Monthly Archives: July, 2014

News
Consumer NZ moves from testing products to testing businesses with new accreditation scheme
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From men in white coats to stickers showing awards won to independent accreditation, endorsements give consumers confidence that what they spend their cash on is up to snuff. And Consumer NZ, the Kiwi non-profit that started in 1959 to delve into the quality of products and services and investigate consumer issues, has launched a scheme called Consumer Trusted to enhance that. PLUS: Consumer’s new (slightly confusing) website.

News
Brewing up value: Dilmah’s boutique push
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Sales of traditional ‘gumboot’ tea are on the wane in New Zealand. But there’s growth in the area of specialty teas and Dilmah is trying to tap into that by promoting the nascent arts of tea mixology and tea gastronomy. So can they convince young Kiwis to sip on a tea with their chargrilled steak?

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Woman’s Day’s face-fixing faux pas
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Jessica Simpson has helped sell countless women’s magazines around the world. And Woman’s Day managed to nab some exclusive photos of her special day for the latest issue. But an eagle-eyed reader sent us one of the photos from the spread and someone’s failed to fix up a bit of cheeky face-fixing.

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TVNZ wins with Germany as over 400,000 Kiwis tune in to watch the World Cup final
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Many of those who drove to work at the right time on 14 July claim to have found the Kiwi roads free of the traffic jams that usually typify the morning commute. This fortunate state of the road was largely attributable due to the nation’s universities and schools being closed for the winter break, but the fact that 419,000 people (according to Nielsen TAM) tuned in to TV One to watch Germany take on Argentina in the final of the World Cup definitely also played a part.

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How Kiwi political parties measure up on Facebook
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Facebook has revealed a series of insights on how the Kiwi political parties are doing in the lead up to the 2014 general election. And given that 1.8 million Kiwis log in to Facebook on a daily basis and that ‘election’ was the second-most commonly used phrase on the site in 2013 (only bettered by Pope Francis), the social media channel is becoming an increasingly important space for politicians to share their policies—or general vitriol—with potential voters.

News
Dog vs. drone
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While drones are being used for nefarious purposes in warzones, they’re being put to good use elsewhere, as a clip posted on Al Brown’s Facebook page shows.

News
The benefits of authenticity: why coming out—and supporting those who do—is good for business
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This week Ian Thorpe revealed he was gay in an interview with Michael Parkinson. A few months back, Michael Sam and Jason Collins became the first openly gay men to be drafted into the NFL and NBA respectively. And New Zealand and many other nations have legalised gay marriage. So progress is certainly being made in the area of gay rights, at least in the developed world. But there’s still a long way to go. And as John Browne’s book The Glass Closet, ASB’s response to Thorpe’s news and OUTLine’s 100% OK campaign show, the business community can lead the way.

News
David Hasselhoff could be the reason why Germany won the World Cup
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In the 80s, after the rest of the world turned its back on David Hasselhoff, the German fans stuck with their bare-chested man. And although his slow-motion running along the beach and his talking car do play a part in this fame, it is in fact his singing career that has made him a staple on television screens in the country in the latter parts of the decade.

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The smell of robot
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Recently, a chatbot called Eugene Goostman is thought to have passed the Turing test by convincing a few people it was a 13-year-old boy (RadioLab discussed the issue of talking to machines in a great podcast a few years back). And as artificial intelligence continues to develop, human-android interactions will become an increasingly common—and perhaps problematic—occurrence. But even if they have our sentience, they can never have our smell. Unless …

News
Here’s to the idea catchers
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As Damon Stapleton wrote recently, the idea is the gift, the award is the wrapping paper. His employer, DDB Group, shares this philosophy and, in a rather earnest video that showcases some of the best ads ever made, it gives ‘the idea catchers’ a pat on the back and attempts to prove Bernbach’s quote about creativity being the most powerful force in business correct.

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The early bank catches the client: how ASB is getting its brand in front of students
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ASB has launched a new campaign via Saatchi & Saatchi to draw attention to its GetWise initiative, which has been created to educate kids on how to be smarter with money. In the new 60-second spot called ‘Creating cash-clever Kiwis’, a series of adorable kids are depicted giving imaginative answers to questions about money. Then, once the kids have had their say, a narrator interjects saying that ‘kids have some funny ideas about money’ before prompting viewers to visit the GetWise section of the website.

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FCB Media restructure sees digital sprinkled across its divisions
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FCB has been running like a dream in recent years, and so has its media arm FCB Media, with four best in shows in the past five years at the Media Awards/The Beacons, a few big clients added to its roster and its integrated offering proving to be a major point of difference. But the world has changed and FCB Media has recently changed its structure to better suit it, with the skills of the digital department now being distributed more broadly across the agency. Managing director Derek Lindsay talks about its philosophy, adding value to clients’ businesses and addressing some of the perception problems media agencies currently face.

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Call for entries: News Works Newspaper Ad of the Year
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Entries are now open for the 2014 Newspaper Advertising Awards, with the usual prize of $10,000 for Newspaper Ad of the Year. Last year, DDB won it with its YWCA advertisement promoting equal pay for women with the headline “from now until the end of the year, women will work for free”. This year, there’s a thousand-dollar media lunch on offer too.

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Go long, add video: new options for StopPress advertisers
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Back in the day, StopPress used to be an insert in the monthly NZ Marketing magazine until we put it online in 2009. Since then, the son has started eating the father and, like many publishers, a lot of the action has been online, which isn’t entirely surprising given the digitally-savvy sector we cover. We publish columns and some other content from the magazine on StopPress from time to time but, as the site was developed for news and short, snappy pieces, it wasn’t really suited to displaying the longer features. But now we’ve launched a new section dedicated to bringing some of that long-form content from the magazine to life online. PLUS: even more gratuitous self-promotion!

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C’mon to New Zealand
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C’mon to New Zealand was a film made for Air New Zealand and the New Zealand Tourist and Publicity department for the purpose of showcasing the great things about our country to Australian travel agents.

News
Laugh in the face of mid-year alcohol abstinence, get Dish Drinks tickets
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For a large number of people in this industry, the idea of Dry July is probably a punishment worse than death. So if you’re in that category, then book yourself some tickets to Dish Drinks, where wine writer and bon vivant Yvonne Lorkin will take you on a journey beyond the well-known red wine varieties of Pinot Noir and Merlot to explore a world of fabulous lesser known red wines, such as Malbec, Cabernet Franc and Tempranillo.

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