Via @inakiescudero I discovered a very smart online promotion EA is currently running in Spain to drive awareness around the upcoming release of FIFA 10. Since the beginning of September (when the demo of the game has been released) on the website of Marca.es (very popular sports daily) visitors can download the demo, play the game, score goals, save them and re-upload the videos on Marca's website entering a contest to award the most beautiful goal scored.
I just came across this cool new campaign for a new apple cider in Australia. To celebrate the release of Tooheys Extra Dry 5 Seeds, Holler Sydney have developed a teaser campaign, hiding giant apples all over Sydney for the next 10 days. Track one down and you've got a shot at picking up one of the prizes.
Clues as to the apple's whereabouts are given out through the 5 Seeds Facebook page and Twitter stream where you can also follow the tag #applehunt.
It's nice to see agencies blurring the line between online and offline, utilising the increase of web-ready mobile devices, allowing people to take the campaign with them onto the streets and away from their computer.
The regional government of Catalunya (Spain) has launched a good initiative to explain citizens how small gestures make the difference in saving energy, protecting the environment, saving lives or simply building a nicer place to live etc...
Using animated cartoons, the website takes you through a series of practical examples, also provinding a series of information on how life in Catalunya has improved in the last year or so, since when the government introduced new services.
Looks like some brands in fashion and luxury are eventually getting the new marketing model right. Some time ago we saw the simple and beautiful Louis Vuitton book trailer. Now it's the time of Paul Smith designing a bottle for Evian. This kind of co-lab of course doesn't sound neither new nor original. What is new and positive is instead the video created to present the project on the Web.
A bit of backstage, some insights from Mr Paul Smith (who is a very nice guy) and a smart PR seeding on a website like HypeBeast. At the end, even if the video will get only 50000 views, I would say the job is well anyway done because the viewers are so much in target, probably influencers or cool people wanna be. Forget immediate ROI, an online video is not the way to get it. Think long term and think about the importance of nurturing your brand appeal day by day with small but important actions.
Last but not least, take a note of what Paul Smith says at the end of the video: "Life is about living young, being useful and enjoy yourself every day". A quote to remember not only for individuals, but also for brands.
Very nice piece of work coming from Italy (weird but true). I'm very glad to share this video created to promote the Baseball World Cup finals currently taking place in Nettuno/Anzio.
Anzio is a beach close to Rome where in 1944 the Americans disembarked.
Maybe more for the media guys, but it's countless times that i have had some discussions with the media agencies that work for some of our clients over the way a campaign of ours is published. Today, while reading Techcrunch, i found this article called "Let's kill the CPM" by Shelby Bonnie, ex-CEO at CNET and now at Whiskey Media, about why he thinks the concept of CPM shouldn't be used anymore when selling a campaign. It raises some questions without giving specific answers, but i think is worth reading, at least sets the tone for a conversation on the subject, wheter you agree with him or not.
Insanely insightful. This presentation from Google, describing several cases of succesful and creatives uses of their platform is awesome. A must for everybody with a bit of a techie, creative, planner or whatever. And I miss some uses that Iain once suggested...
Enrique (Henry), also called Quique the head, was born a head and in Argentina, now he's looking for a body in this clever campaign made by Shackleton, are you the donator he's looking for? This video tells his story (big time when he sneezes):
Diesel appears two or three times on the site and is also the registrant for the domain name, and two of the tags of the video are "fashion" and "motorbike", so i guess it's about Diesel helmets? (my own update, it's about Mowie Helmets, by Diesel)
(so funny that the guy on the right of the Youtube video caption above is my friend Marc, who worked both at Shackleton and Diesel some time ago)
As i'm from Spain and i live in Mexico, i spend some time every day reading the online press from my country, trying to be aware of how the things are going and so on. One of the many newspapers i often visit is Publico, and reading about Jim Jarmusch presenting his new movie at San Sebastian festival i found that in the right side of the page a subtle text claims "doble clic en cualquier palabra para ver su definicion" (meaning "double click any word to get its meaning"), next to a brand called Dixio, which seems to be a service that provides real-time definitions.
If you're a Twitter user you're probably familiar with the fail whale that appears every time the site is down whatever the reason is. Here's an idea, that this simple shooting game, "Die Fail Whale", had been released by Twitter and linked from that fail page so you could get rid of all the anger, instead of a "we're right back" static message.
But actually it's not from Twitter, it's been done by Andrew Conn, kudos for the good laughs i had shooting whales :)
NYC law requires restaurants with over 10 locations to label their menus with calorie totals. But, do you think you can estimate the right amount of calories in these places? Calorie Confusion is an interesting app done by Matt Daniels to gain some perspective on the need of data transparency.
Thinking inside the box is a project from Zulu Alpha Kilo agency, setting eight of their "interdisciplinary thinkers" in a white box for nine hours in Dundas Square (Toronto), and then asking people to come up with some questions and problems to be solved by the eight creatives. The site is pretty neat and well done and it's quite interesting seeing the videos and how they proposed solutions for the questions raised.
By: daniel // Permalink // Comment(s): Category(s):New websites
With a similar quality of production but much less playable than the year before, it's more of a visual experience than a game, apparently i need a Doritos bag to finish playing, somebody help me?
In London, Castrol has raised this interesting issue, providing some info to drivers while they're passing by some billboards with cameras that read vehicles' registration number.
Two years after the superb HBO Voyeur campaign, HBO is coming up with a new and interesting narrative experiment called "HBO Imagine", where you can see some stories told from 4 different angles each, so you can see the whole story only if you check the four or them.
The first one is a 2-part experience: first up is a gigantic 4-sided film experience that will be displayed in NYC, DC, and Philadelphia.
+ September 17-19 NYC (Gansevoort and Little West 12th)
+ October 1-3 in Philadelphia (Old City District)
+ October 8-10 in Washington D.C. (Plaza at Adams Morgan)
On these gigantic 4-sided displays there are 2 different short films playing, directed by Noam Murro, and each film is the same scene from 4 different angle.
The online part, the website, is one of that rare pieces (because these days it's all about fast to see fast to share) that suggest there's a lot to explore and find, through a wonderful 3D menu, go check it out, it's really worth seeing.
Lynx in Australia has launched a new OTP/microsite that takes the user through a series of websites (although it's really just one faux site) that links in to the next site and so on... It's been very well produced and has mini game elements throughout the play-through. I remember seeing a great execution for Lynx shower gel a while back which was a story about a dude who gets kidnapped by hot chicks and you need to decide the path at the end of each section. I did really like it and watched it all the way through. Take a look.
Help the digital creative community starting the week with a boost of inspiration. Every Monday share the best piece of digital creativity you've seen the week before. Tweet #interactivemonday, the project URL and the agency name. And please, no self promotion, let the others judge your work.
H&M; is online with a new website to launch its Fall/Winter collection. Once again they do simple neat things that work very well to present a wide range of items while keeping the experience at least a bit inspirational.
The images of the offline campaign are slightly animated in a Fall mood with blowing wind and falling leaves. Not really exciting, but definitely better than simple static shots. Each outfit comes with three buttons: one for sharing it with the world on a blog, one for commenting on Facebook (once again a smooth simple integration) and one to further explore the styling combination connected to that look.
Today Nike Sportswear is releasing two new videos -Adverblog readers are the first to discover- to promote its Hoodie AW77, a sweatshirt. Each one presents the success story of a French athlete in a non traditional way. I accept I may not be entirely objective as it is a French campaign I am working on, but I really think Duke made a great job. Good concept of storytelling, cool graphics, and nice music conception.
The first one is on the Man United left wingback Patrice Evra. Here is his story :
These "Did you know" videos are becoming kind of a tradition every year. Even if not about advertising, they are pretty interesting because they show some curious numbers about the changing media landscape in these days:
Vodafone just released a short but interesting online campaign in The Netherlands, called Upgrade a Stranger. Random people on the street are filmed (in pairs), and streamed live to the campaign website. Visitor of that site have 2 minutes two choose which one should get and upgrade. The fancy prices are handed out right away.
Maybe you remember a site called "Sexypolitics", a series of quizzes where earning points served for a stripper to do her virtual dance, and this project from Puma reminded me of that, but with an interesting twist, cheering people up in these times of global recession and using that to show a clothing catalog for next fall.
So, being available online or as an iPhone app, this thing called "The Index" works as follows: the worst the economic indexes are going, the less clothes the models will wear. And the opposite.
Season 4 premiere of Dexter airs on September 27 on Showtime, and one of the ways for the American pay tv channel to announce it is quite fun and simple. Remember when you were playing "where is waldo?" ...
That is a cool and clever way to use YouTube deep link feature.
Remember the T-Mobile dance at Liverpool Street Station for their Life's for Sharing campaign ? Then there was the Trafalgare square karaoke, where they made 13 500 people sing Hey Jude.
Well, it looks like the telecommunications brand is getting specialized in dancing flashmobs. They are back with the Oprah's Season 24 Kickoff Party, which took place in Chicago 6 days ago :
If you want more details on this T-Mobile action you can have a look on Oprah's website. Here.
While the concept is no longer original, and one can easily get tired of it, I must admit the images are impressive, especially if you consider this is for a tv show season kick off.
Update: The Youtube video is no longer available due to a copyright claim by Harpo, Inc., we have embedded an approved version found on ViralBlog
From Australia, Wicked Energy is an energy drink whose bottle has been illustrated (don't know if just for this campaign) by different tattoo-related artists. Quite straight and simple, the site also includes beautiful downloads and even a game, so you can play being the dragon trying to reach the top of the bottle.
Very nice job by my Nikefootball colleagues in Brazil to celebrate Luis Fabiano and the Brazilian team who qualified for the World Cup next June in South Africa.
The video is part of the Make the Difference campaign launched worldwide a few weeks ago.
The Central Station of Antwerp is at least a 100 years old and recently rebuild. To give the (online) world a peak of the results, Famous Brussels put the whole station in pixel art. You can now take a virtual tour, create you own avatar and even collect diamands for extra info on the station. A fun and easy solution to show off the impressive building in a 3d environment.
Then add your logo at the end or just in a corner, tiny size, i don't care, you already got me. Let me embed and send it to my friends and i'll make you rich and famous.
In Australia, with the launch of the new Mercedes Benz E-class, something had to be done for the car dealers to get rid (in less than 60 days) of the still available 2421 cars in stock, and that is the main point of this "Let's talk" campaign. And as a part of the strategy they set up some simple but brilliant banners like this one.
There are more executions of the same concept here.
These days i'm judging LIA Awards and it's interesting that more and more often you can find a lot of digital entries submitted not as separate elements of the campaign (microsite, banners or whatever) but what is submitted is the whole campaign itself, even when in "banners" category, for instance, so very often you don't know what to judge exactly. What makes me think about another thing, that is that many entries are not really powerful by themselves, but in the context of the campaign where they live that pieces become substantially relevant.
Does it make any sense judging them as in a "digital" category then? The first example of this happened when i had to judge the banners of this campaign for Dodge in Belgium, made by Proximity BBDO.
The tagline is quite simple, being Dodge a "macho" car, and trying to engage people for their new release, a familiar one, the test drive consists on going to the car dealer and have sex in the back seat of the test car. Then, if you got pregnant and have a baby within the next 9 months you get the car for free
A year ago, Weezer released a video for one of their singles paying homage to many different Youtube memes. That concept of mashing up different memes was what i was reminded with when i saw this video The Viral Factory has just created promoting the new Activision's Blur game, where you have to race a car and fight some other participants in a really bad mood. Every time you hit them or make a boost or something you get a message on the screen, and that messaging ("SHOCK", "BARGE", "SHUNT", "NITRO", "MINES") is what they applied for the different meme compilation, fun (and sometimes wtf) to watch.
By: daniel // Permalink // Comment(s): Category(s):Online Ads
After the Halo 3 one, another game with an energized teaser trailer, the new version of one of the most popular car racing games ever: Need for Speed. The formula, quite simple again, once you upload your picture (or not) you can get to a video where you live the experience of being a real pilot, i think that it works well with the game fans (funny that if you upload a photo you sign an autograph for one girl, but it you don't upload anything she kisses you)
If you're a fan of NBA (or basketball in general) you'll probably enjoy this nice art-directed site called History of Flight (by Academy), 24 years of Nike Air Jordan sneakers, as a recap of some very defining moments of NBA history through the do's and don'ts of Michael Jordan.
The website you don't expect from a large retailer in electronics: the multimedia home recently launched in France by Darty to support its back to school business.
Very nicely designed, the interactive experience allows you to explore a large series of electronic devices you can find in a house and, of course, buy in a Darty shop. It's quite impressive to see from "above" how many stuff we have (or could have) in our homes...
In Brazil, Mentos has recently launched a retro style viral campaign to promote its Power Kiss candies. A teaser video posted on Youtube promotes a series of lessons to be learned following the "Kamasutra do Beijo" (kiss Kamasutra) instructions.
In Japan Axe is back with a new weird but cool campaign. Axe in the Dark is an amusing advergame inspired to horror movies full of monsters and with one hero who will (or could) rescue the girl. Everything takes place in a dark cinema hall: the player moves around with the keyboard, trying to avoid to meet the monster and, at the same time, looking for or, better, smelling for the hero who will save her. Make sure to use the hearphones to play.
Once again Axe manages to surprise us. For sure they don't lack in originality!!
Dutch beer brand Amstel just released an interesting brand utility, named Teamlink. It's an application designed for (Dutch) amateur football players, in support of their team and weekly matches. It features official local competition details as fixtures, tables and results, but also non-official information uploaded by the players themselves. The app can be embedded within social media or at the team's website, which makes it very accessible with high viral potential. Combined with a football minded nation (over 1 million amateur football players on 15 million people), I feel this can be a huge success. Hopefully Teamlink will proof that facilitating an online community is not only credible, but can also be very lucrative.
I love Halo 3 ads, it amazes me how they advertise a game in a film style and using the top places for gamers (like IGN.com on the net or at Xbox Live from the console itself), even better than many movies. This is the latest one for "Halo 3: ODST", to be released by the end of this month:
By: daniel // Permalink // Comment(s):(3) Category(s):Online Ads
Well Uniqlo has done it again with a great site that shows off their latest collection in a great new way.
I love the commitment that Uniqlo has put into the online medium and they always push ideas to the limit. Anyway check it out here
By: marka // Permalink // Comment(s): Category(s):New websites
There is a lot of controversy going on about the supposed ad from DDB Brazil for WWF, about the 9/11 and tsunami disasters. So far, it was only a print ad. But now a full commercial pops up, which doesn't make things any easier for WWF.
In Sweden, Lowe Brindfors has launched a new brand campaign for Saab featuring a TV spot and a website that want to remember consumers how cool and fascinating the brand is. The starting point maybe is a bit ambitious, but the result is astonishing. As said, the first piece is a beautiful Tv commercial that takes you through the world of Saab.
