The digital age is changing the way we live and work. And whatever your industry or interest, you’re part of the wave, like it or not. And digital media conference The Project, described as “a collision of thought on social media and digital communication”, is your chance to figure out how to ride it.
After a bit of a rough patch, the newly rebranded ‘global boutique’ Y&R NZ has been slowly getting back on the good foot, with some nice work for the likes of HRV, Shapes Roadies and ACC, and some big names being added to the staff roster, among them Josh Moore as executive creative director, Ross Goldsack returning as non-executive director and Scott Henderson manning the fort in Wellington. And now there’s another big change to announce, with the chief executive of seven years Jon Ramage stepping down and being replaced by Moore.
Back in the day, as a young lad living with a flat full of horrible men in Dunedin, we (mostly jokingly) discussed the idea of investing in a flat sheep because it was such a versatile animal, providing warmth, a footstool, lawnmowing services, fertiliser, ‘comfort’ (for the Southlanders) and, eventually, food. And Cavalier Bremworth is equally fond of the humble sheep’s versatility, because they’ve launched a new campaign to remind Kiwis that wool is the best choice for carpet as it has already passed the toughest tests when it was on the beast’s back.
Straight from the starter’s pistol, The Block NZ became TV3’s biggest show of the year. So has it maintained that momentum? How are those cheeky Pluk-ers doing with their mobile app? And what’s TVNZ got in store?
There was a bit of chatter in Australia about viewer numbers for the opening ceremony being the lowest since OzTam ratings began in 1999. So what happened in New Zealand? And how did the numbers compare to Beijing in 2008? And what’s this about the Prime Underclass?
Wildfire, a social media marketing company started by Kiwi Victoria Ransom, has been bought by Google for a reported US$250 million.
The Marketing Association hosted yet another sell-out Brainy Breakfast event last week, with over 300 marketers filling the Crowne Plaza’s conference room ready to listen to international social media expert, Brian Giesen and Jennifer Duval-Smith, executive director at Social@Ogilvy in New Zealand, speak about Pinterest—and how to use it to leverage social media campaigns.
We broke the story about Andrew Stone leaving Droga5 on Friday to spend more time with his family and do some consultancy work. And that high-profile departure, combined with the recent loss of its foundation client ASB to Saatchi & Saatchi, led to a fair bit of speculation that Droga5 was in a bit of trouble. But Mike O’Sullivan, who has stepped up to fill the leadership role, says the doors are still well and truly open and, with a few new clients and a new management team, the agency is poised for growth.
Sorted’s shrinkage, RadioLive’s fly on the wall approach, ASB’s Facebook in real life tomfoolery and TV3’s Olympics promo take the TVC title this week.
It’s been featured in Wired, the Huffington Post (“a virtual reality explosion”), The Daily What (“a prototype for Skrillex’s inevitable 2017 Super Bowl half-time show) and a fair bit here on StopPress. And the V Motion Project has started its experiential journey into the public domain, with a surprise in-cinema activation showing the technology in effect on the big screen.
MediaWorks adds some more integration, Gordon Jon Thompson takes a gamble on Sky City, APN names Peter Hunt as its director and chairman of the board, and DB opens up its newly-renovated Monteith’s Brewery in Greymouth.
Last year’s PwC New Zealand entertainment and media outlook said conservatism needed to be shed if media businesses wanted to make hay in the rapidly changing modern era. And, according to the second edition, what previously looked like a wide gap between old and new operating models is now being bridged and the New Zealand market is finally starting to embrace the new ways in which punters consume content, with revenues in the sector growing four percent to $5.2 billion in 2011, PwC tipping an average of five percent percent growth throughout the 2012-2016 forecast period, and mobility seen as the biggest driving force of change.
During the Rugby World Cup, the off-field battles between sponsors—and, often, non-sponsors—made for fairly interesting viewing. And the same is certainly true with the Olympics. Thankfully, MediaCom has its finger on the pulse with its Twitter Tracker, which ranks sponsors by a unique Olympic Twitter Score that includes total volume of mentions, engagement and reach metrics and, importantly, positive or negative sentiment.
There’s plenty of debate about how to measure the value of social media, and, in some cases, whether sites like Facebook and Twitter are at ‘the heart of a fallacy’ around online advertising. But, according to a new study by McKinsey Global Institute (MGI), the business and economics research arm of McKinsey & Company, social technologies have the potential to raise the productivity of knowledge workers by 20 to 25 percent, as information is made more accessible and searchable and communication streamlined.
Over the weekend, we received a message from Facebook’s account manager Adnan Khan asking us to consider adopting Facebook’s Social Plugin commenting system on StopPress, as it would increase the authenticity of the conversations and reduce the number of “faceless trolls” and offensive comments (if you’re so inclined, you can comment on StopPress stories through Facebook, Twitter or Google by logging-in to Disqus). So we couldn’t help but revel in the irony when ComputerWorld published an article yesterday about the fact that, according to social media management tool Status People, 94 percent of Khan’s almost 30,000 Twitter followers were fake.
L&P is a much-loved Kiwi brand. Many of its ads are classics, its Facebook page has over 184,000 likes and the recent Reader’s Digest survey listed L&P the seventh most trusted brand in New Zealand. But sales were simply not matching the affection and loyalty the brand enjoyed. So the packaging has been given a spruce up by brand design specialists Dow Design in an effort to make it more contemporary—and more compelling for the younger generation.
I remember when Michael Wolff was very bullish about the internet in the 1990s, so when he starts sounding warning bells, we had better take heed. And the way he paints Facebook—and a belief that its advertising model will eventually collapse for being so limited—is not unfamiliar to anyone who ever wondered, during the dot-com boom, just why those companies were worth that much.
The wise mouse from sorted.org.nz has been helping to enhance Kiwis’ money smarts for almost ten years now. But in March the campaign took a different tack by upping the engagement rather than just driving traffic to the website. And the second part of its three part financial education campaign aims to highlight the ways Kiwis can better manage their debt.
Back in the day, those with the ability to control fire were likely to be run out of town—or put in the old ‘let’s see if they’ll drown’ chair—for “being conversant in the dark arts”. But, as a new campaign for Rinnai by .99 shows, these days it’s something to put in your brochure.
According to CAANZ, one of the big challenges facing the communications industry is the way it is sometimes perceived by clients—and society more broadly. So, in an effort to address this and show that it is in fact what chief executive Paul Head calls a reputable and professional industry that adds value to businesses, the communications industry will be governed by a formal set of rules after CAANZ introduced its new ‘Code of Ethics, Practices, and Obligations of CAANZ Members’.
After leaving Saatchi & Saatchi to set up the local outpost of Droga5 in April 2010, it’s believed business partner Andrew Stone has left the building after a few eventful years at the helm.
Given Facebook’s pervasiveness, it’s not entirely surprising to learn the ‘Facebook in real life theme’ is already pretty fertile comedic territory. And ASB’s new agency Saatchi & Saatchi, with Thick as Thieves on production duties, has tapped into that idea for its first major piece of work for the bank, an online-only campaign to promote the new Facebook payments platform that shows what such a transaction might look like ‘IRL’.
.99’s win of the Tower business was a much-needed fillip for the embattled agency. And the good news has continued after it was handed the reins for a range of through-the-line communications for Fairfax Media’s Sunday Star Times newspaper after winning a pitch against Y&R Auckland and Christchurch agency Simpatico.
Air New Zealand is going black for good, with its fleet set to sport a new livery from next year that was created in collaboration with leading Kiwi typeface designer Kris Sowersby and Designworks.
Freeview, True and Flying Fish launched the new ‘To be fair, it’s got to be Free’ campaign in June and, more recently, Pio has been explaining the joys of its personal video recording system MyFreeview. After the response to the last competition we ran on StopPress to celebrate the coming of the digital switchover, Freeview has offered us another Panasonic DMR-XW380 MyFreeview HD recorder valued at $800 to give away. So tell us what Olympic event you would record and why and the most creative answer will get the spoils.
Masthead advertising company BrandWorld has added another brand to its stable, with The Extra Mile aiming to attract corporates that have positive tales to tell. And it’s got some fairly big names on board to tell them.
Music is a powerful force in advertising. Jingles are thought to be the leading cause of ‘song rash’ among New Zealanders, choosing the right backing track can sometimes mean the difference between ‘meh’ and magnificent , and, due to the creative proclivities of those working in this industry, many of those who inhabit it are annoyingly talented musicians. And the advertising event that many jokingly (or, in some cases, not-so-jokingly) refer to as the year’s most important is back for 2012. So let the inter-agency banter for the Battle of the Ad Bands commence.
The interactive smarty-pants at Wellington agency Resn have forged a global reputation for awesomeness with its work for a range of big global clients including Puma, Domino’s and Toyota. And now, as the London Olympics get set for blast off, it is claiming an ‘Olympic first’, with an online experience created with Paris agency CLM BBDO for French energy company EDF that claims to have reinvented the way the humble computer mouse is used for gaming.
There’s nothing like leaving on a high note and Clemenger BBDO’s Jon Pickersgill and Sarah Jackson have done exactly that because, just before they jet off across the ditch for new creative adventures at Sapient Nitro in Brisbane, they scooped the June ORCA with their back to front/front to back anti-drug-driving campaign for the NZTA.
Claudia Macdonald, managing director of Mango and founding member of the CAANZ Marcomms Leadership Group, was the first New Zealander to be a juror for the Cannes PR Lions in June. Here she reflects on the experience and what she learnt.