Volkswagen Linkeduit

First interesting social campaign I've seen on Linkedin and a great use of the Linkedin API.

LinkedUit uses the LinkedIn API to create a Top Trumps type game where players compete against other LinkedIn contacts with LinkedIn data (such as number of connections, current position, work experience) used for scoring.

This is a great video that shows LinkedUit in action. You can visit the site here: http://www.linkeduit.nl

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Gaming can make a better world

A great TED Talk about how we can use gamification to help make the world a better place. All the key elements of building behaviors through pervasive game play and game mechanics are weaved together nicely into a story as told by Jane McGonigal from the Institute for the Future.

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Interactive Youtube Music Machine

This was submitted as part of the YouTube Cannes Young Lions 48 Hour Ad contest. Great idea and use of the number keys to skip to sections of the video and a great tie in with the campaign objective.

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Westpac Impulse Saver

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The Best Excuse Ever

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Death Can Catch You Anywhere, Anytime

IF I DIE is a unique Facebook app that enables people to leave a message that will leave a message that will only be published after they die. To get the word out on this unique service (since nobody thinks they will die anytime soon), the agency involved used APIs from popular location based services such as Foursquare and combined with Twitter searches for "Facebook Places" to track thousands of check-ins worldwide. With this information, they knew where someone was in real time and could communicate the message to the person in context to his/her location (the message being "Death can catch you anywhere, anytime, even at [Your current location]). A morbid but interesting execution which I think can be used in spirit for some pretty interesting brand campaigns leveraging on people's real time locations.

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Donate A Word

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Pepsi Social Vending

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Fiat Street Evo

Love this idea of turning street signs into QR codes that each sell a feature of the new Fiat Punto Evo and leveraging on a piece of technology to create a more engaging experience to what could have possibly been just a car catalog

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The Real Cost of Social Media

A great infographic, especially for client side marketers to understand the true cost of leveraging on Social Media. Yes most social media tools are free, but social media marketing takes a lot of effort and resources to do well.

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Volkswagen Scirocco Cup Augmented Reality Advergame

This is a little dated (from last year) but a great example of leveraging on technology (Augmented Reality) to deliver an immersive experience.

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Axe Multiple Girlfriends App

I like that this is a really simple app delivered based on an interesting consumer insight that generated enough social currency (buzz, viral lift or whatever else you want to call it) to spread through people's social networks via Facebook.

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Tsingtao Beer - Strangest Beer Culture

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The Lynx Stream

Ever been too drunk after a night out to remember what happened? Introducing The Lynx Stream; an app that captures and records unforgettable nights out.

The Lynx Stream collects every video, picture, text, tweet, check-in and status update a group of friends makes to produce an automatic Stream of the night and highlight video, which can be watched and shared online

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Reebok The Promise Keeper

Reebok is venturing into the app and utility market for running shoes, trying to expand it beyond sports but into consumer lifestyles like Nike+ (the clear leader and a classic case study for building branded platforms) and Adidas miCoach.

The Promise Keeper will ensure that you make your runs as scheduled. The idea is that by keeping your friends all over the web aware of your running plans, you'll have no choice but to get yourself up off the couch and out of the door.

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The Hectic Schedule of a Social Media Manager

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Viral Videos

How's this for a viral video? It has all the ingredients of fun, entertainment and exaggeration. It doesn't even matter that it's not real.

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Hyundai Accent 3D projection mapping

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Google Goggles vs Sudoku

In case you didn't know this, you can now solve all your Sudoku puzzles via your mobile using Google Goggles.

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First iPad 2 Augmented Reality Application

This will open up a whole lot of Augmented Reality opportunities for brands

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Lynx Excite Angel Ambush London Victoria

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Mercedes Benz - Transparent Walls

Mercedes have developed a new "pre-safe" feature where dangers are identified by the car at an early stage, which then automatically takes counter measures to avert them.

Rather than just tell consumers about the new feature, they created an interactive installation to demonstrate it:

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How to make a video go viral

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Building Sustainable Campaigns Through Platforms

aditionally, agencies have always been rooted in developing campaigns for their clients. This form of classic advertising creates episode-like outbound messages across all channels. With the advent of digital, this same way of working has been extended online.

Platforms vs. Campaigns

Agencies would build individual campaigns that usually result in the creation of a campaign microsite and the deployment of online media to drive traffic to that site.

However, this form of individual campaign experience requires constant traffic driving and has no long-term benefit. Campaigns are short-lived and usually extend the delivery of the brand promise to the digital space and ends after a certain period of time. They follow an up and down cycle. As soon as the campaign has finished and the online media has run its course, the audience dissipates.

What the evolving digital landscape now allows us to do is create a brand platform experience. This arises from the fact that digital creates many unexpected connections between people, technology, and brands and has the power to go beyond the category and shape conversations in society.

Platforms are revolutionising the way brands market to their customers. They are built to last and grow over time; while campaigns are short-lived, platforms are evergreen.

A digital platform is based on utility and provides something that the consumer and audience will feel like using again and again. The best and most pervasive platforms become part of the audience’s lives. Even after the media spend ends, the money and energy invested in campaigns pay off in ongoing participation with that platform.

A great example of a platform is Nike+. Nike+ stems from the Nike+iPod sports kit that is embedded into your shoe, which communicates with your iPod or iPhone device and is able to store information about your runs such as distance, pace, and calories burned.

On the digital front, this is centered on an online platform (nikeplus.com) that gives users the ability to analyse their running data, set goals, track their progress, connect with fellow runners, and participate in group challenges.

Think about it, Nike+ has literally reinvented running – from a traditionally solitary activity to something both fun and social. Digital platforms have the ability to not just change customer perceptions and get them to engage with the brand; it can even compel them to change their behaviours and get them to start running and staying healthy.

Platforms are digital destinations that encourage ongoing engagement. They are more like services and tools vs. your usual information-driven campaign microsite.

Platforms + Campaigns

Even a platform rich with information is no good unless people know it’s there. That’s where campaigns come in.

Nike has showed with its activation campaigns the power and synergies of platforms and campaigns when you run them together.

Platform-centric campaigns such as the Nike Human Race, Men vs. Women, and Nike City10K Singapore vs. Kuala Lumpur all feed and build equity on the Nike+ platform, allowing the audience to participate in social challenges that help them get fit.

These campaigns don’t just drive brand awareness; they activate the existing platform community and provide new value to them. Additionally, they drive new membership and as they develop reach and frequency over time, create long-term value for the brand in the form of an owned media channel of customers and advocates.

Building a destination that gives people a reason to return and creating seasonal messages to remind them to do so is what creates great synergy between platforms and campaigns.

How Do We Create Platforms?

In this day and age, good digital planning revolves around platform ideas and not just (digital) channel tactics. Great platform ideas have the ability to change audience behaviours. This then becomes an own-able behaviour that brands can have, and with such branded behaviour, the audience literally becomes your ads.

Instead of looking at insights and then trying to plan a campaign around customer behaviours, platform ideas allow brands to decide how they want to shape that behaviour.

Platforms are rooted in communities and communities succeed if they solve a need, share an interest/passion, and connect people with those they care about.

The platform has to create value for its audience and this can be in the form of information, entertainment, or a utility. The platform should offer multiple levels of involvement, from creating and commenting to consuming content. In addition, the content provided should be curated by both the brand and its members so that the audience has new ways of discovering content.

In turn, a platform should provide brands with:

• A marketing/owned media channel
• Relevant content (via co-creation and crowdsourcing) that attracts people within the category
• A place for applications and services to be built on
• A place for consumers to talk to each other and to the brand

Platform ideas often do not fit into the client mould because of the long-term commitments. They are difficult to build and require a large commitment in terms of resources and budgets.

A key challenge for agencies to be able to deliver platform ideas is to have a connection with clients in top management. As we all know, many great ideas have been killed at a junior level before it even reaches upper management. This is especially important for platform ideas because it often requires a paradigm shift and will need the influence and buy-in of the company CEO.

The output of advertising has to change along with the changing digital landscape.

With platforms, a brand can reach its customers through meaningful personal experiences, two-way communication, and innovative technology.

Digital platforms unfold as they go, with the ability to build long-term communities over an indefinite period of time. When executed correctly, they provide scalable growth and the basis for long-term relationships and an in-depth interaction and connection between the consumer and the brand.

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Volkswagen - Fox at Planeta Terra

Interesting campaign by VW Brazil using Twitter and hashtags to drive awareness and interest to youngsters that their trendy car, The Fox would be at the biggest music festival in Brazil; The Planeta Terra Festival.

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M&Ms Spaceheroes electro

This M&M's online execution in Denmark using javascript apps launched from a page bookmark is an interesting way to deliver engaging experiences literally
anywhere on the web.

Simply go to http://www.m-ms.dk/spaceheroes/ to get the bookmarklet; drag it to your browser's bookmark bar and you're good to go.
Proceed to any website you like; click on the bookmark link on your browser and it launches the game on that site.

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Thank you A 1,000,000 Times

Porsche could have posted a simple status update to thank its 1 million Facebook fans. Instead, they decided to add the names of its 1 million Facebook fans onto a 911 GTR 3 R Hybrid and display it in the Porsche Museum.

Want to find out where your name is? Check out this microsite: http://www.porsche.com/microsite/facebook/international.aspx

Simply an awesome way of showing appreciation to your fans.

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Coca-Cola Happiness Store

A convenience store is converted into a happiness store, delivering "doses" of happiness to unsuspecting shoppers. Where will happiness strike next?

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The Speed Camera Lottery - The Fun Theory

Great campaign by VW -  Can we get more people to obey the speed limit by making it fun to do? Can fun really change human behavior?

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Love / Hate: The Advertising Relationships

Great video on the dichotomy of advertising. You love it as much as you hate it. That's why you still do it.

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How to make work-life balance work

Possibly one of the best and most relevant TED talks I've seen.

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Virtual holiday dinner 2010

Great X'mas idea by W+K Amsterdam

Over three days 156 people from 6 continents gathered to have a holiday dinner together, screen to screen. From families separated to strangers meeting for the first time, they all toasted to this season of togetherness.

A little thing called facial tracking software allowed the people calling in via Skype to move their dolls by simply moving their faces; making it as realistic as virtually possible.

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PETA Campaign Against Animal Cruelty

Interesting execution by McCann Singapore for PETA using Stickybits (the iPhone App) to bring a bit of interactivity to their outdoor ads.

The ads shows a range of leather goods on OOH mediums that are selling at huge discounts.

When users scan the barcode provided to find out the "sale" price using the Stickybits app, they are directed to videos staring celebrities (who support the PETA cause) illustrating how animals are exploited/killed to fashion these products.

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Google Demo Slam - Skydiving

Love this!

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Xbox 360 TVC

An old TV commercial that never got screened. But a really awesome one from Sony Xbox 360

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Rockem Sockem - The Augmented Reality Version

This is ultra cool - Mattel and Qualcomm have joined together to bring the Rock Em' Sock Em' game to life in a whole new way with Augmented Reality.

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RUN Fwd: - THE GLOBAL EKIDEN RELAY

Nike RUN Fwd is the latest campaign that rides on the Nike+ platform. Taking a queue from the ancient Japanese sport of Ekiden, a popular winter relay whereby teams run over long distances and hand over leadership with the exchange of a sash, Nikhe Run Fwd is a team relay that encourage users to form teams to run in a relay.

Another brilliant campaign that leverages on teams (along with Men vs Women and Nike City 10K Singapore vs Kuala Lumpur) by Nike that is sure to engage existing members and drive new users to the Nike+ platform

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The U.S Army Social Media Handbook

Now even the U.S Army has a social media handbook. And damn it's pretty good.

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The Future of Mobile Tagging

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The Chase Film

An awesome chase film to introduce the 2nd Gen Intel core i5 processor

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KLM surprise

Can an airline use social media to both surprise and make a difference to their passengers' day? Of course!

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11 Digital Trends to watch in 2011

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Why planners and creatives should become best friends

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How would you like your graphic design?

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Christmas 2.0

This is an awesome clip - The story of Nativity told through social media and mobile using Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Google, Wikipedia, Google Maps, GMail, Foursquare and Amazon

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Introducing Vodafone’s Power Pinata

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Save as WWF, Save a tree

Sometimes greatest ideas are the simple ones. This is a classic example.

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BMW - Flash Projection

This is pretty cool advertising by BMW Motorcycles - The after image effect

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Johnnie Walker - Say It Without Saying It

Nice!

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10 Trends for 2011

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Digital guru demystified

This is absolutely hilarious and so true

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Career Path of Corporate Social Strategist

Great slideshare by @jowyang from Altimeter Group on the career path of a corporate social strategist

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The Google Goggles Experiment

An Google experiment with tons of real world applications. Can't wait to see how this takes off.

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Social Media Best Practices in the Chinese Hospitality Industry

An extremely informative deck on social media best practices in the Chinese Hospitality industry by @sinotechian

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Star Wars Augmented Reality

Check this out - The first augmented reality Star Wars game for iPhone/iPod Touch.

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MINI Getaway

This is an awesome reality game that challenges you to do the impossible: Hunt and find the virtual MINI, claim it and then stay at least 50 metres away from everybody else in Stockholm city for a period of one week. If you succeed, you win the new MINI Countryman.

Check out the website at http://minigetawaystockholm.com./

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Rayban Virtual Mirror Webcam Application - Augmented Reality

Another awesome use of augmented reality by Rayban. Using key points on your face, the app maps pairs of augmented reality shades onto your face. Then you can click straight through to the store to try out the products.

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How to better use Powerpoint in presentations

This is a hilarious TEDx Singapore talk about how to better use powerpoint in presentations.

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Subliminal Advertising

This is an old but very cool video. Check out how Subliminal Advertising affects how we see and perceive things. Even Advertising Executives are susceptible.

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IBM eX5 Kung Fu Video

It's never easy coming up with a viral ideas for B2B marketing, especially for enterprise IT services. 

That's what makes this viral video by IBM so cool.

The video is a play off traditional Japanese theatre featuring a kung fu master fending off villains with his awesome kung fu skills.

The tie in between the video and the product is very nicely done - The IBM eX5 always supports your business behind the scenes,

metaphorically shown by the "behind the curtain" helpers in the video. 

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McDonald's Playland

A pretty cool McD's commercial featuring the largest playland they ever constructed outside Sydney's Custom House.

The TVC showed Sydney office workers discovering the Playland while on their daily commute to work. Most of those featured in the are actors although some members of the public appear in the reaction shots. The three-storey high structure included a giant Hamburglar swing, Ronald McDonald bench, slides and Fillet-O-Fish bouncers.

Check it out at:

via http://mumbrella.com.au/

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Uniqlo Lucky Switch

One of the most unique banner ad campaigns in a long long time. Kudos to Uniqlo once again for being awesome.

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Lipton Millionaire

The most engaging brand guidelines ever. Lipton millionaire by tribalddb. Simply brilliant.

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Lipton Millionaire

The most engaging brand guidelines ever. Lipton millionaire by tribalddb. Simply brilliant.

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Herding Cats

A look behind the experiment of IKEA UK's release of 100 house cats into its Wembley store in the UK. An interesting idea that looks really fun to do. And the shots they got at the end were awesome. The tagline at the end says it all: "Home. It's how it makes you feel"

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Hotels and Social Media

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HVS - Examples of How Hotels Are Using Social Media - A Guide for Getting Started.pdf (2426 KB)

An interesting guide on what major hotels are doing on the social media space and how other hotel marketers should get started

 

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A hunter shoots a bear!

This is a great example of how to create a great viral ad for a most certainly boring product - The ink correction fluid/tape.

It's an interactive YouTube video campaign for European stationary brand Tipp-Ex. After viewing a YouTube video titled "A Hunter Shoots A Bear" - during which the former can't quite bring himself to pull the trigger - users are invited to re-write the encounter themselves, making virtual use of Tipp-Ex's ink correction products to white out the title of the video and fill in the blank with their own version of events. Check out the video here:

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The beauty of data visualization

An awesome TED talk by David McCandless on the beauty of data visualization. Information design can help us better answer so many questions

 

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Life Hacks

This is an awesome infographic on some really cool life hacks – like how to get a free phone charger when you lose yours.

Via

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Sony Media Monster Wars

This is a pretty awesome Facebook App by Sony. Generate your own Media Monster through the content on your Facebook profile. The more photos, videos, comments, likes, shares and interaction you have, the bigger, better and meaner your monster will be in battle!

Build yours and let's duel!

And it’s not just a frivolous game/app. The idea for the media monsters comes from Sony’s attempt to clean up the piles of media that often clog our computers, through their new Vaio notebook and software. Along with a great concept, the app also allows for all the social interactions and viral elements of Facebook with status updates, direct posts to friends’ walls, wall to wall views and direct friend to friend battles, challenges and scoring. Nicely done.

(Via www.digitalbuzzblog.com)

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VW's Sunday Drive

When it comes to marketing cars online, it’s always a challenge trying to replicate the experience on a digital platform.

VW Canada’s new Sunday Drive microsite has done a pretty good job doing it. Their idea was to bring back the much forgotten Sunday drive where destination were overated and schedules were non-existent. You  just picked a random direction and drove. Chilling out and enjoying the sights and the whole driving experience.

The microsite at http://vwsundaydrive.ca has a little turntable where you can remix your own tunes for that perfect Sunday cruise to nowhere in particular.

Makes me feel like taking a road trip.

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Tissot Augmented Reality Product Experience

Another great Augmented Reality product experience – This time for Tissot watches.

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The Olympus Augmented Reality Experience

Another really cool use of augmented reality. Get a 3D product experience of the new Olympus PEN E-PL1 camera right from your computer.

Try it out for yourself at www.getolympus.com/PEN3d

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Lego Augmented Reality

This is a really cool use of technology to drive sales.

Lego developed an Augmented Reality Kiosk System called “Digital Box” which is now being rolled out to LEGO brand stores worldwide. It allows kids and parents the ability to see what the end product looks like before making a purchase. Absolutely brilliant.

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The Mégane Experiment

Great campaign by Renault – Can a car change a town?

In 2010, Renault discovered a set of fascinating statistics. According to the figures, towns with more Mégane were happier, had higher rates of fertility and longer life expectancies.

To put this theory to the test, they've sent Claude, a 'consultant de joie' to Gisburn (Lancashire). A town with no Méganes and apparently very little joie de vivre, to conduct 'The Mégane Experiment'.

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Aides Graffiti

This has got to be one of the most creative AIDS Campaign ads ever. EVER.

 

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Old Spice Social Media Case Study

Here’s the case study from W + K for what is arguably the best social media campaign for the entire year.

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Social Media Advertising in the 1960s

What Facebook, You Tube and Skype Ads would’ve looked like in the 1960s.

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Account Planning in the Digital Age

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accountplanningdigitalv03-100503145244-phpapp01.pdf (1235 KB)

Great presentation on digital planning by Zigurds Zakis from Instinct (Part of BBDO Group , Russia). It talks about the changes in traditional account planning to one where involves four key elements

1.       Understanding Customer and Society

2.       Understanding the Economy (and not just the business)

3.       Understanding Technology and what it enables

4.       Understanding Creativity

He also talks about the skillsets of the Convergent Planner and how they should have:

1) The Intellect of the brand architect

2) Financial acumenof the management consultant

3) Geekiness of the hacker

4) Curiosity of the social psychologist

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Audi: Augmented Reality Calendar

Presenting the world’s first car calendar…without the cars. Great Augmented reality stuff by the guys at Audi and Razorfish

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The 73,000 Bar Tab

Innovative campaign by Ogilvy Brazil to educate people about the cost of drink driving!

Check out the video:

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Social Media Infographic - Dos and Don'ts of Social Media for Business

This is a simple but great infographic on the Do’s and Don’ts of Social Media for Business.

Courtesy of: http://www.thesteelmethod.com/b2bdodont.html

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Pilot Handwriting

How cool is this! Write by hand on your computer! The guys at Pilot Pens have developed an application that turns your handwriting into a digital font which you can use to send handwritten e-mails to your friends.

www.pilothandwriting.com

Check out the video below.

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What if money grew on trees?

Interesting campaign by Rabobank Australia. RaboDirect sponsored a ground breaking experiment to see how Australians really react when presented with the ultimate financial fantasy - a money tree!

RaboDirect's mission is to wake up people's lazy money because over the last year Australians missed out on $4.7 Billion in interest on their savings by leaving it in accounts that pay little or no interest. This is what led the experiment. If people ignore money in their account they can't see, do they also ignore money they can see and touch?

They secretly filmed people as they passed by a tree covered in $5 notes and asked a psychologist and financial decision-making expert to monitor and analyse responses.

Check out this video of the experiment:

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The Social Media Revolution

Just to put things in perspective. This is the new and update version from the original video.

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AT&T Augmented Reality Soccer Game - Banner Ad

This is a really cool showcase of an Augmented Reality Soccer Game that ran within a banner ad on ESPN.com.

BBDO and Zoic Studios created a game for AT&T that uses our proprietary motion capture technology (ZugMO) to allow people with a webcam to "head in" corner kicks. Take a look at the video below

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The Impossible Brief

This is a pretty cool crowdsourcing campaign by Saatchi & Saatchi. Think you can solve the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict?

Submit your idea at www.theimpossiblebrief.com

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Latest Social Media Stats from Asia

This video from Thomas Crampton/Ogilvy 360 Digital Influence pulls together the latest stats on Social Media from across APAC.

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How To Do Digital Planning

This is a great article by Iain Tait on what’s required of a digital planner in terms of qualities and skill sets. He lists down 10 things that every good/decent digital planner needs. Original post available at http://www.crackunit.com/2007/11/28/how-to-do-digital-planning/

Be good at cutting and pasting

If you’ve ever set up a blog or or a MySpace page you’ll probably have seen funny code knocking around the place. You shouldn’t be scared of this stuff. As the web keeps evolving to become more open and customisable the ability to copy and paste odd looking bits of code from one place to another increases in value.

At it’s most basic level knowing how to customise a feed or add a widget to a blog will at least give you some appreciation of the building blocks of the web. Kind of like Lego is to engineering.

In lots of ways this act of copying and pasting funny geek code from one place to another is a useful proxy for what digital planners need to do all the time. I’m not talking about lifting people’s ideas or ripping them off, I’m talking about applying principles and techniques in a variety of seemingly disconnected places.

I’m guessing at this point some people will be bursting to say things like – “this is all too geeky, you don’t need to know how a car works to be able to drive”. And that’s true. But if your job was designing and selling cars to people, you might find it useful to know how the different bit of a car fit together. And everyone ought to know how to change sparkplugs and tyres right?

Be able to deconstruct the craft

You don’t need to be able to do all of it. But it’s really important that you understand it and can talk about it semi-convincingly.

What is this it of which I speak?

It is the craft of making really good and interesting interactive stuff.

It is made from all kinds of things. Graphic design, programming, information architecture, experience design, typography, HCI, good writing, databases, video production, game design, e-commerce, networks, devices…

Be good at knowing why something is good or bad. There’s a lot of very bad stuff that looks very good out there. And a lot of amazing things that look like shit. You need to be able to see through the veneer and be able to judge things on a different level.

If there was one bit of the craft that I think is super-important for planners to understand it’s user experience. It encapsulates a lot of what we should be concerned about in terms of making things that work for an audience.

Be able to expand (and contract) to fill the space available

There isn’t digital planner shaped hole.

On some jobs it’ll be much bigger than others.

Sometimes you might be the lead strategist on a big paradigm shifting pure play turnkey web commerce integration project, where part of your job is helping a client figure out how and why their business exists.

This requires a different way of thinking and being from an ‘online advertising’ project where your role might be to convince the Cheezy-Puffs client that the idea that they’ve been presented about building a Cheezy Radio Station on Puff Island in Second Life and Podcasting the shows into Facebook might not be exactly the right thing to do. This time.

Then of course you’ll have to deal with the fallout of sabotaging the idea (from whoever it was that came up with it in the first place)…

Other times you’ll be part of a multi-agency team working alongside a number of other really good planners. In these cases it can be best to wind your neck in a bit and focus on the skills you’ve got that complement the rest of the team. And just skip over the ritual of intellectual posturing and corner-pissing nonsense that you’re meant to go through. It’s just a bit boring and pointless.

Be able to be big, and be able to be smaller too.

Be a good, and patient, educator

When you’re dealing with lots of new stuff that isn’t particularly well understood you need to be able to explain complex things to people. And do it in a way that’s simple (but not patronising), accessible (but not dumbed-down) and effective (but not overly salesy).

That’s a hard thing to do.

But then you have to do it, over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again. And be as enthusiastic and interested as you were the first time around.

“Right, this Internet thing, it’s basically a bunch of computers…”

Be a cyber-optimist and a hyper-cynic

You’re the person that everyone expects to be really excited by, and interested in, the latest gizmos, widgets and whatnot. And you should be. But at the same time you have to be the one that is able to see beyond the hype and have a critical view on whether it’s just another passing fad or something that we should all care about.

Sometimes you’ll back the wrong horse. We all do. But just as long as you’re backing the horse for the right reasons that’s the best you can be expected to do.

Use the forces of geekdom

Geeks are cool. Well, at least a bit cooler than they used to be.

What is it that planners need to learn from geeks? Maybe it’s passion. Or an obsessive attention to detail. Or is it a drive to understand the how and the why of stuff. I’m not really sure. But there’s an interesting strand of geekism that feels very real, very tangible and very very useful.

There’s something about a need to take stuff to pieces and put it back together again that links the minds of geeks and planners I reckon.

Don’t hate business, it’s your friend

If you’re in ‘the game’ because you want to make film or art then making digital stuff can often drift even further away from your goal than doing traditional advertising.

There’s still a need to create desire and make beautiful things . And there’s lots of amazing digital ‘art’ that gets made in our world. Some of it in the name of art, some in the name of marketing.

But a lot of the projects where we’re really able to add value are things where we get to optimise businesses. Creating revenue opportunities. Selling more stuff. Driving efficiencies. Reducing waste. Things you might find tedious and hateful if you’re in denial about how and why you get paid.

Of course you can have ethics. And lots of the really interesting things that digital enables is rooted in empowering small businesses and creating a level commercial playing field.

But let’s be really clear, digital is not just about creating fascinating communications, it’s about how you can help business end-to-end.

Do things, make stuff

There’s a bunch of plannery mantras in circulation around doing stuff. Whether it’s ‘act don’t say’, ‘always in beta’, ‘embrace failure’ or any variant of this kind of thing. It’s all pointing in the same direction. You should get out there and do things rather than just banging on about them.

And yes, a blog counts as doing something. But no. You don’t have to have a blog to be a planner. Not yet anyway.

Be Non-Stick and Wipe-Kleen

If you’re out there experimenting and doing new stuff, chances are you’ll fail from time to time. No one likes to fail. But some people are much better at failing than others. It’s natural to be gutted if something doesn’t work as well in the real/virutual world as it did in your head.

But if you’re the kind of person that bangs their head against stuff when you don’t win, your temperament might not be exactly right for a game where the things that don’t work are as important as the ones that do.

Say sorry. Explain to yourself and others why it failed. Learn from the failure. Try not to repeat the same failure again. Dust yourself down. Move on.

(This point was inspired by someone at an above the line agency we work with who reportedly referred to our agency as ‘Teflon Poke‘)

Love what you do

Do what you’re doing for the right reasons. In interviews the thing I try to figure out above anything else is whether or not the person I’m seeing actually loves what they’re doing. If they’re in the game because they’re really excited and passionate about it then they’ll learn new things (because they can’t help themselves). If they’re in it because they think it’s a career opportunity or they fancy a change of scene you’re all in for a much rougher ride.

If you’re in ‘digital planning’ for fame, money, groupies and adoration, you’re in the wrong business. Well until next summer anyway.

And isn’t it much nicer when you work with people who love what they do. It’s the kind of thing it’s hard not to fall for.

Posted via email from The Digital Marketer

How Google Works

Great infographic about how Google works

Posted via email from The Digital Marketer

Rethinking the Creative Brief

This is an interesting and insightful deck on how to rethink the creative brief – From what it means, to how to make it better. Kudos to Jasmin Cheng (@min_o) for this great work.

The Creative Brief: A Research Project

View more presentations from Jasmin Cheng.