote your product or to simply entertain consumers than you are late and already out-of-fashion. The third (or even the second) comer already cannot count on the wow-effect. But but but, augmented reality can still have a future, like any other digital gadget, if it's used in a smart, really interactive way, with the end goal of providing an added value to the end consumer.
Worth the fairly hefty load, this feels like a fresh way to get people interacting and engaging with your music. Turn the Cold War Kids off and on as they play their new single I've Seen Enough. So often the music industry pioneers a new technique and the rest of the marketing world play catch up - expect to see this used to sell processed cheese shortly.
I'm happy to share with you our latest work to present the Nikesportswear Summer collection to the Italian audience and drive awareness (and possibly sales :-) through Nikestore.com.
On Nikesportswear Stories we tried to bring to life the concept behind the NSW which is "designed for sport remixed for life". We shot a super fast series of photos with two athletes (a volleyball player and a footballer) and two DJs, showing them in moments of their daily life.
To begin this post I think i'll stole a quote from Agency Republic's Gemma Butler while voting last One Show Interactive: "There could be a Nike category in every festival". Being myself a big fan of Uniqlo's interactive stuff, i'm amazed on how often they're releasing such amount of high quality stuff, maybe festivals should think of another Uniqlo category too.
I think this "Uniqlo Tokyo Fashion Map" project is a follow-up to the Uniqlo Parka one released last February, and although reminds me a little of that Nike "Pass the ball" project i cannot but loving how Uniqlo makes fun of each and everyone of their catalogs while using amazing skills of data visualization.
