Category Archives: Opinions & interviews

John Jay (WK) talks creativity with Fastcompany

Thanks to Fast Company for sharing an inspiring video interview with John Jay, global executive creative director at Wieden and Kennedy. This is the best way you can start your week. Have your Moleskine ready, and start taking notes. Watch the video after the jump.

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File under: interview

R/GA: a profile

A nice R/GA profile through the eye of Hillman Curtis.

The Playboy Interview: Marshall McLuhan

This morning i came upon (via @pedroramirez, digital director at Grey Mexico) a fantastic link, an old Marshall McLuhan’s interview published at Playboy Magazine in 1969. With assertions such as “Effective study of the media deals not only with the content of the media but with the media themselves and the total cultural environment within which the media function”, the text is as interesting and (surprisingly) contemporary as it gets in many aspects of our current environment.

The iPhone and the App Store contradictions

Marta Kagan recently put online a useful presentation on branded applications for the iPhone, considered as the next generation of immersive mobile branding. Her slideshow gives me the opportunity to spend a couple of words on the huge contradictions I see on App Store if you take the digital marketer point of view.

View more presentations from Marta Kagan. (tags: iphone marketing)

We are talking so much about the digital world, where everything and everybody is connected, where you can discover and get to know great ideas and great people from all around the world, global meets local etc, etc, etc… But, but, but the Apple App Store is far from being a global store. If you are based in Italy for example, very often you can’t buy nor even download for the applications developed in the US, and viceversa.

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File under: branded applications, iphone

Marketing trends for 2009

Marketers and account planners out there, have a look at the Leo Burnett predictions in marketing for 2009. A few things might not sound new, and on a few things you might disagree. But it’s a good set of inspirations for the new year.

I especially appreciated the idea of New Realism when they say “we will be forced to become much more realistic over the coming years” but I also think it’s important that agencies will align with brands on this subject. For this reason I also recommend (both agencies and clients) to read also the latest Future Lab report called “Bridging the Brand-Agency Divide” that offers a few tips to understand and reconnect the client-agency relationship in an era of economic (but not creative) recession.

File under: marketing trends

The new age of advertising

Advertising is hijacking all the blank spaces. Eggs, body parts, air-sickness bags… no blank space will survive. The world has become a stage for product placement. The Baltimore Sun has a good article on the new advertising age, where marketers are trying to catch you where you least expect it. Scary to read if you’re a consumer, inspiring to read if you’re a marketer

It’s all about engagement… or maybe not?

On ClickZ, writes a very interesting article on the “engagement” idea in online marketing. I’m so happy to hear her point of view on this topic! One thing’s for certain: engagement as the objective of your next marketing campaign doesn’t make a lot of sense, at least until we’ve figured out how to definitively measure the results. It’s amazing how many times we concentrate all our attention on the “beauty” of a website, on how it is funny or on its viral potentials etc… and we therefore miss the key points any online effort should bear in mind: which are the marketing and communication objectives of my online campaign? Who am I trying to reach? Viral marketing applications can also be effective where engaging consumers is concerned if they serve a purpose beyond just that. Take a moment to recall some of the most popular viral videos and interactive tools and you’ll realize their success wasn’t measured in their ability to engage alone.

File under: engagement, viral marketing

Advertising industry lacks talent

Interviewed on Media Guardian, Bartle Bogle Hegarty founder John Hegarty believes the lack of talented people in advertising industry is a “major, major problem”. The industry is getting more and more complex and this sophistication requires people with skills and talent, ready to adapt to the new challenges.

Before, it was easier to get people because what we needed them to do was less than we need them to do today. (…) We have an industry that’s totally appalling in training people. I think it’s hard, the creative department is unbelievably hard. There’s a dearth of good creative directors out there – a complete dearth.

File under: advertising, Bartle Bogle Hegarty, talent

Predictions for online advertising in 2006

It’s November and it’s time to start with the predictions on what will happen next year in the advertising world. Will online advertising surpass outdoor? Will mobile marketing eventually take off? Will it be possible to find a reliable business model for podcasting? Etc… 24/7 Media has started the game announcing at Ad:Tech New York which will be the top 10 trend in online marketing and advertising in 2006. 1. Consumer-generated media will become increasingly attractive to advertisers 2. Advertisers will continue shifting traditional ad spending to the Web due to increased Internet consumption and better targeting/reporting capabilities 3. Advertisers, cable providers and interactive marketing experts will collaborate to address “The TiVo Effect” 4. Brand advertisers will drive the next wave of growth for the paid search market 5. Best practices in localized mobile marketing will be perfected overseas in 2006 6. Online advertisers will employ holistic targeting methods to deliver better results and reduce reliance on high-profile, high-CPM ad buys 7. Technology and better data access will transform online advertising success to a formulaic equation 8. Japan will be the next frontier for paid search and interactive marketing 9. Mobile carriers will adopt new ad models to boost revenue beyond usage 10. Performance-based pricing models will demonstrate the true value of search engine marketing (SEM) as a lead generation channel As you can see, mobile marketing is also touched in the prediction. It is expected to take off here in Europe, while it will still be in the test phase in the US. More details on each single item can be found in the press release. [via AdJab]

File under: 24/7 Media, predictions 2006

Olympic advertising: forget about de Coubertin

Advertisers targeting Chinese people at the next Olympic games in Beijing in 2008 will have to think different and forget about the traditional “soft and fuzzy”. Quoted on The Guardian, Tom Doctoroff, the chief executive of advertising agency JWT greater China and area director of north-east Asia says:

“Don’t go soft and fuzzy in the western humankind brotherhood tradition. Chinawill view the games with completely different eyes. Chinese revere and fear winners. You should directly link the product with the conquering spirit of the victors”.

The Chinese market is huge and therefore extremely attractive, but brands need to learn playing by the rules, the rules provided by the government but also the rules set by the Chinese culture and tradition.

File under: advertising, Beijing 2008, china