Monthly Archives: August, 2013

News
Ngage sees digital signage coming of age
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There’s been plenty happening in the digital signage space recently. Prices for screens are coming down, big global players are making big orders and digital-out-of-home is responsible for a lot of the growth in outdoor sector around the world. APN Outdoor just launched the country’s first digital billboards in Auckland. And Ngage is also riding that wave, with a recent roll-out of digital signage across the BP network and some big projects on the go.

News
Richard McManus reads, writes, webs
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Kiwi internet entrepreneur Richard MacManus has always had the dream of writing a book. Ever since selling his technology blog ReadWriteWeb (RWW), which he started back in 2003, to US-based media company Say Media in 2011, that is exactly what he has been working on.

News
Portrait of a mogul as a young man
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Richard Branson wasn’t always the suave, successful mogul he is today. In its latest ad, Virgin Mobile shows Branson’s life story in exactly one minute and three seconds. And yes, he always sported that beard, even at two years old.

News
Jaguar gets down with the kids
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Jaguar drivers seem like they’d probably be more familiar with ‘tally ho old chap’ than ‘OMG! LOL!’. But that hasn’t stopped the premium car brand and its agency Big from using the line ‘WTXF?’ in a new campaign for its XF model that’s appearing on super-sized billboards in the main centres and on extra large online banners.

News
Extreme football-related phubbing*
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There’s been a lot of talk about football rights in New Zealand recently, with online offering Coliseum unexpectedly snatching that trophy off Sky and Sky then raining on its parade slightly by signing deals directly with four English major clubs to show delayed coverage of their games. But as newspapers embrace video, and as humans embrace mobile, it’s not just broadcasters looking for content anymore, as evidenced by this great ad for Sun+ Goals that features football fans watching when they shouldn’t be.

News
Mumford & Sons like you’ve never seen them
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Creative types can be a bit precious about their image. But not Mumford & Sons. The beardy folk rockers aren’t above taking the piss out of themselves and, with the help of four funny men—Ed Helms, Jason Sudeikis, Jason Bateman, and Will Forte—the band has created what Buzzfeed calls the best music video of the year.

News
Swearing like a doctor
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Dr Who nerds have been all aflutter this week after Peter Capaldi was named as the new 1000-year-old time-traveller. He’s renowned for his role as the potty-mouthed spin doctor Malcolm Tucker in the brilliant show The Thick of It. And this guy has decided to combine the two roles and create a trailer that gives fans a glimpse at what the upcoming series might be like (block your ears children, salty language ahoy).

Opinion
Neuromarketing: thinking beyond the lab
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Neuroscience provides us with deeper insights into how consumers think, feel and make decisions than ever available before and these insights have the potential to revolutionise traditional marketing practice. But its application to this industry—something known as neuromarketing—is not always understood.

News
For the love of paper: Twenty, Tuatara and BNZ
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Paper has had a pretty rough time of it recently, with big printing company closures, publishers haemorrhaging cash and direct mail struggling to get the same amount of attention that other ‘sexier’ channels like online or TV get, despite NZ Post’s recent study into its effectiveness. But advances in printing technology mean there are a number of creative possibilities now available, and a few recent Kiwi examples have caught our eye.

News
Brand vanity
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Brands tend to inflate their importance in people’s lives. And The Onion has showed this phenomenon in its inimitable fashion with a clip featuring “fans from all over the country flocking to see all of their favourite brands” at the Lollapalooza music festival.

News
Beached as
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Last week Vodafone took out the awkward ad placement award, and we’ve got a contender for this week’s edition, with an ad on Stuff promoting ‘beach fale fun in the sun’ in Samoa running alongside a story warning of a tsunami. Pesky news, always wreaking havoc with those commercial messages.

News
The revolution will be personalised: Kiwibank and Assignment showcase the switchers
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It’s not often you see an ad that mentions the brand’s competitors more than the brand that paid for it. But that’s exactly what Kiwibank and its new agency Assignment Group have done with its ‘Every revolution needs a leader’ campaign, which puts the spotlight on some of the 800,000 New Zealanders who have switched to the bank since it kicked off 11 years ago.

News
An ironic giveaway
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After a brief but rewarding fling with StopPress and Idealog, tech reporter/photographer/regional man of mystery Sim Ahmed finished up yesterday and is off to work for POS start-up Vend HQ. But we’re not letting him get away without mentioning a bit of copyright hilarity he was involved in on Twitter last week.

News
Telecom keeps business personal for the SME crowd—UPDATED
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While Telecom is currently focusing on the advertising of its major competitor, with proceedings lodged today in the High Court over aspects of what it believes are misleading claims in Vodafone’s recent SuperNet campaign, it will be focusing on its own advertising come Sunday night, because it’s launching a new campaign for its Business Hubs, the local (and often locally-owned) business-only locations offering services and products to SME customers.

Movings & Shakings
Movings/Shakings: 2 August
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Carin Hercock swaps APN for Nielsen, the Red Bulletin takes a new approach, Sim Ahmed and Simon Pound join start-up Vend HQ, Damien Shatford signs with the Sweet Shop, Republik gets some Aussie biz, Big Mobile gets bigger, Rose Matafeo changes channels, Stefan Korn takes Creative HQ reins and APN Outdoor heads to Broadway.

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