Filed under: Brands & Marketing, Environment | Tags: advertising, Britain, generation difference, music, Orange, outdoor, poster, racism, Rock Corps, Tinchy Stryder
A lot of people still say Britain has a racism problem. Whilst there is no doubt that this sick issue perpertrated by ignorance still exists, things are nothing like when our parents were young – thankfully!
Case in point is this Orange poster:
Tinchy Stryder and Orange poster
Whilst walking by the poster last night (with some older generation folks) they stopped and pointed it out to me as an example of how things have changed (for the better). It took me a few moments to work out what they were talking about and then I realised. It was the realisation that left me with mixed feelings – sad that I still recognised what they were talking about and happy that it was not immediately apparent to me. I also wondered if anyone at Orange or their ad agency had given this any thought? There may well be the few who get offended but the same url /monkey is applied to all the posters and relates to the personality of fun (I think). Advertisers need to be aware of how their work can be viewed and the social ‘baggage’ that they sometimes have to drag along. Likewise they should never shy from a good idea because of the risk of a few people taking the campaign out of context. The Orange campaign is a good one and any person offended by the above advert is as equally narrow-minded as the person that would endorse it for the wrong reasons.
So my conclusion is that it’s a good thing most people will miss the ‘racial banana skin’ on this advert as it shows how our country is progressing and moving on from horrible racist terms to describe people, but the fact this post was written shows we still have some distance to go. What are your thoughts?
Filed under: Industry news, News, Our team | Tags: advertising, Brand Republic, IPA, member, neoco, new, organisation, PR, practitioners
brilliant online resource with fantastic journalists and articles... like the one about us yay!
If you are up to speed with our agency tweeting (if not, please explain why – ed) then you’ll know we applied for and were accepted in to the IPA! Hooray. Well, it looks like the IPA were proud to have us and Brand Republic obliged with some press coverage. You can read the article here
Or you can read the original IPA article here.
yay! look our logo on the IPA homepage. sweet.
Filed under: Brands & Marketing | Tags: advertising, Coca-Cola, Innocent, marketing, McDonalds, News
Not so long ago, I was still a grubby student studying Advertising and Marketing Comms at Bournemouth University. Innocent was a brand we’d all use to demonstrate our conceptual understanding time and time again. The only explanation for this I can think of is that, as a bunch of lively late-teens, we had a close affinity and understanding of the brand already (well, we wouldn’t have picked anything hard now, would we?!). This is more pertinent given that I’ve been to the Innocent Summer Fete two years on the trot, and am planning to go back this year.
It all begs the question: what is it about the Innocent brand that builds such subconscious salience amongst my demographic? I’d put money on it being the very ‘Innocence’ of the brand – the fact that it brings out the kid in everyone by building such an idealistic experience around what is essentially still, just a drink. But unusually, I don’t mind feeling duped by the powers of Innocent’s marketing comms – having spent so many years studying it, I appreciate that I’m harder than most to be sold a product, let alone a brand’s ideology. So when I buy into something enough to let my guard down, I’m really quite impressed.
The thing about Innocent is that there’s a fair trade – you hand over your otherwise cynical, sarcastic and close-minded attitude to sales messages, and in return they offer a unique and truly engaging brand experience that is as real at their Summer Fete as the images they paint in your mind. I’d put it down to their marketing strategy being as synergetic as any depicted in a textbook, which I think owes as much to the unified vision of the founders as good marketing practice. The wonderful thing about Innocent has been the consistency of it’s touchpoints with consumers – from the summery nature of the product, to it’s links with live music, to the bunting, knitting and welly wanging – it’s a return to the quintessential English traditions that time has otherwise forgotten about.
So it was with horror that I found out that Innocent has now sold a minority stake worth £30m to Coca-Cola. If anything could be further from Innocent’s links to all things traditionally quaint and British, it’s one of the biggest corporate bloodsuckers on the planet. And this is on top of Innocent’s flirtation with McDonald’s a while back, trialling Innocent smoothies with kids’ Happy Meals.
Honestly, I feel pretty confused. I feel cheated by an otherwise loyal and trustworthy friend. It just goes to show what can happen when you build such a close relationship with your consumers – they expect you to stay true to the brand vision they bought into, even if macro-economic factors make it hard to achieve.
Everyone’s feeling the pinch of recession, but Innocent’s decision to ally with an American multinational could prove far more damaging in the long term than the short term cash flow problems it will address. I really hope not – but in the meantime, I’ll be sticking to my fizzy water.
Coxy.
Filed under: News, Ping.fm update by Neoco, research | Tags: advertising, audience, Digital Strategy Consulting, DSC, DTA, ecommerce, IAB UK, Lightspeed, online, reserach, shopping
A recent survey by Lightspeed Research and the IAB UK has found that consumers are most receptive to online ads whilst researching and shopping.
The research found that consumers believe they are most likely to pay attention to ads from the early evening onwards, particularly if they are engaged in social networking or e-commerce activity. However, while the early evening was the best time of the day for all age groups, for younger audiences there was likely to be a steady increase in their attention to adverts as the day progressed, especially with entertaining ads. This was markedly different for older age groups who had peaks between 9-12pm and 2-6pm – this was the same for a recent digital marketing campaign by Neoco promoting movie entertainment.
The survey also revealed that people prefer not to be interrupted when they are engaged in an activity that requires their full attention such as watching catch-up TV or movie clips.
(Thanks to Digital Strategy Consulting for the graph)
Want more insight like this? Neoco send out a regular email with a collection of great facts and insight like this, combined with a series of workshops for that enable you to maximise that knowledge. Just get in touch with Benn for more info.
Filed under: Brands & Marketing, Events | Tags: advertising, Alastair douglas, Andrew Sibley, B2B, council, Covent Garden, Digital, event, forum, Guy Philipson, Hanne Tuomisto, hopefully they've got nice food, IAB, joe harrison, london, online, Richard Bush, UK
IAB banner
Another event that you can catch the Neoco team at – or ask us for a report from is the IAB B2B forum: B2B marketing can be hugely different to consumer facing campaigns, particularly when using online advertising, but it can also be incredibly powerful when used correctly.
This essential IAB afternoon forum will give you everything you need to use internet advertising correctly to attract, convert and retain customers in the B2B sector. Whether you are entirely new to internet advertising, or are simply looking to refine your skills, this event will equip you with actions to take back to your teams, improve your business systems and ultimately increase your return on investment in 2009 and beyond.
The IAB has been providing educational material and thought leadership in the B2B sector for many years through its B2B Council. Consisting of the industry’s leading experts, the Council has put together an agenda that is packed with case studies, helpful tips and facts. It will cover most forms of internet advertising from a strategic perspective, including search, email, display and video marketing.
At the event, the B2B Council will also be launching their latest publication with every delegate receiving a free hard copy.
AGENDA
12.45 – 1.15pm
Arrival and lunch
1.15pm – 1.30pm
Chairman’s welcome and B2B Market Overview
Joel Harrison Editor for B2B Marketing
1.30 – 2.00pm
ATTRACT – Innovative online thought leadership
Hanne Tuomisto-Inch – Banner Corporation
Andrew Sibley – Head of Brand & Advertising – Cisco Systems
Cisco’s European head of brand and advertising, Andrew Sibley, will shed light into Cisco’s worldwide experiences and strategies in branding and marketing to business and IT decision-makers in the digital space. Cisco, one of the IT industry’s leading innovators, is a good example of a company that is at the forefront of innovation in digital marketing. Online is key to all Cisco’s communications from enhancing brand experience to launching new products.
BREAK
2.20 – 2.50pm
CONVERT – Delivering business intelligence through digital acquisition 2 x breakaway sessions: long and short closing cycles
Edward Weatherall – Concep
Matt Cooksley – Global eMarketing Manager – Cushman & Wakefield LLP
Long closing cycles: Cushman & Wakefield is the world’s largest privately held real estate services firm with 221 offices in 58 countries and more than 15,000 employees. The firm offers a complete range of services to various clients, from small businesses to Fortune 500 companies. Based around the long cycle, if you choose to attend this session you will learn how to convert clients for larger purchases that require a longer period of consideration.
Alastair Douglas – Simply Business
Short closing cycles: If you run campaigns within quick closing cycle sectors, this session will be perfect for tips to improve upon your campaigns from an expert in this field. Simply Business is the UK’s most popular business insurance and finance portal, using many internet advertising tools including search to deliver undeniably good results.
2.50 – 3.20pm
RETAIN – The role of Internet marketing in Retention
Richard Bush – MD – BaseOneGroup
Retention is key, we all know that, but what role can the internet play in developing and retaining our most valuable customers. In this interactive session we’ll be investigating the retention potential of a whole range of web based techniques from search to virtual seminars.
3.20 – 3.40pm
FUTURE – 2009: an IAB insight
Guy Phillipson – CEO – IAB UK
3.40 – 4.00pm
Q & A
Filed under: Brands & Marketing | Tags: advertising, BA, bad, Barcelona, celebrity, Digital, football, Konica Minolta, marketing, online, responsive, Ronaldinho, soccer, sponsorship, star, T5, Ternial 5, ugly people, waste of money
Konica Minolta ad with Ronaldinho
One of the great things about online and digital advertising/ marketing is how responsive it can be. The fairly recent BA T5 ads were great as they streamed almost live images of the queues at the airport to show you that things were back to normal (or not). There was also a lot of effort to make these ads appear in relevant places both online and offline. Well done BA marketing team and agency. Which leads me to the Konica Minolta marketing team and/or agency…
The other morning I saw this new(?) ad campaign, a £1.4m ad campaign that clearly shows bad advertising is bad regardless of media. The ads are for the print machine manufacturers Konica Minolta and dedicates approx. 80% of the media to the less than pretty face of footballing maestro Ronaldinho. The lone statement reads ‘Ronaldinho brings dramatic improvements to football. KM brings dramatic improvements to colour output’. A little more research in to the campaign shows that maybe this is not totally bad advertising but more out of touch. It appears the campaign was masterminded in Japan and handed down to territories. Now, maybe in the Land of the Rising Sun, Ronaldinho is still seen as something special but for anyone who actually keeps up with football (which is surely a large part of the target audience for this ad?) then they would know Ronaldinho has been struggling with his football game, weight and lifestyle for about 18 months or more. Famously dumped from Barcelona for being unfit, unmotivated and a little petulant, why on Earth would you think this is a good image for your product? So the ad campaign was launch exactly a year ago but he was struggling with all these issues back then.
Importantly, why keep running the ads now? This billboard went up a matter of days ago and highlights the issues of advertising offline. At least if this was online, the banners/ MPU/ whatever could be updated with new content or even a new tagline, maybe something like ‘KM printers stay in their prime long after others have lost theirs’
Filed under: Technology | Tags: advertising, algorithm, bias, content, disclaimer, editorial, Google, interface, keywords, Le Web, links, machine, Marissa Meyer, objectivity, Page Rank, peer review, ranking, Search, search engine, search results, SearchWiki, SEO, subjectivity, Technology, topics, trust, Wikipedia
It is generally agreed that when we potter over to Google, hunting for enormously exciting topics to read about, we want it to return the best results possible for a search. But who or what should decide what those “best” results are? Option one – is a machine. Since its conception in 1998, Google has based results on its Page Rank™ algorithm. A method of measuring a page’s importance based on its incoming links, which – it is generally accepted – was Google’s major unique selling point. One of the keys to Page Rank’s success was its pure objectivity. All pages were born equal in Google’s eyes, and had to “earn” their rank by other pages “voting” for them via an incoming link. Google’s – or anyone else’s – personal opinion of a given page was effectively irrelevant.
However there are problems with this which first started to surface a few years ago. Google appeared to be struggling. With the Internet growing at a rate of 10 million pages per day, they appeared to be struggling to find a relevant page for all those obscure topics out there. The tiny amount of relevant content was slowly getting lost in all of the rubbish (and porn).
Option two – is a human. The best current example of a large human created information resource is Wikipedia. Written and reviewed by humans, Wikipedia is a collection of over 9.1 million pages covering almost all topics of interest. Because Wikipedia is peer reviewed so closely, you can almost guarantee a relevant page is returned, whether you’re searching for “Aabenraa”, “Zaafaraniyeh” or “Basil Brush” – the lovable anthropomorphic fox. But there are obvious problems with this. A human created resource is subject to bias. Even when reviewed by large numbers of people, cultural bias still exists.
So why is this relevant? Well – in my opinion – Google has hit a wall (again) when it comes to returning relevant content using purely machine learning. With the Internet now containing more than 1 trillion (that’s 1,000,000,000,000) pages, Google’s job in finding those top 10 relevant pages for a given term is now harder than ever. At the end of the day – for now at least – a computer cannot fully comprehend all of the possible variations a given search term could mean, and the relevance (if any) that those variations can have with each other.
One option Google has is to start applying human editorial judgement to their search results. This however would surely go against Google’s founding principle. Then again, there are signs that Google are starting to consider just that. Their Terms and Conditions used to state that “Google’s indices are indexed by Google’s automated machinery and computers”, but this disclaimer has now been removed. Perhaps the most interesting development to this effect is Google’s recent interface change. When you now perform a search on Google whilst signed in, you are graciously supplied with additional controls relating to their “SearchWiki”. As you can see from the image below, we are now given the options to “Promote” or “Remove” a URL (using the icons to the right of the page’s title).
Now initially, using these options only affects what you (you being the person currently signed into Google) see. However Marissa Meyer (Vice President of Search Product and User Experience at Google) has stated that “in the future it’s likely Google will use the data to at least make obvious changes”. Now this comment, made at Le Web conference in Paris last December, is enormously significant. This is – for the first time – Google admitting that they are going to use human generated information to affect their search results.
So what are the ramifications of this? Well I could go on for quite a while about these, but let’s just stick to the key factors. First, this is going to affect the Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) industry. At present SEO “experts” can go about their task with the sure knowledge that Google will treat the site they’re working on with the pure, unemotional objectivity as every other site online. However once human subjectivity is added into the mixing bowl, all this changes. At this point it doesn’t matter if you have the perfect keywords in just the right positions around your site, if enough users don’t agree that your site matches the search term, then that alone could send it tumbling down the search results.
The other key factor is trust from the perspective of objectivity. One of the reasons for Google’s mass popularity is that when you enter a term to search for, you can be sure that the results returned are not there due to any bias, be it political, religious, cultural etc. However if Google do decide to go down this path, then it’s quite likely that we will start to see a bias on the side of those who choose to use tools such as the SearchWiki. This might not only affect our faith in Google, but more importantly – from Google’s perspective at least – advertisers’ trust in Google. After all, nobody is going to want to advertise with a company who appears to be favouring a competitor.
So what would you rather? An objective search engine run by a machine that returns ok results, or a subjective search engine run by humans that gives “better” results (assuming you side with the bias)?
Filed under: Brands & Marketing, Events | Tags: advertising, Andy Burnham, conference, control, digital marketing, engagement, futurology, i'm in charge here, IAB, Jerry Yang, Justin Billingsley, MP, Orange, piracy, robots, Rt. Hon, who's in control, Yahoo!
IAB Engage 2008
This year’s IAB Engage Conference was yet again packed with impressive speakers. Digital Marketing professionals and advertisers came together on Wednesday to discuss issues from piracy to measuring engagement, from integration of TV and online advertising to the extreme possibilities of the future – we’ll be sending our robots to shop for us within ten year apparently, and our dreams will soon be infiltrated by product placement via our personal contact lens screens!!
The Keynote speakers, Yahoo! founder Jerry Yang and Rt. Hon Andy Burnham MP, were less controversial and engaging than some of the others guests but their presence was a testament to the high profile of the event. A real highlight was a presentation by Orange brand director Justin Billingsley who certainly made the case for making digital the starting point for any marketing effort.
As impressive as Orange’s campaigns are, it is clear that their creative ideas only work because they are based on a simple principle. Namely that digital marketing should aim to entertain, answer, or add utility before it aims to advertise. This is a great way to make sure brands are working with consumers and not at them and it’s exactly how Neoco approaches its work.
The theme of the conference was “who’s in control” which framed the discussions perfectly. More than one speaker argued that marketeers have the power to make the difference – good news for us! Recent Neoco campaigns, however, are a testament to the success of putting consumers in control. For my part, I can’t help thinking control is the subject of so much debate because it’s basically a redundant concept but perhaps that for another blog piece…
Filed under: Coffee Break | Tags: advert, advertising, best, Billboard, ever, failing education system, John Smith, london, mispelling, mistake, msipelilng, poster, TFL, tube, Underground, wallpaper
Following on from my previous post about the best Tube advert ever (click here to read), I was at Waterloo the other day and saw a follow up contender…
tub
You have to love the gritty feel to it along with the no-nonsense approach to clearly defining (with yellow arrows) where the advertising space is. Closer inspection also reveals the typo ‘NEW ADD’. So, I nominate this as the best advert for the fact that Britain has a failing education system for the ‘common’ person. It also doubles up as an advert for a failing Tube/ Underground system…
tube ADD image numero 2
Filed under: Industry news, research | Tags: advertising, cinema, direct mail, figures, first time, growth, magazine, market, newspapers, online, press, record high, research, spend, UK, World Advertising Research Centre
New research by the Advertising Association and the World Advertising Research Centre (WARC) has shown that the total online ad spend in the UK reached a record high of £3bn for the first time over the last year.
Online now accounts for 16% of the total UK advertising market, growing 39.5% last year and remaining the UK’s fastest growing sector.
Ad spend across all media in the UK over the last year grew 4.2% to £19.4bn. The UK cinema advertising sector saw great growth, rising by 10.1% – although, at £207m, this is only worth 1.1% of the UK’s total advertising market. Outdoor advertising also grew by 4.6%, to £1.05bn, which gives it a 5.5% share of the UK advertising market.
Press is still the largest single sector in the UK, accounting for £7.7bn, which is around 40% of the UK advertising market. However, there was some bad news for press advertising as it saw a decline of 1.6%. Direct mail advertising also saw a decline, but a much greater one, at 6.5% taking its total spend to £2.17bn.
Many analysts have long predicted that online would soon be stealing market share from newspapers, magazines and direct mail – and these figures seem to prove them right.
