New Zealand’s small group of ‘technology evangelists’ have the ability to powerfully influence the technology buying decisions of more than a third of Kiwi consumers – making them a critical target market for vendors.
The stuff.co.nz mobile team has triumphed at the 2011 W3 Awards in Los Angeles, bringing home not one but two commendations from a pool of 3,000 plus entries.
…as Jules Lloyd hangs up her McDonald’s apron, creative boffin Barry Low joins Image Centre, Desiree Doyle departs CAANZ to work on her tan, Adshel head honcho Steve McCarthy heads off into the distance, iSite names a national sales manager, Fairfax expands its network, Titan Media Group adds two to the crew, the MA’s Kelsey Waters goes digital and, after the sale of Synovate was approved, Ipsos comes to New Zealand.
Much like the mighty All Blacks’ heroics on the weekend, New Zealand’s Brandspank has walked away with a decent bit of recognition at this week’s Australasian PROMAX awards.
When it comes to the latest fundraising initiative for Christchurch, it’s a case of both what you know and who you know. Pixels for Christchurch launched last week at the Yoobee flagship store in Auckland’s Britomart. With the helping hand of brand development agency FlyCreative and Shortland Street star Kiel McNaughton, among others, artist Shane Hansen’s artwork ‘Arohanui Otautahi’ was broken down into 100,000 pixels that were made available for public purchase. The ultimate goal is to raise $100,000 for Christchurch and so far over 18,000 pixels have been sold.
Once upon a time, newspapers were rivers of gold. But, as everyone knows, those rivers have started to dry up recently as readers went online and got their news hit for free. Now publishers around the world are embracing visual media—and competing with broadcasters—to try and fill the financial void. And Fairfax has joined that brigade with its soon-to-launch local IPTV arm.
Heartland agency Tracta have rolled out a new safety campaign for Unison, the power company that owns, designs, manages and operates the electricity network for the Hawke’s Bay, Taupo and Rotorua regions.
The RWC semi-final was watched by 1.9 million viewers across the country, according to the official agency that monitors television ratings, AGB Nielsen. This means it took over as the number one TV event ever from the opening ceremony and All Blacks vs Tonga game, which lured 81 percent of all viewers.
The last time 180 Amsterdam’s creative sage Andy Fackrell visited New Zealand, it was as one of the fancy international judges wheeled in to decide who wins the Axis Awards. And soon he’ll be returning for a bit longer after taking up a one-year contract as executive creative director of DDB Group New Zealand.
Advertising agencies rarely advertise. But do we detect something of a trend? DDB put out a one-off ad to celebrate what would have been the 100th birthday of one of its founders a while back, and M&C Saatchi attempted to clear up some confusion in the marketplace after ‘Pink fist-gate’. But DrafFCB takes the title of best self-promoter after sponsoring Mad Men on Prime and using some of its clients’ ads to show off a bit. Now, after a fantastic performance at this year’s Effies, it’s doing a bit more shouting with an entertaining, rugby-related full page ad that featured in the Business Herald on Friday.
If you were ranking car brands on the quality of their ads, VW would certainly be near the the top of the pile. And here are a couple of newbies, one a creative retail spot from DDB NZ and Robber’s Dog that follows on from the darkly humorous ‘Wedding Day’ and the other from DDB Singapore, which employed the services of Yukfoo Animation and director Julian Stokoe for a cool, crayon-heavy, 60 second spot to promote the new Jetta.
Last week’s contribution from infographics.co.nz saw New Zealand at the bottom of the heap when it came to corruption. But being at the bottom of the heap this week for the most significant oil spill will be of little consolation to Bay of Plenty residents currently dealing with the fallout from Rena.
NZ Lotteries has given the digital signage sector a big fillip with the roll-out of LCD promotional screens to 600 of its top Lotto stores around the country, the biggest roll-out of its kind in New Zealand. And so far, the enticing new technology is doing the business.
Digital media agency PHDiQ has launched a new interactive campaign for Rexona, where fans can record and upload video messages in support of the All Blacks.
Dr Obvious has diagnosed the RWC as being a pretty hot social media topic (recently released stats show there have been more than 1,931,215 tweets about the #RWC2011 over the past five weeks when you include all teams, hashtags and @rugbyworldcup). And, as this infographic shows, the All Blacks are winning the conversation wars ahead of Sunday’s trans-Tasman semi-final stoush.
After a six-year stint heading the Newspaper Advertising Bureau, general manager Robert Munro is set to depart in December.
We all know what happened with Telecom’s last attempt to leverage its sponsorship of the All Blacks. But its Backing Black roadshow has kept on trucking, the HQ was launched at the Viaduct a few weeks back and now TOUCH/CAST has launched a new online campaign in the lead-up to the semi-final that puts users at the centre of the All Blacks.
A stirring hard house haka remix in honour of ‘Don Carter’. SBW has never looked so good.
Ah, the charmed WAG life.
Obama’s hot new track, ‘Trick the Bridesmaid.’
Fun with captions.
A sadly appropriate clip from John Clarke …
Every day nearly three million Kiwis spend an average of three hours and 22 minutes tuning in to their favourite shows. But changes to the way ratings are measured will have major implications for advertisers and, to assist with this process, ANZA, together with ThinkTV and Nielsen, are providing a free briefing session for them and their advertising partners.
Trade Me announced today that the daily deals on its homepage will be powered by 1-day, from Tuesday 1 November. There will be three deals every day, running from 10am for 24 hours, or until sold out.
DDB has been on the hunt for a creative director since Adam Kanzer departed in mid-2010 and, just as it did when Justin Mowday shifted from DraftFCB to take up the managing director role, the Death Star has managed to secure the services of another senior DraftFCBer: creative director Chris Schofield.
When most people go on holiday they like to know where they are going and what they’ll be doing, but Indiana June is not like most people. Ex-pat Kiwi Diana Tansey, aka Indiana June, has chucked in her copy writing career to cycle around the world, traveling to wherever social media decides.
A positive new campaign from the Newspaper Publishers’ Association will be launched this Friday as a refreshingly generous DM hits the desks of advertising agency executives. The generosity involves a return trip for two to London for the advertising agency executive that gets most of his/her friends overseas to enter a competition for Kiwis living in London.
The votes have been counted and the results are no surprise, with the latest outing for the Hilux taking out the Ad Impact Award for September.
While the Rugby World Cup doesn’t appear to have got the tills ringing quite as loudly as everyone was hoping, the out-of-home sector has certainly felt the positive effects of the tournament, with the Outdoor Media Association of New Zealand (OMANZ) announcing a Q3 gross media revenue increase of 36 percent over the same period last year.
As MC Alison Mau said at the Effies last week, those attending advertising events are always the best dressed *awww shucks*. And, as you can see from the glamour shots below, the gladrags were dusted off once more as revellers gazed in awe at the winners on Thursday night at Sky City. If these don’t satisfy your insatiable desire for event photos, you can also check out the best dressed award contenders here and some afterparty photobooth action shots here.[nggallery id=14]
Who’s it for: Mammoth by Shine and Flying Fish
Why we like it: It’s the same comical hypermasculine approach used for the launch last year. But if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Just add in a rudimentary pulley system to remind men how …
RAPP Tribal Wellington recently said goodbye to its general manager Sean Keaney after he took up a position with AIM Proximity. But it’s balanced out that bit of bad news with some good after winning the Salvation Army business for the New Zealand, Fiji and Tonga territories after a competitive pitch against two other agencies.
Maori Television is the most watched free-to-air broadcaster for Rugby World Cup 2011 and its total cumulative audience rose to more than two million individual viewers, the largest for any broadcaster covering the tournament.
Carlson Marketing, a proprietary loyalty programme company that has 27 offices in 15 countries, including branches in Auckland, Sydney, and Melbourne, and claims to be New Zealand’s largest loyalty programme provider, is soon to be no more due to a rebrand that will align it with global parent company Aimia.