POST DIGITAL

#CannesLions Contenders

As the Cannes Lions festivites have gotten underway and the predictions have been noted and posted, the shortlist for 2012 is about to reveal a few winners.  For me, I ask a few simple questions - did the work change the industry? Was there a value exchange that linked business objectives with consumer interests in a way that was ownable to the brand. Did the idea provoke a connection to brand?

As I peruse the submissions here are a few that caught my eye.

AMERICAN EXPRESS
In the Promo category, Year 2 of the Small Business Saturday does it for me.  American Express and Crispin have submitted chapter two of an idea that is riding a cultural trend in the states.

 

HELLMANN'S
What's for dinner tonight?  A common question that is aswered by this app from Hellmann’s which prints recipes on a personlized grocery receipts based on the food that you have purchased.  While some might find this a bit big brother - i think that the use of data creates a value exchnage that will generate more uses of the product.

SPRITE
While Sprite and Ogilvy did not change the industry with this one they did dramatize refreshing for these beach goers in a simple fun format.

 

C & A FASHION LIKE
This one struck me as pure genius as it played off a simple and true insight. The majoroity of woman question their fashion judement while shopping.  Knowing that, why not offer to let a network of people help you decide.  C & A's Like Fashion app brought the social network to the physical store. This was a great use of technology in the physical world.

 

Update: The Direct Grand Prix for American Express's Small Business Saturday campaign, which already won a Grand Prix in Promo & Activation.

Coke’s new comprehensive “liquid” marketing strategy

The media landscape is a very different beast today than it was even 5 years ago. Then agency-led television commercials dominated how we channel our marketing. The very fact you are reading this here proves that things have changed.  With splashes of Henry Jenkins’ spreadable media concept, experiential marketing, Sir Ken Robinson’s whiteboard execution and Coke’s sophisticated marketing aplomb, the videos take us on a discovery that is as startling as it is revelatory.

Coca Cola have always been at the forefront of innovation. In this video Jonathan Mildenhall, Vice-President, Global Advertising Strategy and Creative Excellence at The Coca-Cola Company is the person responsible for leading global creative vision and strategy for the Company's portfolio of global brands. He explains how Coke will leverage the opportunities in the Post Digital landscape and transform one-way storytelling into dynamic storytelling hoping to add value and significance to peoples lives. 

The challenge of content creation in an enlightening way, reminds us that every contact point with a customernis a point of judgement that should tell an emotional story.  The importance of a content fludity model is also referenced. What is most surprising during the nearly eighteen viewing minutes is how willfully the soft drink marketer peels back the layers of their organization to reveal what’s been working and what hasn’t.

What these videos do is demonstrate is that the world has changed and the largest marketing organization in the world has changed with it. Have you moved from one-way storytelling into dynamic storytelling or from consumer insights to provocations thus potentially adding value and significance to people’s lives.  For those of us who have been building liquid and linked content through transmedia storytelling this is simply refreshing. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

Writing Your Next Symphony

"Do not follow where the path may lead. Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail." - Harold R. McAlindon

Over the last few days, I have sat in a number of business meetings with fortune 500 marketers who all seem to have the same problem. There is a huge data conundrum.  Everyone of them spoke of the large agency partners having either too little of an understanding of their data across all channels or that their digital &  direct agencies who were in analysis paralysis and could not produce assets that met the data and technology demands of the new mediums. (Often referred to as perishable assets.)  Now that we are in post-digital era where people and our customers leave digital finger prints behind on everything they touch, why have the people who are supposed to be experts at the customers not figured out how to deliver new value to the Post-Digital client?

One of my early mentors, Marc Beeching once said, "The best stories are like a great piece of music. They have a beginning, middle and an end.  Sometimes you have to decide which pieces go where"  I think that analogy holds true for the data conundrum brands are in.  

Much of the Industrial Age and the Information Ages required focus and specialization.  But as white collar work has gotten routed to Asia and reduced to software, there is a new premium on the opposite aptitude: putting the pieces together, or what I call a Symphony.  What is in greatest demand today isn't more analysis, but synthesis-- seeing the big picture, crossing boundaries and being able to combine disparate pieces in to an arresting new whole.

For marketing & brand leaders and digital & traditional agencies alike who do not wish to follow their competitors down a path to a commoditized value exchange -- which is the typical path that many continue to travel -- They have a choice. Live in the past or get down to imagining and forging a new trail to the profitable future.

I have quickly found that you must marry your creative skill sets to a vastly uncomfortable place to survive. Dare I say "Data Synthesis".  As a creative leader you must act like a composer or a great conductor (my favorite is Gustavo Dudamel) .  Ask yourselves which symphony will you write for your brand or clients?  Will it tell a story? Will it have empathy? What meaning will it carry?  How will it be designed?

Next time your clients or potential clients ask you to show them your value -- create a symphony.  

Your audience will listen and remember you. 

Go instead where there is no path and leave a trail.