Entries for the 10th YoungGuns awards are now open, so if you’re under 30 and you’re already delivering awesome ideas that are “challenging and changing the way communication is done”, get in there for a chance to be recognised as the best emerging creative talent in the world—and to have your place of employ recognised as a supporter of the yoof.
Air New Zealand already has plenty of customer loyalty, but plenty obviously isn’t enough, because the national carrier has come up with another way to inspire brand allegiance after it jumped on the location-based social media bandwagon and opened its Foursquare account.
After every Olympic Games, New Zealand’s obsession with medal tables and country rankings becomes apparent as we do a few sums, take comfort in our per capita performance and repeatedly utter the phrase ‘punching above our weight’. But in the advertising world, if results from the Cannes Lions are anything to go by, New Zealand doesn’t even need to rely on per capita results, because the 25 Lions won by Kiwi agencies, which was up from 23 in 2009, meant we were again near the top of the pile in terms of total awards won.
The 2010/2011 rotation of the Newspaper Advertising Bureau’s (NAB) Newspaper Ad of the Month competition has begun and it’s off to a spluttering start, with the guest judges for June shaking their heads, waggling their fingers, furrowing their brows and deciding the quality of the entries wasn’t good enough to award a winner.
All good things must come to an end (except for honey, which doesn’t have an expiration date) and the axe is currently hanging ominously over Ira Goldstein, the New York banker who, since 2000, has been the endearingly stupid face of ASB bank.
With all these new hires, it’s like a staff party in your mouth. And everyone’s invited.
Earlier this week, a customer service survey showed Kiwi consumers are voting with their feet when businesses don’t meet their expectations. And another customer service survey, the KiwiHost/JRA Customer Service Pulse, shows those expectations now involve organisations responding to their concerns much faster than they have in the past.
Elvis is back in the building. And since some of the ad folk have apparently been hassling CAANZ since March about what’s going down this year, consider this your first official notice to get practicing, because the finalists for the always hotly contested Battle of the Ad Bands will go on stage at The King’s Arms on 19 August.
Rate yourself as a bit of a photographer? Then get your favourite snaps in front of the judges for the New Zealand Geographic photographer of the year competition and you could be the envy of all your camera-wielding friends.
In this week’s installment, Monsieur Pound wonders whether recycled ads in this year’s Cannes Lions are an indication of declining creativity, immoral agencies or unobservant organisers. And he also looks at the similarities between Good Health magazine’s viral video and a similar Volkswagen experiment conducted in Sweden.
Disney/Pixar’s Toy Story 3 opened in Kiwi cinemas yesterday. How serendipitous, we say, because Andrew Gordon, an animation guru who started working for Pixar in 1997 and is now a senior animator, will be one of the 15 international creatives speaking and teaching at the upcoming Semi-Permanent design fest.
The cellular bandwagon keeps rolling on in New Zealand, with impressive results for Adshel’s first mobile out-of-home marketing campaign and TXT2Get celebrating its 1000th mobile campaign.
Cadbury has its weird, slightly creepy dancing cow, which, for some, is an all-too direct connection with the source of its chocolate. And, as history has shown, when Cadbury zigs, you can expect Whittaker’s to zag, so Andrew, Brian, Assignment and Curious Film have taken a much more artistic, evocative and slightly more mature approach for a new TVC.
Big news for Flying Fish New Zealand, which has added US-based animation gurus Psyop to its diverse director roster.
The AUT adschool’s mid year show was held last week, and those young, naive tikes with the world at their feet, blissfully unaware of the crushing reality of the real world, usually come up with some pretty bloody good stuff. And through the magic of technology, you can see it here.
If you believe the company mantra, TBWA\ is all about ‘disruption’. And there’s been plenty of that in Mayoral Drive lately (although not of the creative kind it likes), after ASB decided to end its 12 year relationship and shack up with Droga5 last week.
Who it’s for: TSB by Special Group and Robber’s Dog
Why we like it: TSB Bank has been at the top of the banking customer service charts for a while now. And, as a result of this solid reputation, it’s also New Zealand’s most …
Comforting economic performances and improving consumer confidence in the Asia Pacific region should bring a smile to the collective dial of the New Zealand media and marketing fraternity, with media advertising spend in the 12 markets followed by Nielsen growing by 18 percent from the same time last year, although New Zealand spending across TV, newspaper and magazines is at the back of the regional pack, recording an increase of eight percent.
This week the big news is all about the Cannes International Advertising Festival. So here are a few of the Lion winning campaigns you might not have seen. The big theme this year seems to be finding a way for technology and participation to come together for brand nirvana—and if it’s for a good cause well, gold.
Despite our apathetic streak (or, perhaps more accurately, a national belief that if you just keep moseying on things will probably come right eventually), new research has showed that New Zealand consumers are actually fighting back against poor customer experiences and voting with their feet when businesses don’t meet their expectations.
With a record haul of Lions under his (and his company’s) belt after this year’s Cannes accolades were dished out, Colenso BBDO executive creative director, handyman of the land and Titanium and Integrated Lions juror Nick Worthington is sitting pretty. And in this clip, he’s also sitting with Our Maan in Cannes in a loud French restaurant.
Our Maan in Cannes gets up close – and personal – with Chris Schofield, creative director at DraftFCB and one of just six Kiwis to be chosen for jury duty at the Cannes International Advertising Festival, to find out about his Cannes experience. He was judging the Radio Lions and, interestingly, while DDB NZ managed to take home a gaggle of Lions for its Sky TV Arts Channel campaign, this category was the only one to go ‘Grand Prix-less’.
After their combined bacon and dairy victories earlier this year, the dream team of Naked Communications and Josh&Jamie has snaffled another one, SBS Bank.
All the Lions have been delivered at Cannes and Colenso BBDO has easily topped the Kiwi agency list, bringing home a record haul of ten leonine friends (three Gold, four Silver and three Bronze), out of a total of 25 for Kiwi agencies.
ASB has scratched its 12 year itch, after long-time incumbent TBWA\ was ousted by new (but old) boys on the block, Droga5.
Colenso BBDO will be hoping that the 10-man Cannes Lions jury will perform a feat of advertising alchemy and turn their ‘Yellow Chocolate’ campaign for Yellow Pages into a Titanium Lion after it was named on the Titanium and Integrated Lions Shortlist at the 2010 Cannes Lions Advertising Festival.
Our maan in Cannes caught up with Barry Williamson, media director of Mediaedge:CIA over a seriously expensive breakfast at the salubrious Carlton Intercontinental Hotel.
Colenso BBDO’s award-winning work for the New Zealand Book Council has been shortlisted in the Film and Film Craft categories at the 2010 Cannes Lions Advertising Festival. Clearly not content to rest on their laurels, or indeed these other laurels here, Colenso has been shortlisted in the Sound Design and Animation sections of the Film Craft Category, whilst also making the cut in the Public Awareness Messages section of the Film Category.
Anthony Utama/Getty Images33 different businesses and independent journalists entered the 2010 Magazine Awards, with published work from 65 different titles. You can read all about the serious stuff here. But what fun are awards if you can’t laugh at the expense of your colleagues and competitors? Herewith, the StopPress Alternative Magazine awards for 2010.
Niche creativity, consumer empowerment via social media – and, therefore, engagement measures – and the innovative uses of media hardware are the themes dominating Cannes Lions this year.