POST DIGITAL

ON:Muvi & The New Beetle

This is a smooth site.  LG introduces Muvi. 

Beyond the sleek product design the visuals on this site were exciting and motivated me to think about trading up my Aquarius blue Beetle for a new one that had a Muvi with a color match.

The Muvi product photography combined with the illustrative nature of the the 3D graphics gave this a superb feel and exciting presentation layer.  (actually made it worth sitting through a site intro)

While I am never crazy about the "book" metaphor as an interface this was fun as the fashion had enough non traditional animation and the pages had video that made each page unique. 

View the site @ http://www.coolnstyle.com/promotion/nb/index.html

ON: Heidies + Diesel

Today I was in a room with a few marketers and creatives who thought throwing up a "spot" on you tube was worthy of a consumer conversation.  I thought I was going to pull my hair out. (I know i am supposed to be educating - but the audience has heard this message from me more than once and in a few different scenarios...not arrogance...just frustration)

Common think about it...How many marketers put a short film on YouTube every day in the hope that it’ll become the next viral phenomenon only to see it fall flat on its face?  Get out of your EGO.  What makes them think that their video will gain worldwide exposure when 80,000 other marketers have done the same thing that very day?  We love that marketers that are willing to take risks and try new platforms, but the fact that so few of them succeed means that most of them still don’t get it.

The media is NOT the message. Just because YouTube is hot does it mean people care about a marketing message that is stuffed on it. The content has to be great and relevant to the adolscent boys/girls who are watching.

Enter the Heidies!  A campaign launched for Diesel underwear has received attention by creating a big conversation worthy idea and seeing where it went. It seemed to have worked, with millions visiting the Diesel website, a lot of PR buzz and likely accolades at the Cannes ad festival.

The reason it is successful is because it has Diesel knows its audience, it has a great strategy, played off a new platform and is telling a story worthy of me repeating it here and then they used all the right media mix to invite consumers into the story line.

ON: Pepsi Access

BBDO created a subway poster that has a fully functional headphone jack imbedded in it, which plays samples of various exclusive tracks available at pepsiaccess.ca. There are close to 100 posters playing 12 different tracks running in Toronto and Vancouver from now until the end of summer.

Every Pepsi comes with a PIN, which can be redeemed for access to ultra-exclusive music, concerts, events, etc. at pepsiaccess.ca. This poster plays a 30 second track sample of “Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley. After an announcer says: “That was a taste of an exclusive track from Gnarls Barkley. Check out pepsiaccess.ca for more.”

Great idea.

ON: Microsoft's The Break-Up + Consumer Conversations

Consumer conversations... Microsoft seems to think they get it. I must say I was surprised and delighted that they seem to be turning the Microsoft machine on to the biggest change in the advertising world. 

“We want to try and tell that digital media is not about technology but about quality of communication, about the interaction between 2 people. There is no better medium than a movie to symbolize the one-to-one communication between people, in this case between an advertiser and a consumer.”

 

The Break-Up
Uploaded by Damon_Crepin-Burr

She is a consumer. He is a advertiser. All she wants is genuine affection. All he gives is loyalty reduction. THE BREAK UP. A story of love gone wrong...

See http://bringtheloveback.com/ By Microsoft Digital Advertising Solotions

ON: Vitamin Water Knows Their Audience

This past week I was watching MTV and got a glimpse at Vitamin Water's newest :10 and :15 second simple spots that has taken platform of "The Smart Life" to a new place as they have ventured into television media and created a highly engaging new web site that educates, entertains and delivers passion points for a mass consumer who aspires to make smart choices.

Using a great British voice the spots are quick and to the point and they drive to a medium that engages the consumer in their product offering.  Just Yummy!  Click on Try It (top left corner of the site) to see the :10 and :15 ads.

Vie The Site at : http://vitaminwater.com/

Below is an example of their :30 Sec spot that is running on ESPN.

ON: Going Green The Yahoo Way

Yahoo has introduced Yahoo Green today, an online education program that will offer users the latest environmental news and consumer tips, Reuters reports (via Environmental Leader).

he site, which has Ford and its Bold Moves campaign as an advertiser, looks like a major expansion of the 18Seconds site that Yahoo developed to track CFL purchases at national, state and local levels, ranking each city and state based on per capita sales.

Earlier this year, Yahoo asked ad agencies to create and submit proposals for a new campaign from the search/ad giant that encourages environmental responsibility - it’s not clear if this site is part of one of those proposals.

Last month, Yahoo said it would become “carbon neutral” as a company by the end of 2007.

Along with the new site, Yahoo has launched an online contest where it will donate 10 hybrid-fueled Ford Escape taxis to the U.S. city where the most Yahoo users sign up to take the personal environmental pledge or take part in other environmental themed activities on Yahoo sites. It donated another 10 hybrid taxis to New York, where the campaign launch took place, replacing an equal number of conventional taxis.

Yahoo rivals like Google and Microsoft are racing to outdo one another with corporate environmental measures. MSN Network is heavily involved with the Live Earth concerts. In partnership with Kevin Wall, executive producer of Live 8 and CEO of the Control Room, it launched Save Our Selves (SOS) - The Campaign for a Climate in Crisis.

Google announced it was constructing a solar electricity system for its Mountain View, California, headquarters campus with a total capacity of 1.6 megawatts – enough to supply 1,000 average California homes. Google also joined the Business Council on Climate Change, a coalition of San Francisco Bay Area businesses that promise to report and reduce carbon emissions, share the best green practices and advocate for policies to address global warming.

ON: MTV's Digital Incubator

While going through the slew of emails that I get from media conglomerates on their new launches I ran across one that came to the top... (thanks Matty!)

Cisco Systems is teaming up with MTV again to fund college entrepreneurs who might be creating the next big thing in broadband and mobile content. Cisco is working with MTV's 24-hour college network called MTVU to launch the second year of the "Digital Incubator" program, an annual contest that selects undergraduate and graduate student groups to win a cash award aimed at helping them develop content for broadband and wireless users.

Cisco announced Monday that it had selected five winners for a $30,000 grant. This year's winners combine elements of social networking, cell phone-based gaming, online interactivity and viral videos. The programs will become part of MTVU's programming for the coming academic year.

Cisco is best known for providing the infrastructure gear that makes the Internet work. For more than a year, the company has been implementing a strategy to broaden its product portfolio. The company has been aggressively pushing into new markets that are more consumer-focused, such as video, home networking and even consumer electronics.

Late last year, it created the Media Solutions business unit, which develops and markets products to digital media content owners. The head of the group, Dan Scheinman, has said the next step for Cisco is to work more closely with the companies that are creating the movies, TV shows, music and other multimedia content that end up in consumers' homes.

The Digital Incubator program is another way for Cisco to understand and possibly influence the kinds of applications that will be developed.

"There is a massive technological disruption under way fueled by consumer demand," Scheinman said. "And we're trying to get an idea of what that next generation of entertainment will be."  While none of the 10 teams selected last year has hit it big yet, Scheinman said that seven of them are still working on developing their projects. MTV has decided to license the software from at least one of the teams from last year.

This year, Cisco changed the program slightly. Instead of providing $25,000 to 10 teams, it is offering $30,000 grants to five teams. Cisco is also selecting a grand prize winner in the fall to win a supplemental grant of up to $100,000.

Winners can be found here: http://www.digitalincubator.net.

ON:The Algorithm

The last few glorious days I have had driven in to work with the radio blasting and the convertible top down.  On my way up I-95 I noticed a billboard that attracted my attention and peaked my curiosity.
Ask.com launched a TV, outdoor, online and print campaign that's all about the algorithm. The campaign positions the algorithm as the ingredient that powers Ask.com and binds the search engine's products together. Four friends are talking about using the algorithm in "BBQ" -- although it quickly becomes clear that one man has no idea what it is and does a poor job pretending that he does.

"Daddy" is hysterical. A child tells his dad that a classmate was teased at school because her parents use a "lame algorithm." The father then tells his son, "your mom and I get everything we want with the most powerful algorithm on earth," as the child exclaims, "I knew it!"

The outdoor teaser campaign features strange lines such as, "The Unabomber Hates The Algorithm" and "The Algorithm Constantly Finds Jesus." Weeks later, the ads were rebranded with the Ask.com logo



The online media is just as brilliant and simple.
So simple that you are encouraged to engage despite not having to much information. 

ON: Emerging Media + Big Ideas

One of the things that I hear from marketers at packaged goods companies is that they want integrated strategic thinking that leads to big ideas. 

Very few agencies are able to offer this as they were set up in silos to create areas of expertise in Broadcast, Interactive or even Promotions.  As the mediums have fused, there isn't any medium that is NOT digital.  The importance of  "Big Ideas" that tell consumer a story generally are worthy on a consumers conversation.

This features a few brands that delivered on "Ideas" that were relevant to broad audiences in world of converged marketing channels.

ON: Spider-Man 3

As I am a big comic book fan I thought i would check out one of my favorite comic book properties Spider-Man 3.  Over all the experience was rich...This website has everything the internet has to offer: games, downloads of wallpaper, widgets, screensavers, a mobile section, blogs and video offered in a choice of full-screen, Quicktime and high definition. It also offers some exclusive, web-only content to entice users, like behind-the-scenes footage and interviews with the stunt team.

The only thing that let me down about the site was the conspicuous absence of user-generated content. For example, the blog section, which I expected to be a forum for users, was actually just a series of video blogs produced by the franchise itself. After exploring for a while, I finally found a forum where users can post their thoughts; oddly enough, it was a bit of an online ghost town. Many users had responded to the video blogs in admiration of the film, but that's mere "Spider-Man 2" technology. After searching, I finally managed to find a place to submit user-generated webisodes.

Check it out at: http://flash.sonypictures.com/movies/spiderman3/site/index.php