Over the past year and a bit, Y&R NZ has been undergoing something of a transformation (as its logo said, ‘re-est. 2012’). And, along with a new brand, new sub-brands and a swanky new office in the Auckland CBD, there have also been a host of changes to the staff roster in recent months.
Admission grows like topsy, Fuse gets a Christmas present, Oddbird takes flight, Firebrand joins the Salt stable, Komli signs up The Economist, Josh Moore, Philip Andrew and Dave King get jury nods, Matt Palmer joins The Feds and Lance Kelleher re-signs with 8com.
Off the cuff comment by Top Gear presenter fuels speculation that the show is coming to New Zealand to film our talented dogs, however the agency behind the campaign says it’s pure speculation.
Big Data has become a big marketing buzzword. But, according to Darryn Melrose, most articles are written on the assumption the reader knows what the term actually means. So he decided to spell it out.
Sponsorship isn’t just about logos on hoardings any more. It’s all about ‘activation’ and ‘integration’. And, with the X Factor hitting TV3’s screens this year, broadcast sponsor Ford and its agency JWT have already got in on the act with The Passengers, a campaign that aims to find “traffic light tunesters and side-street singers” to feature on a remix of Che Fu’s ‘Fade Away’. Plus: Last two X Factor judges named.
Where Kiwi kids may once have had a melting Popsicle dribbling down their chin as they climbed trees, played BYC or harassed geckos over summer, it seems they’re much more likely to be eating a Popsicle and staring at a screen these days. So, to tap into this evolution and add a bit of digi-fun to the brand, Tip Top and Colenso BBDO have tipped their hat to the classic arcade game Asteroids and custom-designed something similar to promote the new Popsicle Blasta.
For all those media minds looking to have their say on the best media thinking of the past year, prospective judges need to have their applications to join the Media Awards panel in by 4pm this Friday.
Bad news for flailing media companies, you’ll soon be competing for subscription dollars with the third largest social network – YouTube.
Igloo boss Chaz Savage has resigned from the fledgling pay TV venture, and is taking up a role with Telstra in Australia, according to a spokesperson for Igloo.
Following on from last year’s Donna Time campaign, which moved the focus from young Maori mates to slightly boganic mums, NZTA and Clemenger BBDO have launched an eye-straining new print campaign that targets families where drink driving is a common behaviour and, like the previous campaigns, encourages someone to speak up about it.
In an effort to “be in the right place with the right inventory”, APN Outdoor has reached an agreement with the sole remaining principle of JAM Billboards, Vanessa Bryce, to acquire its three remaining billboard licenses in Auckland, effective from 1 February.
Watch out Facebook, Google+ is on your behind. Somebody’s using the untrendy service, because it’s now the number two social network in the world, says one study.
If Rule 34 of the internet is “If it exists, there’s porn of it”, then surely Rule 35 is “If it can host porn, it will host porn”, a lesson Twitter’s new video service, Vine, has learned today.
David Kester, ex-UK Design Council head, gives a pep talk on how to invigorate a culture of constant design in New Zealand.
The advertising industry has its fair share of detractors. But research shows its contribution is overwhelmingly positive, writes CAANZ chief executive Paul Head.
When tablet computers first arrived on the scene, they were slated as something of a saviour for the ailing magazine industry; a medium that offered the utility of digital technology but actually allowed publishers to make money from it. That certainly hasn’t come to pass in New Zealand yet, and there have been a couple of false starts in that space already. But with impressive download figures and an endorsement from Apple in its best of list at the end of 2012, McHugh Media’s Mindfood iPad app could just be a glimpse into the future.
Gareth Morgan’s Cats to Go crusade has led to much gnashing of teeth from the heavy petters, a vast array of feline puns and plenty of conversation, both here and, with the story featuring on Mashable and Huffington Post, around the world. And Mammoth and Sugar & Partners have decided to hitch their ‘Warmth Lovers’ campaign to that wagon by creating a contextual online ad showing that its spokescat, Prince Nikolai Stroganov III, is already pretty happy inside.
Metservice launched its new redesigned website in December, aiming to make Kiwis’ weather needs more easily accessible. The redesign included new opportunities for targeted advertising that allowed brands to advertise next to specific weather types. And interactive manager at Metservice, Craig Delaney described it as being “like Google AdWords, but instead of bidding on words you buy space next to a weather type.” And, following on from a similar contextual campaign last year, Hellers has again teamed up with Christchurch ad agency Simpatico to launch another meaty weather-based campaign on the site.
Auckland tertiary institute builds gamer community to attract students to its new game development degrees. And zombies.
As the tide of digital has washed over this industry in recent years (the Ad Contrarian calls it The Triumph of Disinformation), blowing the trumpet of traditional media has been fairly tough going. But as part of the magazine industry’s renewed zeal to grow advertising market share and convince clients it is an effective advertising medium—and in an effort to inspire some optimism among those selling magazine ads and show how magazines are evolving—the Magazine Publishers Association is putting on a conference featuring big brained magazine supporters such as Y&R’s James Hurman, Fisher & Paykel’s Sonya Aitken, Pacific Magazine’s Peter Zavecz and Contagion’s Richard Thompson.
At 22, Derek Handley became the country’s youngest ever managing director of a listed company. Around ten years later, he sold The Hyperfactory to US marketing behemoth Meredith. And now, in between helping create the ‘future of reading’ with Booktrack, he has announced plans to list his latest venture, mobile media specialist Snakk Media, on New Zealand’s alternative stock exchange. He’s also co-founded an organisation alongside Sir Richard Branson called The B Team that aims to find a new and more sustainable version of capitalism. So what does the future look like to him?
The follow-up to TNT’s ‘push to add drama’ campaign goes even further; Nike strokes the egos of Christiano Ronaldo and Kobe Bryant; Dick Smith’s banned Australia Day ad; speaking of Australia, this smarmy Kia ad gets some pretty funny parody treatment; amazing powers put to, well, pretty mediocre use, really; Brick Lane goes 8-Bit; ‘The Replacer’; studies have shown that newspapers are interesting; VW’s Superbowl tease ad (what the?) brings some of the world’s greatest meltdowners together; and, awww, mini Subarus.
There are those among us who have some serious issues with grammatical errors. And, with a healthy dose of ‘there but for the grace of the flying spaghetti monster go us’, we couldn’t help but notice a slightly ironic ad talking up the BBC World Service in the New Zealand Herald. First Jimmy Savile, now this. The controllers will be aghast.
Quora asks if we need another web blogging platform, then answers its own question with a yes.
As a guest contributor for The Gunn Report, Y&R NZ’s managing director James Hurman looked for the campaigns that had hit the ‘high water mark of human achievement in creative communications’ by winning both Cannes and Effie golds. And just nine campaigns joined this exclusive club in 2012.
Facebook’s new Graph Search hasn’t rolled out to all of the social network’s one billion users yet, but a new meme shows the privacy horrors that awaits us when it does.
The media landscape has been transformed and fragmented by the power of digital, mobile and social technology. And it’s increasingly difficult to work out a plan to get traction for brands in this new, less certain environment. Contagion’s Tom Bates looks at three areas worthy of focus for modern-day marketers.
Anyone trying to find out what different marcomms agencies do is likely to be overwhelmed by a surge of meaningless jargon and general incomprehensibility. In recognition of this, a Tumblr called Agency Wank has compiled “the wankiest slogans and text on ad/marketing agency websites”. Here are a few pearlers.
