Monthly Archives: September, 2014

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The best of both worlds? Why House of Travel is flipping its marketing script and embracing Facebook
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Interactive is an expanding piece of the ad spend pie here and around the world, and Magna Global has predicted it will overtake TV in the US by 2017. Facebook is a big part of that ecosystem and it reckons it can offer both scale and granularity. So we caught up with Facebook head of New Zealand Stephen Scheeler to find out what’s happening here and how House of Travel has harnessed the social network and is moving away from traditional media.

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Saving over selling: how FCB’s National Depression Initiative joined a very exclusive club with IPA Effectiveness Award shortlisting
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Marketing gets a pretty bad rap from the general public for the sophisticated tricks it uses to influence behaviour in the quest for profit. But the Ministry of Health and Health Promotion Agency’s National Depression Initiative campaign by FCB is a prime example of the power of marketing to do good. And the campaign, which covers the period from 2010 to 2013, has just been shortlisted for the coveted IPA Effectiveness Awards, the first time since 1994 that a Kiwi campaign has earned that accolade.

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Izzy Dagg showers with his phone for Samsung
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The growing prevalence of the online channel has made it more common for the regional arms of major organisations to make locally produced content. And this trend has now seen Samsung release a new YouTube clip that features rugby star Israel Dagg showing off the full utility range of the GS5. But placing your brand’s message in the hands of a sports star comes with its risks.

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Digital interaction you can’t look away from
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If you are sick of “having your heart toyed with like a meaningless plaything” in the real world, you now have the opportunity to experience the very same thing in the digital realm, with Wellington/Amsterdam web savants Resn creating an interactive artwork to accompany the song ‘Look Away’ from SBTRKT’s soon to be released album, Wonder Where We Land.

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Battle of the big screens
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Despite Steve Jobs’ antipathy towards big screens, Apple launched the 14cm iPhone 6 Plus (and a couple of other things) last week. And Samsung, no stranger to taking swipes at its main mobile competitor, responded with a series of ads showing some disappointed Apple staff. Now it’s followed those up with another feisty spot that talks about the initial negative response to its big, “more productive, more innovative, more fun” Galaxy Note and the ensuing scramble from other manufacturers to follow suit.

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Two (screens) become one
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In an effort to make the trend of second-screening a bit more interactive, a team of tech geniuses at MIT has developed a system that allows a smartphone user to interact with a laptop or tablet screen with a second device. And while the technology is still in its infancy, there are undoubtedly a few marketers around the world who are thinking up ways that it could be used in a campaign.

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Told you so
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It’s a classic—albeit fairly rare—tale: someone has an idea for a business. Their friends, families and potential investors tell them it’s ridiculous. A few years later, it’s a runaway success. And if that happens to you, a new ad for the oft-controversial domain name company GoDaddy via Barton F Graf shows how inspirational business owners should react with humility and grace.

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Orcon’s FreeMyRugby petition won’t cause riots, but it draws attention to the growing trend of sports broadcast bidding wars
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Orcon is taking a leaf out of the ‘Politician’s Handbook’ by attempting to mobilise the Kiwi masses through a petition, which aims to break Sky’s hold on the broadcasting rights for live rugby games. The petition is hosted at a microsite called FreeMyRugby.co.nz and draws attention to the fact that only New Zealanders with a Sky subscription—available for $74.75 a month on a Sky basic and sport package—are in a position to watch the All Blacks play live. And while sharing this common knowledge is unlikely to cause a riot, it does draw attention to how the media landscape is changing and how this might continue to impact Sky’s hold sports broadcasts.

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Creative urban explorers win Jasmax video comp
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Architectural design firm Jasmax is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, and, in keeping with the marketing zeitgeist, it asked punters to join in the fun by creating a short video showing “how architecture impacts and facilitates our everyday lives” (and at least one Jasmax project). And Jason Dobbs and his skateboarding son Cato took the $5,000 prize with a clip called A2B.

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Willie the brave
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While The Civilian Party is jokingly proposing Hamilton become independent from New Zealand as part of its election campaign, Scotland actually gets a chance to decide whether to stick with the Brits or go it alone. No prizes for guessing which side Groundskeeper Willie is on. Plus: John Oliver’s plea for unity.

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OMD takes Yahoo digital strategy prize for Pepsi On project
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Nigel Latta’s recent programme about the evils of sugar certainly got Kiwis talking. And the food industry—and the marketing tactics it employs—came in for plenty of criticism, with sugary drinks given the hardest time. When you see footage of two-year-old children having their teeth removed because their parents put fizzy drink in their sipper bottles, it certainly makes it tough to celebrate marketing campaigns that help sell more of the stuff, but, as Peter Cullinane says, ‘if it’s legal to sell, it’s legal to advertise’, so here’s to OMD New Zealand and Frucor, which have taken out Yahoo New Zealand’s Digital Strategy Award for the Pepsi On project.

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Insights into outdoor media effectiveness – Millward Brown
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APN Outdoor recently commissioned research consultancy Millward Brown to undertake what has been called the “largest outdoor media study” of its kind in the Australasian market. Millward Brown found that outdoor and television advertising were the best performers in terms of ad recall, with 82 percent of respondents saying they recalled seeing ads in these channels.

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FCB takes the early lead as Effies finalists announced
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After more than 170 preliminary judges and 60 category judges pored over the entries for the 2014 Effie Awards, 113 of them have made the finalist list, with FCB New Zealand topping the charts on 23, Colenso BBDO/Proximity New Zealand on 18, DDB and Saatchi & Saatchi on 11 and Ogilvy & Mather on ten.

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The next gay man’s Gore? Civilian Party takes to TV to promote its anti-Hamilton policy
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Politics is generally a pretty serious realm and this has been a pretty serious election. Dirty Politics. Moments of Truth. Colin Craig’s face. But over the years, parties like McGillicuddy Serious (best policies: mandatory homosexuality for 33 percent of the population and setting up a Frivolous Fraud Office to investigate any fraud deemed too silly for the Serious Fraud Office) and the Bill and Ben Party (best policy: “no policies, no promises, no disappointment”) have tried to see the funny side. Ben Uffindell, founder of satirical website The Civilian, added his name to that list for this election and, to the chagrin of many, The Civilian Party was given around $30,000 to spend on election advertising, which it’s used some of on a TV ad to promote its desire to declare independence from Hamilton.

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Mountain Dew continues to preach the practice makes perfect mentality
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Frucor has well and truly proven its marketing chops with V, the country’s biggest energy drink brand—and one of the most progressive and ballsy advertisers. But with one in every two beverages sold in New Zealand being a soft drink, the future of the company required it to be credible in that space. Frucor is the bottler for the PepsiCo brands like Pepsi and Mountain Dew, and it’s been on a mission to win the hearts and minds of younger consumers for a few years now, so following up the multi-award-winning Skate Pinball and Beyond the Wall campaigns, it’s continued to target that market, releasing a series of nicely shot videos as part of the ‘to get to easy you have to go through hard’ campaign.

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The Generosity Journal: Aisha Daji Punga
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As part of our series dedicated to celebrating good work and inspiring a bit more generosity—with the help of the One Percent Collective—Aisha Daji Punga, Frucor’s commercial development director and the recent winner of the marketer of the year title at the TVNZ-NZ Marketing Awards, looks at a few brands and agencies doing good, including Tip Top.

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Innovation on rotation
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Nike is rightfully renowned as one of the world’s most innovative companies, and its approach to marketing those innovations is similarly creative. The company kicked off in 1964 and it released its first swoosh-enabled shoe in 1971 and since then it has released a huge array of footwear. So, as part of its Genealogy of Innovation campaign, 200 pairs have been brought together in a two minute film that charts “seven, game-changing eras”: Genesis, Reformation, Golden Age, Enlightenment, Rennaissance, Transformation and Revolution.

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When fancy furniture meets a climbing wall
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While the rest of the world is intent on trying to come to grips with what the digital world offers, Ikea seems satisfied in sticking with the comfort of the conventional. This was seen recently when the high-end furniture company re-imagined its annual catalogue as a state-of-the art bookbook. But working in a conventional channel doesn’t always imply simplicity. Recently, in an effort to celebrate the opening of its 30th store in France, Ikea constructed a nine-metre-high climbing wall in Clermont-Ferrand.

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