With Facebook poised to give the world a range of emoticon options, Jacqui Copas ponders whether this poses new social risks
for brands.
TV3 put on a bit of corporate cheek today, riling up TVNZ over Facebook over its ‘superior’ version of The Bachelor.
With users logging into their social accounts on mobile multiple times a day and scanning the newsfeed for anything that might interest them, the smartphone has become a key battleground for the publishers vying for consumer eyeballs. And with NZME data showing that 50-58 percent of all the traffic to the Herald’s mobile site came from social media channels over the last few months, we look at how news publishers are becoming increasingly dependent on social media channels.
Facebook appears to be steadily eating the internet and, in August this year, it took over from Google as the biggest driver of web traffic to news sites. It’s a bit of a love/hate relationship, however, with many publishers relying on the network for traffic, ad revenue and validation/stimulation, but also fearing that they are vulnerable to a tweak of the algorithm or demands for more money to reach its audience. Earlier this year, Facebook announced the arrival of Instant Articles, which let selected media brands publish content directly to Facebook and display it in newsfeeds without requiring users to leave. And, as part of a regional deal with Fairfax, stuff.co.nz will be the first local brand that gets to play with it in New Zealand.
“If you’re looking at your comms and media plan and it looks suspiciously like the one you had ten years ago, then you’re probably building for where people were,” says Facebook’s chief creative officer Mark D’Arcy, who was recently in town to speak to the crowds at ad:tech and at AUT’s Project Connect. And he reckons the only way to change this is by breaking down the legacy structures and strategies that have until now determined how marketers and advertisers do their jobs.
Facebook announced a stonking third quarter result today, beating analysts’ expectations with US$4.5 billion in revenue and a 14 percent increase in the number of monthly active users. But, much more importantly for the world’s largest social network, Richie McCaw has finally signed up and got the blue tick after a bit of pressure from the socially savvy Dan ‘Mince on Toast’ Carter. And, just a couple of days in, he’s already close to the 300,000 fan mark. If he keeps that up, he’ll soon be getting thousands to post ‘authentic’ pictures of him in his Versatile house, wearing his Beats headphones and using his favourite teeth whitening brand.
As a still-nascent format, digital video can be a confusing realm for brands to navigate. So is it all it’s cracked up to be? And if it is, then what? Facebook video or YouTube? Long form or short form? DIY or through a publisher? Pre-roll or standalone? Fortunately, Lynda Brendish has done some of the legwork for you.
Why are the likes of Google and Facebook acting so altruistically and exploring options to provide internet access around the world? And what do their movements mean for the traditional telcos and marketers? Anthony Gardiner looks at what is destined to be a highly disruptive journey.
There has been a lot of talk and hype about virtual reality in recent times. And just in the past month we’ve had a few sets of cardboard virtual reality goggles sent to the office from PR companies, which shows it’s very much in the public consciousness. One brand, which jumped onto the VR trend early in a marketing capacity, is Contiki. We had a chat to Contiki’s global CEO Casper Urhammer to find out more about the travel brand’s use of it. PLUS: with the amount of research and development going into virtual reality, is it better to wait?
Griffin’s recently launched an online competition campaign called ‘Super Little Bakers’ via Assignment Group, which urges kids (or rather, their parents) to submit recipes to a micro-page within Griffin’s Facebook to go in the draw to win prizes. An overall winner will be crowned Griffin’s Super Little Baker of 2015 by the end of the week, after over 170 recipes were submitted.
Jetstar introduced its new flight destinations today after running a Facebook-based campaign where it uploaded videos of its regional tour and asked its Facebook fans for advice on which activities to partake in in each destination.
Industry happenings at Facebook, GrownUps, Marketing Association, Fairfax, Ideas Shop, InMobi and Vizeum.
Since its inception in 2013, Radio New Zealand’s (RNZ) digital brand The Wireless has grown quickly, attracting a new audience of readers that were largely disconnected from the legacy structures of the state broadcaster. This upward trajectory has seen the website’s average audience climb from 700 daily users last year to 3,000 this year. And the RNZ executive team is now hoping to spread this success across all its digital properties with the appointment of The Wireless editor Marcus Stickley as the digital features editor. PLUS: digital teams restructure, a tale of two Tobys and a RNZ new website on the cards.
The second episode of Kiwibank’s KB Series featuring Jamie Curry is out. In this episode, Curry has moved into her new flat in Auckland and is attempting to navigate herself through the beginnings of adult life, which she does with much uncertainty and awkwardness.
Tourism New Zealand has taken the unique approach of teaming up with Facebook and production company Symphony to create an online series for its latest campaign which follows the adventures of a young couple travelling around the country in a Kombi.
Following the recent announcement that Sky TV had signed a long-term deal with The Walt Disney Company to add the Sky Movies Disney channel to its programming portfolio, the broadcaster released a short online video showing that the fairies, genies and flying nannies that typify the Disney experience had arrived in New Zealand.
Industry happenings at DNA, Facebook, Adshel, Orange Productions, MediaWorks, Vanilla Brief, BTL and Maori TV.
Kiwi-born Mark D’Arcy, the chief creative officer at Facebook, has spent the last week in Cannes attending a series of meetings with the advertising community that has converged at the French Riviera. As a veritable Facebook evangelist, his objective has been to encourage creatives to continue experimenting with the platform to see how far it can be pushed.
An advert for a feminisation-suit was recently fed onto Idealog writer Jonathan Cotton’s Facebook newsfeed, leading him to ask some serious questions about what the social media site thinks it knows about him.
The top honour at the Facebook Awards is the Blue Award and this year it went to Leo Burnett and Procter & Gamble for the thought-provoking ‘Like a Girl’ campaign produced for the Always brand (it also won a gold award). And the Blue for Good Award (which recognises campaigns created for charitable or not-for-profit organisations) went to the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge, a campaign that Facebook says placed only second to the 2014 FIFA World Cup in terms of how many people it reached (it also raised $220 million dollars for the cause). PLUS: Spencer Bailey, the head of Facebook for New Zealand, identifies key creative trends that have taken shape over the last year.
Wanaka is a place well renowned for its beauty, with its crystal blue lake, mountainous terrain and great slopes. And while stunning promotional imagery for the town is common to see, it’s not as often we get to see a hyper-fast compilation of the township through 4,000 images carefully stitched together by an experienced videographer, here’s Lake Wanaka Tourism’s latest marketing approach.
Mitre 10 general manager Dave Elliott gave a full and frank insight into his business at the IAB Vertical Snapshot event on May 27.
In the modern world social media is beginning to dominate with folk progressively visiting platforms like Facebook and Snapchat instead of consuming traditional forms of media. And with this audience shift, advertisers are coming up with increasingly creative ways to market through them, travelling to their audience’s turf. Sovereign Insurance has cottoned on to this, and is using social media to educate people about life insurance, offering a free six months of it through its Facebook page.
There was a time when people seemed to get angry about autoplay video, with Fairfax in Australia getting a kicking a few years back. Now it seems to be part of the online furniture. Instagram and Facebook launched auotplay video in 2013 and Twitter has also just announced it. But as those videos don’t play with sound unless users click on them, brands and publishers are adapting to an era of silent video marketing—and, just as some have done with pre-roll ads, they’re starting to find some creative solutions.
Jamesons was reportedly the first brand to embrace the nascent realm of 3D videos on social media when it slid a sponsored shot across the bar for St Patricks Day. Now AMP Capital, which owns four malls across New Zealand, is using the multi-dimensional technology across its social media channels to create a series of short, innovative videos showcasing its food and fashion.
Facebook has become a hugely important traffic source for many publishers. And last week Facebook announced the launch of a new feature called Instant Articles, which allows users to view articles from other websites (particularly enhancing mobile experience) without leaving the site. This is hoped to make for a faster loading time, more data about what users like to consume and therefore an enhanced overall user experience. And there are also benefits for the publishers. It’s very early days for the scheme, but we thought we’d find out a bit about the initiative and whether New Zealand’s main media outfits are keen on the idea.
Over the last year, various media organisations—StopPress included—have on numerous occasions asked Facebook for user information specific to New Zealand, but the social media juggernaut was been unable to provide much beyond international stats and the fact that around two million Kiwis visit the site an average of about 15 times a day. However, yesterday, during a press conference held at the Seafarers building in Britomart, Facebook gave a room of journalists what they had been asking for by presenting a statistical breakdown of how New Zealanders use Facebook. PLUS: Facebook financial results for Q1 2015.
The Building and Construction Industry Training Organisation (BCITO) has launched a new campaign with the aim of recruiting 5,000 new apprentices. And it’s doing it by focusing on the pros of working in construction, such as not racking up a huge student loan, being fit and muscular, spending time outdoors and being a total babe magnet.
Last month, DDB digital CD Haydn Kerr attended the Facebook Creative Hackathon, where he was the only creative from outside the US and the UK. Here’s what he learned.
In a world where teenagers and adults alike seem to be checking their mobile devices every few minutes (or seconds), ignoring your compelling conversation to scroll aimlessly down their Facebook newsfeeds, uploading selfies to Instagram or sending the odd Tweet, it comes as no surprise that social media sites are an excellent platform for advertising. And a few big brands in New Zealand have now started using image and video-sharing mobile app Snapchat as a marketing tool. Here’s what Spark, Vodafone, ASB, Skinny Mobile and a few others have been up to.