After a restructure of the editorial department last year, experienced editor and journalist Garry Ferris has been appointed to a new role that will see him overseeing all of Fairfax’s print and digital products in Auckland, including the Sunday Star-Times and the Sunday News. PLUS: what’s happening in the marketing department and which agencies is it working with?
In a world of mergers, acquisitions and acronyms, knowing your DDBs from your TBWA\s and Y&Rs can be tough going. And so, it seems, is knowing how to say them. Thankfully, some anonymous cunning linguists have come to the rescue with this slightly ridiculous agency pronunciation guide.
Organisations that embrace the notion of a social business have the opportunity to gain loyal, engaged employees and find a competitive edge in recruiting, retention, talent development and business performance, writes Theresa Clifford.
Meet Lloyd. He’s got a tongue—and he knows how to use it. And, in this new spot by DDB and the Sweet Shop’s Damien Shatford, the rather weird Sky employee, who’s almost like a better-lubricated version of Fresh Up’s ‘Thirst is Creepy’ characters, is being introduced to the nation in an effort to convince the 800,000 Sky TV subscribers who receive their bill in the post to move with the times and sign up to email billing.
The closure and voluntary liquidation of Publicis Mojo that was announced just before Christmas last year came as a shock—to the employees, to Mojo clients and to the industry as a whole. And in his many years in the ad business Graeme Wills, the ex-chairman of Publicis Mojo Australia and New Zealand and head of new agency Joy, claims he’s never seen a company behave as unprofessionally, nastily and cynically as Publicis Groupe has during this saga.
MediaWorks confims it has axed Dotcom’s ads, but won’t say why. Dotcom uses sad-face emoticon to describe his feelings at the moment.
Earlier this week, DraftFCB announced it would be handing the Westfield baton on for ‘commercial reasons’. And a few days later it’s announced something of a replacement, as it has been appointed as the full service advertising agency for Paper Plus Group after a competitive pitch process that was thought to have involved the late Publicis Mojo, Hotfoot and the incumbent Hyde, which relaunched the brand back in late 2011.
Nothing can stop Kiwis from shopping for bargains, especially not when everyone takes their mobile phones on holiday it seems.
The 1 billion-strong social network launches a social-powered search engine. Is this where your next SEM dollar will go?
Less than one year into the role and just before the launch of the new primetime news show Seven Sharp, TVNZ’s head of news and current affairs Ross Dagan has followed in the footsteps of his Australian predecessor Anthony Flannery and resigned to return to his homeland. He will depart the network in March.
Hawke’s Bay man creates iOS game from home which has taken the app world by storm, now sitting pretty in the Apple App charts.
Social media law is never to argue, debate or reason with a customer on your page, and more often than not bow down fearfully in front of the thousands of watchful eyes. But Abi Morrish thinks 2013 is the year of ‘no shit in social’.
There still seem to be a few holiday tumbleweeds out there in marcomms land, but we managed to find a few contenders, with TVNZ’s colourful Seven Sharp promo, Animates’ accurate Doomsday prediction and nzgirl’s raunchy ‘regretgasm’ spot featuring in the year’s first round.
The modern world is quick to jump on PR fails, and they certainly make for good fodder in an age of rampant sharing on social media. But in an effort to get people to appreciate the complexity of PR issues, Wellington PR agency BlacklandPR has created a list of what it deemed the most difficult PR challeges of 2012. And the merging of Christchurch schools took top spot.
‘Flatties’, the entertaining home loan-related follow-up to Westpac’s ‘Start Asking’ brand campaign by DDB and Prodigy, managed to beat out its big brother in the Jan/Feb instalment of Campaign Review in NZ Marketing magazine after taking second place. And it’s followed that up by winning the November round of the Colmar Brunton Ad Impact Award.
“For the past few years, Radio Hauraki has been shit.” So says a very frank and rather Back of the Y-esque video clip involving petrol, a lighter and some hearty appliance violence. But with a new look, a new breakfast pairing and a new campaign via Saatchi & Saatchi, the Radio Network claims “things are changing” for the rock station in 2013.
The ham has run out, the afternoon naps are no more and the working masses are now mostly staring forlornly at their screens once again. Here are some of the moves and shakes that occurred before, during and after the Great New Zealand Slow Down, including new things for Guy Cousins, Renee Parsons, Kenny Yeon, Starseed PR, Bullseye, Senate, Mi9, and DB Breweries.
Shortland Street fans rejoice. Now you can do your on-demand catching up with the gang from the big screen. Mobile screen fans to get some love in February.
The YoungGuns awards aim to recognise the world’s best advertising and communications industry talent under the age of 30 and, after becoming the only agency in the world to win the YoungGuns agency of the year twice in 2001 and 2008, Colenso BBDO was named as the most awarded agency of the decade by the organisation in 2010. And it’s obviously no fluke, because it’s also been awarded the 2012 agency of the year prize after winning four bullets in total—one gold, two silvers and a bronze—with Contagion the only other Kiwi agency to take home a prize after winning bronze.
With a new measurement system that aims to shift the focus from buying screens to buying eyeballs, the rise of digital screening technology, an enhanced focus on cinema’s ability to add incremental reach, and a fully staffed sales team to show off its wares, Val Morgan’s sales director Natasha O’Connor says the issues that have hampered the growth of cinema advertising in New Zealand—primarily a perceived lack of accountability and additional production costs inherent in transferring TVCs to film—are now being addressed and it has taken steps to ensure cinema will be easier to plan, buy and measure in 2013.
Latest current affairs show on New Zealand TV landscape promises to tell the news with a bit of a laugh. Don’t we already have 7 Days for that?
Three years after winning the Westfield New Zealand account, DraftFCB has resigned the business, with the agency finishing up on 31 March.
Following news of its liquidation in a classic Christmas dump last year, a new report shows the agency owes its employees, the tax man, and trade partners a significant amount of cash – and it looks like it doesn’t have money in the bank to pay it all.
First it was Droga5, and now, in the classic ‘Christmas dump’, where bad news is saved up for when everyone’s focusing on some well-earned festive cheer, it was announced yesterday that Publicis Mojo’s time in New Zealand is also up. It will be replaced by a new agency called Joy in the new year.
As a wise man once said, those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it. So, given all the opinions that have flowed forth over the past week from a range of marcomms cutters and thrusters (never fear, we’ve got a few more up our sleeves to ease you into 2013), it seemed remiss of us not to do a bit of reflecting ourselves, both on the industry we cover and on the evolution of StopPress and NZ Marketing.
What’s more Christmassy than an inappropriate pash at the office party? Or a deep ham and alcohol coma? Or the disappointed look on your greedy kids’ faces when they don’t get what they want? A festively-themed, avian-heavy dollop of digital show-offery, says the gang from audio-recognition app Pluk. So Pluk the video and see what happens.
The tenth year of Auckland indie Big Communications has been another solid one, with new clients like Motorcorp, Barfoot & Thompson, ATEED and The Langham, and more good stuff as part of the long-running Vero campaign. Managing director Ant Salmon goes long.
When it comes to mergers, it doesn’t get much bigger than ANZ shutting the stable door on the National Bank. Everyone knew it was coming eventually, but having to say goodbye to the much-loved stallion still came as a shock to many. And from the relatively smooth IT switchover (thought to be the biggest IT project this century in New Zealand) to the roll-out of the different phases of communications, most would agree they did a pretty bloody good job of it. Matthew Pickering, head of retail marketing, pipes up.
Five Kiwi apps have floated above the rest in Apple’s pick of this year’s best in the New Zealand App Store.
2012 was a comeback year for the Whybin\TBWA Group after something of an annus horribilis in 2011. It put Middle-earth into New Zealand, oversaw the biggest thing in banking with the surprisingly smooth National Bank/ANZ fusion, launched the Digital Arts Network by merging Shift and Tequila\, and its PR arm Eleven won a couple of PR agency of year awards. So chief executive David Walden, who sold a few shares and began the hunt for a successor, ended the year a pretty happy chappy.