We reported on the unofficial results that placed New Zealand ninth best country overall soon after the big leonine haul at Cannes this year, and the just-released official report has confirmed our position in the top ten—and not per head of population, either, just flat out ninth most creative country in the world based on the awards Kiwi agencies won at the prestigious advertising event.
There seems to be an underlying disdain for the persuasive arts among the masses, something that can presumably be put down to a combination of outright envy and the (slightly) misguided belief that you dastardly marcomms schemers are somehow able to trick them into parting with their cash through the wonder of advertising. But there’s certainly no shortage of interest from the aforementioned masses in the commercial messages that grace their screens and, much like Paul Henry, this strange love-hate formula creates TV gold, as evidenced by the continuing popularity of the Fair Go Ad Awards.
MediaWorks TV launched its new season line-up in Wellington this morning. And the Auckland launch is scheduled for tomorrow. But there’s sure to be slightly more interest in some the programming decisions than there usually is after it announced today that its two major channels are set for a rejig, with C4 being re-launched as a mainstream entertainment channel known as FOUR and TV3 moving directly into TV One’s demographic territory.
Dunedin’s well-received new campaign tapped into its local networks to try and discover some of the region’s quirks and secrets. And Christchurch and Canterbury Tourism has taken a similar approach for its new tourism push, although instead of crowd-sourcing ideas from the hoi polloi, it’s using “global TV star” and proud Cantabrian Phil Keoghan as its ambassador.
Helen Souness is the Kiwi marketing director responsible for managing SEEK, the hugely successful online trans-Tasman employment brand. She’s based at the company’s Melbourne HQ but regularly returns to New Zealand to develop and test campaigns and jumped back across the ditch last week to host a series of local marketing workshops and forums for SEEK’s diverse bunch of large and small advertisers, where she provided plenty of insights around how it became a celebrated employer and consumer brand.
Behold these vespertine delights! Bluebird’s ‘Do us a flavour’ experiment reaches the stores; Vodafone’s new brand campaign is the pick of the always competitive telco bunch; the Big Mac and Quarter Pounder spots out of DDB Sydney hit the mark; Honda embraces Michaelangelo for its new Insight ad; the National Bank follows up its big brand relaunch with a suitably quirky home loan spot; Sam Neill multiplies for Kiwibank; the rise of Wilson continues; and Dan Carter strips off and goes extreme unicycling for Rexona.
Of note in this collection of commercial messages, the Groove Armada track is changed in the Fresh n Fruity ‘wrecking balls’ ad; Goldstein’s final fling hits the screens; Marmite celebrates its 100th birthday; Burger King takes a comical approach to comparative advertising by using shock tactics; Len Brown takes the political TV ad title over John Banks’ very rushed effort; OPSM gets busy with a new global campaign; and is the old chap in the Colour Steel ad actually a puppet?
Time is running short for your shot at 2010 RSVP and Nexus Awards glory. So make sure you get your entries in to the good folk at the NZMA by 5pm this Friday. Or else.
Listen to any social media evangelist yabber on for a few minutes and you’re likely to hear the words honesty, authenticity and openness mentioned. The thing many of them seem to overlook is the fact that as long as there is competition, many companies will presumably continue to be dishonest, fake and secretive. After all, it’s what business was originally founded on (oh, and greed). There are exceptions, of course, and, to be fair, the rise of social media has forced a number of previously PR-driven, corporate speaky companies to get real with their customers. Which is a very roundabout way of getting to Fisher & Paykel’s new campaign, Inside Stories, a feelgood marketing initiative that aims to show what really goes on behind the scenes with stories that are told through the eyes of its staff, rather than through its appliances.
TelstraClear, as we wrote in the cover story of the May/June edition of NZ Marketing, is something of a quiet yet consistent achiever among the major telcos. And, to celebrate its 20th year in New Zealand, show off its network and tell Kiwis what the company is all about, it has sent its ‘mascots’, the modern TC and his misanthropic old partner Bill, on a journey around the countryside.
The winds of change have blown for two titles in the Tangible Media stable, with the rejigged weekly Groove Guide set to launch with a renewed pop cultural zest and a new but familiar editor at the helm, as well as a relaunch and an editorial reshuffle at sustainable living magazine Good.
Who’s it for: Sky TV by DDB NZ and Capital City films
Why we like it: The DDB/Sky relationship has been a particularly fruitful one recently. The Arts Channel campaign won every award in the world. The ‘Your Happy Place’ content campaign also got a few …
Crisis communications is one of the easiest areas to study and gain an appreciation for tangible social media ROI. And while we can never fully prepare for a natural disaster or acts of God, the advances in digital media can help accelerate the recovery. They can also help change the structure and procedures of previously traditional and parochial communications departments, as the State Government of Victoria in Australia discovered when it was subjected to some of the worst bushfires ever seen last year.
The shock tactics directed at young drivers on TV don’t seem to have the desired effect anymore. So Ogilvy instead decided to use shock tactics with a hoax ad and a fake but fairly intense phone message to try and drive home the point that fast cars can be deadly.
Regional branding efforts and their associated tourism pushes often have a whiff of desperation about them. But there seems to have been a coming of age in New Zealand recently, with some solid and distinctly uncringeworthy new marketing initiatives from Wellington, Christchurch and, most recently, Dunedin, which has just launched its new brand with an outdoor and online campaign.
As Westpac chief economist Brendan O’Donovan said at a CAANZ/ANZA seminar ‘Nurturing the Green Shoots earlier this year, when economic times are tough, they’re usually much worse in the marcomms sector. But, conversely, when things start looking up, it reacts faster than the economy. And, judging by the just released third quarter television advertising revenue figures from the New Zealand Television Broadcasters council (as well as the outdoor results released last week) the long-awaited upswing appears to have cometh.
Trinity P3’s founder and chief ‘pitch doctor’ Darren Woolley was one of more than 30 agency management consultants and search company representatives who attended the AdForum CEO Summit in New York last week and found out where the advertising industry was heading and how the agencies were taking it there. The consultants represented more than 530 agency searches each year, or the equivalent of $9 billion in billings, from marketers around the globe looking to find agencies with the right chemistry for their needs. And here’s what he learned from the six day conflab.
In this edition of Ads@6, the iPad shows its stuff, the Vogel’s campaign keeps hitting the mark, the House of Travel inspires plenty of holiday envy, Telstra Clear and 2degrees face off with their respective monthly mobile plans and there’s even an ad for Lancaster Bomber magazine.
Three men, three very different presentations and a multitude of ideas about what could be around the marcomms corner … for your viewing pleasure, Pure Productions has released recordings of the sage words of Colenso BBDO’s planning director James Hurman, TVWorks chief executive Jason Paris and Image Centre Group’s Mike Hutcheson from the Future of Television Advertising event it held recently. So, if you weren’t cool or important enough to actually be there, they’re certainly worth a gander.
As draconian media overlord and Rhys Darby lookalike Vincent Heeringa opined soon after the recent New Zealand International Business awards were handed out this week, the creative economy used to be something that cute, boutique Kiwi businesses talked about. Now, however, design and intellectual property have become an integral aspect of the really big New Zealand exporters as well and they were the two elements that bound many of the winners—and particularly the supreme award-winning Pumpkin Patch—together.
There were over 1,000 entries from around the world, but there were just 16 golds awarded at the US Direct Marketing Association’s Echo awards and two of them went to New Zealand agencies, with .99 continuing its Midas touch with Air New Zealand’s ‘Nothing to Hide’ in the Consumer-Travel & Hospitality/Transportation section and RAPP Tribal winning for its ‘Thank You Notes’ campaign for Heinz Wattie’s Gourmet Dog in the Production Manufacturing and Distribution category.
A spoonful of appointments news always makes the medicine go down.
The up-until-relatively-recently New Zealand-owned mobile marketing company The Hyperfactory has managed to get four finalist nods in the 2010 Mobile Marketing Association Global Awards. And Tui Blond’s consumer sampling campaign for the brand’s launch by POCKETvouchers is also in the running.
Pay peanuts, get monkeys that are unable to make coffee.
Brings a new meaning to the phrase sick ollie (but only if the guy being ‘ridden’ happens to be named Ollie).
Banksy’s fairly dark couch gag for The Simpsons did the rounds this …
The Outdoor Media Association of New Zealand (OMANZ) has just voted in a new chair in the form of Phil Clemas of APN Outdoor. And it seems he’s joined at a good time, with quarter three results showing continued growth in sales.
Resn, one of the few digital agencies in New Zealand doing regular international work, picked up a host of awards last year, including digital agency of the year for the second year running in the CREATIVE Hotshop awards and more Pixels than you could shake a stick at. And ’tis the awards season once again, with the Toyota Racing Sponsafier website it created for Saatchi & Saatchi Los Angeles chosen as one of three finalists in the ‘Advertising and Branding’ section of Adobe’s MAX Awards and the same website winning a silver in the Brand Destination Site for the American Interactive Advertising Bureau’s Mixx Awards.
Everyone loves passing judgment on new TVCs. Almost as much as they seem to love passing judgment on new logos. So here’s a massive selection of the newest/best Kiwi commercials we’ve seen recently, including the continuation of Wilson’s journey and some nice work for National Bank, Purina One, Jim Beam, Apex rentals and Kapiti ice cream.
It’s a day filled with Tonys. First Bradbourne, now Gardner, the new general manager of Ogilvy Wellington. He’s replacing Fraser Holland, who has returned to Hawke’s Bay “for lifestyle reasons”.
How does $15,000 of free advertising from the New Zealand Herald and Easy Mix 98.2 sound? Pretty good if you’re the Prenzel Shop in Botany, which snatched the winners loot after beating out 121 other finalists at the 2010 TOP SHOP Retail Excellence Awards. The Prenzel Shop, which retails New Zealand made foods and liqueurs, was described by the judges as “a store that compels you to buy things you never dreamed you needed”.
In anticipation of another year’s worth of world-class entries, the New Zealand Marketing Association (NZMA) has secured over 50 big brained experts, specialists and industry virtuosos to determine who will take home the metal at this year’s RSVP and Nexus Awards.