Uber has now reached one million trips in New Zealand since it launched 18 months ago and to celebrate, it’s offering its users two free rides tomorrow and has released information on its impact in the country.
Social media is being used in all kinds of creative ways to market these days. One of the latest initiatives is by Tourism New Zealand and travel group Helloworld which has created the world’s first social media relay, through Instagram, in celebration of United Nations World Tourism Day.
Biggsy and Duster may sound like characters in a gangster flick. But they’re actually Assignment Group’s two newest hires, Philip Andrew and Peter Biggs.
Dr. Paul Bracewell, founding partner and chief data scientist at Dot Loves Data, says the statistics being thrown around in the media about the 2015 Rugby World Cup are typical of many applications of analytics in the business world: there are few actionable insights being provided. So he crunched the numbers and showed that the simplest solution is often the best.
Through a content partnership between Marketo and StopPress, we look at how technology is being used to automate marketing processes and what this means for industry. This time we chat to Vend’s Josh Pickles on his experiences with the Marketo platform.
Samsung has released its Samsung Galaxy Note5 and teamed up with designer menswear brand Working Style to promote the product in New Zealand, creating an analogy between the streamlined design of the device and the fine workmanship of a tailored suit via a TVC by Augusto.
The venn diagram that justified the creation of House of Cards showed that Netflix had big data on its side. And since then it’s had a pretty good run as far as creating original content goes. Its latest series, Narcos, follows the story of drug kingpin Pablo Escobar and it has also been a major hit. And, in keeping with a native ad strategy that has seen it work with The New York Times to promote Orange is the New Black, The Atlantic to promote House of Cards and Wired to promote a new era of TV, it’s called on The Wall St Journal’s commercial content division Custom Studios to create an impressive indepth series of the economics of the cocaine trade.
While everyone’s automotive attention is currently on the sneaky emissions-dodging Germans, Honda continues to pump out the advertising gems and, following in the footsteps of the classic Rube Goldberg effort Cog, the attention-grabbing Hands, the very clever The Other Side and the mind-hacking Keep Up, it’s weaved together around 3,000 hand-drawn images and used the power of stop motion to show 60 years of innovation.
Following on from the recent consolidation of the Slingshot, Flip and Orcon advertising accounts, M2 Group has released its first ad campaign via its recently appointed creative agency Rapp.
Guess what’s projected to be the fastest-growing business in the US? Apps? The ‘sharing’ economy? The internet of things? Big data? It’s actually … (imagine you hadn’t read the headline or seen the accompanying images) marijuana. So how far away is it in New Zealand? And what opportunities might there be for savvy entrepreneurs and marketers? Henry Oliver gets the rub of the green.
Earlier this year, Vodafone changed creative direction with the introduction of an adorable porcine character named Piggy Sue, whose heartfelt story relayed the point that ‘life’s better together’. And now, the red telco has built on the positioning with a new ad that shows the value of mobile technology in keeping people connected through a brief story about a grandfather playing a game of chess with his grandson.
As is increasingly becoming clear, brands can no longer expect to put the bait out and wait for its audience to come. A bit more is required these days to target the more distracted modern audience, and brands are having to travel to audience-territory or risk being ignored. A big brand which has cottoned onto this is Sky TV which (along with a number of other brands) has now joined image and video-sharing app Snapchat in an attempt to target a millennial audience, to generate interest in its Rugby World Cup 2015 coverage.
Online browsing through smartphones is exploding in the local market. But Sizmek’s Carolyn Bollaci believes there’s a disconnect between the level of consumption and the quality of the ads being served.
House and garden brand Unilever has released a short film about a weary tree that leaves the rainforest, after the realisation it might be safer in the city.
With digital revenue still not measuring up to print losses and ad blockers becoming more common in the top-right corners of browsers, media owners increasingly have to reassess how they go about sustaining their online businesses. And over the last few weeks, Tangible Media and Bauer, two of the nation’s biggest magazine publishers, illustrated there’s no concrete rule applicable to doing this, with the pair taking divergent paths as they set out create commercially sustainable online properties.
It’s a conversation that happens twice a year, once near the beginning and once near the end. Do the clocks go back or forward one hour? The conversation was probably the result of many arguments back in the day before the internet and smartphones came along and adjusted time automatically for us. But still, the debate continues. That’s what Leigh Hart, Millen Baird and Jason Hoyte have tapped into for this new Hellers ad, by Moon Media in conjunction with Simpatico Advertising, in probably the most confusing way possible.
In an ongoing series, StopPress talks to a range of newsmakers to find out how those trying to shine lights into dark places are keeping their own lights on and whether commercial realities are leading to editorial compromise. Next up, Ben Fahy talks with TVNZ’s chief executive Kevin Kenrick.
Dulux has harnessed the power of the MythBusters for its latest campaign through OMD to prove whether or not Dulux’s new ‘Wash&Wear’ paint is up to scratch in four new TVCs.
At the moment, it is near impossible to escape the rugby madness that has hypnotised the nation. Many of our beloved products from the supermarket have turned black, one of which being Anchor’s milk bottles, which turned the shade in support of the All Blacks. Dow Design provided us some insights on what makes good product design, and what sells.
Southern Cross, Beats, ASB and Meridian Energy win the applause this week.
TV3’s Grand Designs New Zealand is set to kick off early next month and today MediaWorks released the second phase of its marketing campaign for the show, which lives up to the Grand Design ethos of creative design including some clever eyeball trickery through interactive adshels. PLUS: partner ANZ’s campaign around the show.
Last Thursday Doritos released ‘Rainbow’ Doritos in support of LGBT teens, which were available to every person who donated to Dan Savage’s ‘It Gets Better Project’. The cheesy rainbow snacks sold out in just two days.
Interactive advertising continued its upward trajectory, with the latest IAB/PwC online ad spend report showing that it generated a record $184.73 million in the second quarter of 2015. And IAB chief executive Adrian Pickstock says that channel is nowhere near plateauing yet.
Once again Whittaker’s has taken out the number one spot on Colmar Brunton’s NZ most loved brand survey, even outranking the All Blacks on a Rugby World Cup Year.
Brands are increasingly looking to produce online content that viewers find entertaining enough to share. And as part of its sponsorship deal with the Winter Games, Audi set out to do something a little different by inviting a collection of 20 lucky Kiwis to attend a pop-up bistro event high up in the Pisa Range hosted by celebrity chef Simon Gault.
Southern Cross Health Society has gone the emotional route with its new campaign via Barnes, Catmur & Friends consisting of an ad narrated by an old man giving advice to his younger self along to a series of clips of his most significant life experiences and the lessons he’s learned.
Beats by Dre has a mixed reputation among sound bogans for the audio quality of its products, but it is renowned for the quality of its advertising and the brand has managed to worm its way into popular culture by getting endorsements—paid and otherwise—from stars like Lebron James, Richard Sherman, Serena Williams, Neymar Jr, Nick Kyrgios, Kobe Bryant and Lady Gaga. Now it’s moved onto rugby, with All Black captain Richie McCaw putting in the acting performance of his life to make what is one of the best rugby-related ads of the past few rugby-filled months.
With the Rugby World Cup about to start tomorrow morning, there are bound to be a few tired All Black fans over the next six weeks. There’s already a campaign from NZME called Push Back for Black that asks employers to go easy on rugby-loving employees. But if there’s no leeway from the boss, then ASB is ensuring Kiwis get some extra stamina through stimulants.
Earlier this week NZME announced plans for its print, digital and radio news teams to come together as an integrated 24/7 operation led by managing editor Shayne Currie, whose role has been elevated to report directly to NZME chief executive Jane Hastings. And as is usually the case with restructures, there will be a few staff changes, some of which were announced by Hastings and Currie to the newsroom on Wednesday afternoon.
Changes at FCB, MediaWorks, NZME, Bauer, Sovereign, Postr and DDB.