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News injection proven to stave off violent strains of marketing disease

BOHICA. Here’s your regular injection of marcomms miscellany, which includes quake-related media facts, tales of the hugely popular pop-up Wellington restaurant/experiential marketing ploy in Sydney, Auckland City Council’s new film initiatives, accolades for font gurus, new bubbles, silver foxes, over the shoulder boulder holders, bland pasta spokeswomen, signs and even databases.

E-Quake

Nielsen put its ear up to the internet after the Canterbury earthquake to find out how New Zealanders turned to social media to share their experiences and gain information. And more than 27,000 comments were posted on social networking sites such as Twitter and message boards such as Trade Me, as those affected used social media to connect with family and friends.

New Zealanders also made heavy use of video sites such as YouTube, dailymotion.com and Vimeo and photo sharing sites such as Flickr to upload videos and images of the damage left by the earthquake.

“The dramatic numbers we’ve seen in social media usage demonstrates the platform’s ability to quickly collect and disseminate information. With one quick tweet you can reassure loved-ones that you’re OK,” says Tony Boyte, research director for Nielsen’s online division in New Zealand. “The social media phenomenon has fundamentally shifted not only the way we consume news and information, but also enabled us to be a large part of the news dissemination itself. The volume of social media activity around the Christchurch earthquake highlights that New Zealanders didn’t hesitate to jump online to not only receive the latest updates, but also to add to the spreading of the news through their consumer generated media tools.”

  • 27,034 comments were posted on social networking sites and message boards in the six days after the first Christchurch earthquake struck
  • Twitter received the highest overall volume of posts to a public forum, with 7,206 comments related to the disaster.
  • 8,170 posts were uploaded to local New Zealand message boards and forums, including Trade Me Message Boards (61%), Old School Forums (3%), Geekzone Forums (3%), Oh Baby Forums (2%) and PC World forums (2%).
  • Hashtags were widely used to associate posts on Twitter with the earthquake, especially #eqnz (1,741 posts), as well as #christchurch (355 posts) and #christchurchquake (183 posts)

OMG WLG

Positively Wellington Tourism’s experiential WLG restaurant in Sydney has pretty much sold out (apparently it’s been called the fastest-selling ‘Australian’ restaurant ever on the Time Out Sydney website), with two waves of reservation releases seeing over 2000 seats booked for the two-week initiative and a small number of walk-in seats held back to enable Sydneysiders to try their luck on the night.

Four ‘chefs in residence’ are taking control of the WLG kitchen for three to four days each, delivering different seasonal, Wellington-themed menus (a three-courser is just $29). Some of Wellington’s best wait staff and baristas will also be on hand and WLG will also serve wine from New Zealand’s top wine-making regions and 400 litres of Tuatara beer will be on tap.

Positively Wellington Tourism chief executive David Perks says the There’s No Place Like Wellington joint venture brand campaign is seeing some great results through its focus on tactical deals, and research show Wellington’s position as New Zealand’s cultural and culinary capital, combined with its walkability, urban edge and proximity to two of the country’s finest wine regions make it a desirable short break destination for East Coast Australians. But there’s still a long way to go in establishing widespread awareness of what the city and region has to offer.

“We’ve started to build a very positive and influential fan base for Wellington across the ditch, but we’re still some way off that tipping point that will see us reach our full potential,” says Perks.

On Film

The screen production industry contributes around $2.2 billion to Auckland’s economy and there are over 1440 production and post-production businesses. But Auckland City Council wanted to add to those numbers, so, with the help of Film Auckland and industry practitioners, it has released a new protocol for the screen production industry, which is intended to make filming in Auckland even easier and more attractive to international and local producers.

“The Auckland City Council recognises the key role that Film Auckland plays in stimulating growth for the screen production industry. Because of their dedication and diligence, we are confident this new protocol will make Auckland a first-choice competitor in the film industry,” says Cr Aaron Bhatnagar, chairman of the City Development Committee.

The protocol is designed to simplify the consent process and enable quicker turnaround times.

“As part of making Auckland an internationally renowned film friendly destination, it is imperative there are rules and regulations in place. This protocol guides filmmakers through the consent process enabling them to submit a thorough and complete application from the outset,” says Roimata Macgregor, chairperson, Film Auckland.

My Type

Kris Sowersby, a self-employed font boffin based in Hawkes Bay who started the New Zealand based Klim Type Foundry in 2005, has been acknowledged by New York-based Art Director’s Club.

The ADC announced the 50 young creatives from 14 countries worthy of the ADC Young Guns 8 accolade. Entries were received from 37 countries. Sowersby’s first retail typeface, Feijoa, was released internationally in 2007 and his reputation for typeface design has seen him work with, and for, contemporary typographic luminaries such as Christian Schwartz, Erik Spiekermann, Chester Jenkins, House Industries, DNA Design and Pentagram.

Al dente

Youtube Video

Apparently our rather dull netball stars make for good spokeshumans. Or so Clemenger BBDO Adelaide thought.

Fox hunting

No doubt there are a few handsome, charming, debonair and confident old chaps in adland who haven’t been ousted by the digital upstarts quite yet. If so, root them out, because GrownUps.co.nz is calling for nominations for the inaugural Silverfox of the Year competition.

“Everyone knows a ‘Silverfox’ or someone who closely fits the description and we hope they’ll encourage them to enter,” says GrownUps managing director Richard Poole. “We’re expecting some well known names from around the country to enter, including sportsmen, businessmen and some from the entertainment industry, as well as other well-known personalities.”

People can enter via www.grownups.co.nz in one of three age categories, 50-59, 60-69 and 70 plus. But you’ve only got until Sunday, 19 September to enter. And the winner, as is the custom these days, will be chosen via an online voting process.

The cup bubbleth over

New Zealanders have the third highest per-capita consumption of sparkling wine after Italy and Australia. And it’s a market worth around $1 million a week in New Zealand. Lindauer apparently has about 70 percent of that market. So, following the success of previous projects for Lion Nathan, including the relaunch of Coruba, bcg2 were asked to take the lead agency role for the trans-Tasman brand launch of Te Hana, a New Zealand sparkling wine brand available in three varieties that aims to get a slice of that pie. Mediacom, Mango PR and Shift are also involved in the launch.

“Being in on the ground floor of a completely new brand is exciting. We can contribute to the big picture with everything including channel planning and messaging strategies, retail look and feel guidelines, internal sales conference videos, sell-in presentations for key retailers, as well as the more expected stuff like the ad campaign, which is launching right now,” says James Blackwood, bcg2’s chief exec and executive creative director.

Lion Nathan Australia are also adopting the complete brand strategy, media strategy and creative idea to roll out across the Australian market.

The Unmentionables

Skinny Marketing has built a website/social media hub/webcam gimmick for Lingerie Brands, and Anthony Gardiner was the poor chap who had to spend all those hours photographing models in their undies and arduously airbrushing.

“The idea is to attract people with the gimmick and then invoke conversation through the embedded Facebook & Twitter feeds. But mostly, I just thought you might like to have a laugh at yourself wearing sexy lingerie.”

Speaking of sexy lingerie, check out what’s been billed as the UK’s first 3D billboard for Wonderbra.

Data Bullets

Pacific Micro Marketing has been surveying, recording, classifying, segmenting and analysing people for over 15 years. And it has just launched an online consumer database, which gives access to over one million customer records, to help clients find new customers and drive their marketing strategy.

Databases can be created from scratch, existing data can be uploaded and more prospects can be found to match your marketing strategy and maximise customer value. You can get counts, quotes and purchase data and there is no set up fee or minimum orders.

Check out the PMM website for more info.

Seeing Signs

Panasonic New Zealand has taken on the distribution of the PADS (Public Area Display Systems) digital signage software package, which is being used by many of the world’s top brands including Coca-Cola, Microsoft and Toyota, from Dutch company Network Display Systems.

“The PADS product ticked the two most important boxes for any software: simplicity and power,” says Rick Haywood, Panasonic’s manager of broadcast and display systems. “We have been involved in digital signage for over ten years now and were looking for a product to move us forward in this market… PADS is a perfect companion to our display technology and allows us to provide a turnkey or scalable solution to our existing suite of products.”

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