It was an offer too good to refuse and after just six months in operation, indie agency Josh & Jamie have made their first creative signing: the entire Assignment Group staff roster. Or, slightly more accurately, J&J founders Josh Lancaster and Jamie Hitchcock will soon be nestling into the nurturing bosom of Assignment Group.
The tagline for the 2010 Women’s Refuge appeal almost says it all: ‘Living in fear isn’t living’. But Saatchi & Saatchi Wellington have managed to say a bit more about the scourge of domestic violence in New Zealand with their creative work. And by raising awareness of what it’s like to live in psychologically or physically abusive homes, it hopes more funds can be raised to help the women and children leading fear-filled lives.
Online video has been an integral part of marketing campaigns for years, and a video going gangbusters on YouTube and other video sites is like the Holy Grail of marketing. Support, content, timing and knowing your audience are all elements that have to be included in the mix. But what’s often glossed over is the above-the-line support that is typically needed to get the ball rolling.
Obviously the Adfest judges aren’t offended by the sight of horses in the throes of passion quite as much as some members of the New Zealand public, because, slightly ironically, DDB NZ took home one of the top awards, the Grande 360 Lotus, at the Asia Pacific advertising festival for a Moro campaign that celebrated the joy of coming fourth.
Small, very New Zealandy and not very old agency Josh&Jamie is steadily becoming not so small, continuing its solid run of victories after taking Fairfax Media’s online news-site Stuff.co.nz off incumbent Big Communications in a competitive pitch.
Air New Zealand’s daily deals website grabaseat.co.nz has appointed Trade Me’s advertising sales team to manage its existing advertising placement programme from 1 August, making it the second external website along with interest.co.nz to have its advertising exclusively sold by the Trade Me team.
Candida, Kinetic 121 and New Zealand Post Targeted Communications have sounded the horn for entries into this year’s Art of the Envelope awards. And while the creative postal interpretations will be sure to arouse all who lay eyes upon them, the bcg² campaign that shows some well-known marketing characters bringing the sexy back to the humble envelope is possibly even more stimulating.
Who it’s for: Frucor/V by Colenso BBDO
Why we like it: It was always going to be hard to top the success of—and mystery inspired by—the previous V campaigns, but ‘Pomparkour’, the new spot—and new sport—from Colenso and independent director Nathan Price …
Another week in marcomms land, another round of new hires, smooth industry moves and media swapsies.
After a tough couple of years working primarily on the Telecom account at Saatchi & Saatchi, creative group heads Connan James and Craig Farndale have packed their bags and gone free range.
While the anatomy of TVC and online advertising mediums has been much discussed, a direct comparison of advertiser value is more elusive. But with so much video now consumed online (and online content consumed via TV and other screens) and more advertisers placing TVCs there, directly comparing the value of each medium comes into question. So, which one offers the best bang for buck? And how does one go about comparing value?
After some big account wins last year, DraftFCB has gone on a bit of hiring spree to keep up, signing on Nick Smith as the head of craft, Steve McCabe as senior writer, Roslyn Koskela as the new HR manager, and four other humans for account service, media planning and creative.
The strife in Thailand had its wicked way with Adfest, the Asia Pacific advertising awards. But the dates were changed a few times and, instead of the usual Thai beach resort location, it was decided the big name judges would converge on Tokyo this week to make their decisions. And it’s fairly slim pickings on the finalist front for Kiwi agencies.
With three times as many entries than the 2009 edition, the esteemed judges of the 2010 TVNZ-NZ Marketing Awards had a pretty tough job ahead of them deciding on the finalists. But after plenty of discussion, dissection and deliberation, the judging has come to an end and NZ Marketing magazine and the New Zealand Marketing Association (NZMA) can announce this year’s leading contenders.
Five years ago Gary Lee, the founder of E2 Digital, and Neil Cameron, the managing director of Christchurch advertising agency Harvey|Cameron, had lunch. And what they talked about at that lunch—joining forces to create a fully integrated communications company—physically came to fruition earlier this week.
For months the New Zealand tech retailers have been displaying a range of iPad paraphernalia for sale in their stores and, as of today, they actually get to sell the object all that paraphernalia is associated with. But after all the hype, all the talk of publishing revolutions and all the feverish Tweetbooking about Jobs Almighty and his newest hero product, there seems to be a surprising dearth of local applications available on the day of the iPad’s release in New Zealand.
When New Zealand Post isn’t deciding what marketing-related events to sponsor, it’s devising ways to make some more money to pay for them all. And the Targeted Communications team thinks it has a big one on its hands with Genius, a ground-smasher of a new data segmentation product that aims to provide Kiwi marketers with the most targeted consumer information available in New Zealand.
Japanese tech behemoth Toshiba has followed up its sponsorship of the Rugby World Cup in 2007 by signing on as an official sponsor for next year’s event. And Pernod Ricard New Zealand, with its newly named international version of Montana, Brancott Estate, is also on board.
Wise New Zealand marketing oracle Michael Carney peers into his crystal ball for this week’s installment of Marketing Week. Analogue TV is either dead or on death’s door overseas. How long has it got to live here? How to catch the elusive black swan. Are you overlooking the oldies? The paywall prognostications come thick and fast. So how is Rupert faring? What people really think of advertising? The social media horse is starting to bolt. And there’s still time for marketers to try and mount this difficult beast. Tips and tricks for post-recession category management.
Tabulations are complete and the calculators have done their business for the 2010 Qantas Film and Television Awards, with a total of 637 entries being received. And while it’s two down on last year’s total, the award organisers feel it is a clear indication of the continuing “strength and resilience of New Zealand’s film and television industries”.
While most normal people merely think about ridiculous ideas and never actually go through with them, the beauty of the ad industry is that agencies are often given a big bunch of cash to make those ridiculous ideas come true. And that’s exactly what Colenso has done with its latest—and awesome—ladder-inspired campaign for V’s new Isokinetic, guarana infused energy drink.
With a solid crowd to make the obligatory live crosses from Breakfast weatherman Tamati Coffey look good, the spray painting talents of the Cut Collective and a host of confused-looking commuters gazing up at a giant billboard as they powered to work, Cadbury kicked off its nationwide roadshow for the Billboard to Bags campaign this morning at ‘experiential venue’ 1 Queen St in Auckland.
Cast your minds back to 2009. Now back at me. Now back to 2009. Now back to 2010. As everyone knows, it was a pretty lean year for all concerned, but the releases trumpeting various revenue increases seem to be flowing reasonably freely of late, with the latest coming from the Outdoor Media Association of New Zealand (OMANZ), which announced that gross media revenue for Q2 has increased by six percent from the same time last year, up from $14.3 million to $15.2 million in 2010.
The months are obviously getting closer together: the May winners of the ORCA’s were announced last week as The Radio Bureau did a bit of catching up. And the June certificates have also been handed out, with Karl Fleet and Tom Paine from Colenso BBDO taking out the top prize for their V Pocket Rocket Campaign for Frucor. Feast your ears on the June winning effort here.
Who it’s for: Freeview
Why we like it: Half the office said they vomited in their mouth and changed the channel when this chirpy old duck and her grumpy old curmudgeon husband graced their screens to tell everyone about Freeview, and the other half said they quite …
We all know the marcomms community thrives under pressure. As a result, entries tend to come in at the last minute (that was certainly the case for entries into this year’s Marketing Awards). And time is running out to get your name in the hat for the Creative Challenge—and get your hands on the $125,000 prize—with registrations for the inaugural event set to close tomorrow.
DDB NZ has added three new team members to its creative department, but it’s still on the hunt for a creative director to replace Adam Kanzer, who left in mid May. And Clemenger BBDO is in a similar position, with former creative director Paul Nagy yet to be replaced and a new managing director still to be found to replace Lesley Brown, who departed about 18 months ago to have a baby and chose not to come back.
For the second year in a row, DDB walked away with a cool $10,000 after the Sky Arts Channel Mark Rothco spot took out the Newspaper Ad of the Year prize last week (this Throaties spot won the 2009 edition). And the highlight of the night—aside, of course, from the big grand finale announcement, the delectable nibbles and the burly guard who was keeping watch over the silver briefcase on the table that was filled with $10,000 cash—had to be the Q+A video with Chuck Porter, the convenor of judges at this year’s event and co-founder of award-hogging US ad agency Crispin Porter + Bogusky.
The pioneering approach taken by the Ministry of Health for its National Depression Initiative proved to be something of a watershed for online social messaging and health communications in New Zealand. And the efforts of Wellington-based agency Resn have shown that the interactivity offered by the online realm is also proving to be an effective way of spreading the Smokefree/Auahi Kore message to Kiwi yoof.
