ANZ has launched a new cross-Tasman brand ad by Whybin\TBWA that gives a nod to the pioneering human spirit by featuring a series of snippets from innovators in their respective fields.
The Japanese are renowned for their kooky ideas, be it in the form of ads, businesses or game shows. And, to promote the speed of its new “premium 4G” ultra-fast data service, telco provider NTT Docomo has followed up last year’s elaborate high-speed fried shrimp ad with an elaborate high-speed gyoza dumpling ad.
Several weeks ago, Colenso BBDO launched Pedigree’s Found app, an innovative tool developed in conjunction with Google with the aim of giving dog owners a digital tool to find their lost pets. At the time of the app’s launch, the team at Colenso mentioned that the new tech trinket would serve as precursor to the launch of Pedigree’s new global platform. And overnight (in New Zealand) this new platform came to fruition via a pair of TVCs bearing the slogan that launched in Australia and Brazil.
The 2015 TVNZ-NZ Marketing Awards are ready to be collected. So if you feel you’ve performed heroic feats of marketing over the past year, take a leaf out of Wendy Rayner’s book, submit an entry and you could also be Mighty Marketing material.
From Ram’s patriotic effort to Cadillac’s knobby manifesto to Lincoln’s campaign featuring Matthew McConaughey, car brands often like to get deep and meaningful in their ads. Honda has given automotive cliches a bit of poke—while gratuitously promoting its new car to “a small but hard to reach demo”—with an ad featuring Abed and Dean Pelton from Community, which is being shown on Yahoo and sponsored by Honda.
Air New Zealand celebrated its 75th anniversary yesterday by holding various competitions and promotions, including a mid-air game show, a chance for customers to win back their fare and a themed flight across the Tasman. PLUS: a gallery of old Air NZ ads.
Back on Oct. 27, 1994, Wired (or, as it was then known, Hotwired) claims to have given birth to the web’s first banner ad. 20 years on and the web is littered with them, to the point where banner blindness has become a real thing. But how well do you really know your banner ads? Boonstra McDonald has created a site where you can learn a bit more about your favourite flashing friends. And it turns out large rectangle, square button, pop-under and co. have got quite interesting back stories.
Due to its rapid growth and ongoing success, Xero has on numerous occasions been dubbed the Apple of accounting by the media. And while the company is going through a rocky patch at the moment with reports showing its annual loss widening and speculation that the Australian Stock Exchange might investigate the company on account of failing to disclose information to stock holders, it remains a major Kiwi success story, which has already made strong headway in the Australian market and is also getting noticed in the US. And despite having his hands quite full at the moment with international conquests, the company’s chief marketing officer Andy Lark recently chatted to StopPress’ sister publication Idealog about taking on the US and why marketing cannot be a substitute for a great product or sterling service.
The Pew Research Center in the United States has released its 12th edition of the annual State of the News Media report, which examines the landscape of American journalism and tracks trends related to readership, revenue and device usage. And while the publication doesn’t include a Kiwi perspective, it does provide an in-depth glimpse at many of the changes and challenges that the local media also faces due to digital disruption. One of the most telling findings from the study was that 39 of the top 50 news sites now receive more traffic to their sites on mobile phones than from desktops.
Our weekly wrap of good things, strange things, funny things and other things from inside the intertubes.
In addition to the TVC released in mid April, Monteith’s has launched an online game called The New Gold Rush. The player has to find the key to Monteith’s brewery on a virtual map of the West Coast. And if the instructions are anything to go by, then the secret as to the exact location is hidden within the TVC.
In its 2015 flu campaign, the Health Promotion Agency has visualised the flu as a blue dust-like substance that floats in the air and moves from person to person.
Often ads that aim to get drivers reducing their speed involve families and children and those who would be affected most if the driver in question was to lose their life. Generally, this involves a tragic scene with a ‘speed kills’ tagline. But, in its new ‘Reduce Speed Dial’ experiment created by Colenso BBDO and Finch, Volkswagen has taken a different approach by having kids design their parents’ speedometers.
Last week, Bauer’s head of digital Michael Fuyala told StopPress that the publisher would over the next few months be making some significant moves in the digital space following the decision to join the IAB. And last night, the company kicked off the first phase of its new digital strategy—which has been in the pipeline for some time—by announcing a digital extension for Fashion Quarterly called FQ.co.nz.
We live in sad times. And they just got sadder, because artists Aric Snee & Justin Crowe have released an amazing new narcissistic development, the selfie-arm, ‘a sarcastic solution to the problem of being alone.’ PLUS: the wonders of solo chatting.
BMW’s Super Bowl ad for 2015 featured a clip from 1994 in which long-standing news personalities Katie Couric and Bryant Gumbel are discussing the mysteries of…
In 2011, Kiwi-born Robin Leonard founded AllFamous Digital in the Philippines, and inevitable ups and downs that have come with it have taught him some important rules about running a business in the digital marketing space.
Google recently changed its search algorithm to punish websites that aren’t mobile-friendly. And with watches, car interfaces and who knows what else becoming internet-enabled, designing and building websites for a future where device size is unknown is paramount, say Sam Judson and Richard Allardice.
In an effort to remind Russians to watch their speed, BBDO Moscow has produced a smart YouTube-based campaign for InTouch Insurance that only shows an accident happening when viewers fast-forward an otherwise boring ten-minute video of a car driving along the road.
Stem Creative has released the first three episodes of its six-part satirical web series called Agency, just a few short months after the creators came up with the idea. And the result is a humorous look at the trials and tribulations of the advertising industry through the eyes of three “hapless but genuine and enthusiastic marketing wannabes” at a small creative marketing agency in Wellington.
Four-person Swedish agency Dogwash has released a quirky campaign that allows ad folk to accurately express their thoughts through a catalogue of emojis that can be downloaded from the app store. And since most agencies always have one eye on the gong, the emoji suite includes Cannes Lions, Clios, D&D Pencils and a host of other award-themed options.
APN Outdoor started the large-format digital party in New Zealand in 2013, iSite is set to launch its own large format digital network soon and a few other smaller players have added their own sites. Now Adshel is joining in the fun, with 35 digital panels set to be switched on in the Auckland CBD and fringe suburbs in June. And general manager Nick Vile says it opens up a range of possibilities for advertisers.
Colenso BBDO has won two Webby Awards, which the agency will scoop up during the ceremony in New York next month. One Webby was for the Best Use of Online Media for its Burger King ‘Anti Pre-Roll’ campaign while the other was a ‘People’s Voice’ award in the Best Use of Social Media category for ‘Motel BK’.
The freelancer experience has until now been typified by making contacts and hoping that they require your services on a regular basis. And while this approach has seen freelancers make ends meet for generations, it isn’t best case scenario for any of the parties involved. Freelancers are often left without work for long stints while agencies and clients might only have a limited list of potential workers, who might not always be available. So, in a bid to make freelancing in the local market more accessible and practicable, Greig Cranfield, who has until now served as digital specialist recruiter at Razzbri, launched Yudoozy, an online recruitment service that links freelancers to clients.
Game of Thrones has seemingly become to Ireland what Lord of the Rings is to New Zealand: a perfect opportunity to market stunning landscapes to fans of the series. And for this reason, Tourism Ireland and HBO have been surprising Ireland’s residents and visitors by scattering fantastical Game of Thrones props around the country to promote the show while simultaneously promoting Ireland as a tourist destination for Game of Thrones fans, or anyone who admire the stunning landscapes in the series.
As the industry continues to fragment, agencies are forced into adapting their approaches to ensure that clients’ demands are still met. And while they don’t always have the massive holding-company budgets at their disposal, indy agencies have the nimbleness to react quickly to change and redefine their role. And Sugar & Partners creative and digital director Dave Nash sees this as a major advantage at a time when more and more clients are asking for integrated advertising executions.
Content is de riguer at the moment. And while there’s plenty of action in this area, there’s also plenty to learn. So, to help with that, StopPress is hosting an event next week for those looking to get a flavour of the latest thinking on content marketing. The Content Marketing Picture—organised in partnership with co-hosts Getty Images and TVNZ—will take place at the Spark Conference Centre in Auckland, Tuesday 5 May, from 5.00pm.
Everyone’s so busy these days. So busy, it seems, that there’s not even enough time to get changed, as evidenced by Australian surfing brand Quiksilver’s release of a line of suits in Japan that you can wear surfing.
