Spontaneous Love From Land Rover

"Surprise & Delight" videos are everywhere these days, but often the surprise isn't very interesting, isn't connected to the product or is so connected it feels forced. That's why this spot from Land Rover New Zealand is so perfect. It's a truly spontaneous act of love from the brand that isn't just rewarding vocal influencers or creating a predictable vending machine stunt.

It's a beautiful little piece of film, and almost makes me want to buy an old Land Rover of my own to restore. Or at least a new one for new adventures.

-Parker

Smirnoff NZ: #PurePotential On Instagram

I’m a big fan of Instagram these days (I post there more often than Facebook, and even used it to find a photographer for some family portraits) but haven’t been impressed with with way brands are using it (Nike and a few other sports brands aside).

However, Smirnoff New Zealand made excellent use of the photo-sharing service throughout December with their #PurePotential campaign.

The gist of the idea was that Smirnoff NZ asked users to take a picture of the ingredients in their fridge, tagging the photo @SmirnoffNZ and #PurePotential and that the brand would give them a recipe for a vodka-based drink they could make with the ingredients. These recipes came in the form of high-quality videos, perfectly sized and paced for Instagram.

As far as I can tell, they responded to almost every single one of the fridge images that Kiwis uploaded (including this one of my very bare fridge).

It worked well by taking advantage of that fact that user’s are used to giving their followers an intimate look at their lives using photos on Instagram.

It wasn’t just a social campaign, either. They had out of home ads (billboards, bus shelters, wild postings) throughout Auckland (and, I presume, New Zealand) related to the campaign, driving to Instagram and pushing the "Pure Potential" message.

PS: I’ve been impressed with a lot of the advertising work I’ve seen from New Zealand since I moved to Auckland a few months ago, and I’ll try and share more of it when I can.

Steinlager Pure Deep Dive

Since I've been in New Zealand, I've been working with my colleagues at DDB on a really neat campaign for Steinlager Pure: a sponsorship program for William Trubridge as he attempts to break his own world record by free-diving to 102m. This is an incredible feat, as William attempts it without weights or oxygen, and has to hold his breath the entire time while also making it back to the surface. Check out Steinlager.com and scroll down to check out different information about what William's body goes through as he does this dive. There are also audio messages of support from Kiwis and fans around the world, added to the website via neat mobile integration.

The actual dive took place on December 3rd at 8am New Zealand time, and you can watch the recap video below (a video that was amazingly put together just a few hours after the dive):

The Best of New Zealand Advertising

Last week, I had to good fortune to attend the Communications Agencies Association of New Zealand's Effectiveness awards. The "Effies," as their called, are Kiwi equivalent of the Canadian Cassie awards. It was a great way to be exposed to some of the awesome advertising happening here, and I've included some of my highlights below. SKY TV/ Game of Thrones: Bring Down The King 

I might be a bit biased because it was my DDB New Zealand colleagues* who came up with this idea, and because I love Game of Thrones, but it was great to see this spot that lets Kiwis bring down a statue of Joffrey by tweeting about him win a gold at the Effies.

*I moved to New Zealand, in case you missed that. 

Maritime New Zealand - Saving Lives Like They Did in the 80s

I heard somewhere that there is no where in New Zealand that is farther than 150km from the coast, and Auckland also apparently has the highest number of yachts per capita in the world so it makes sense that water safety is a big deal. The video below from Maritime New Zealand is a playful look at why you need to be wearing a life jacket for it to be effective.

Tui Beer: Catch a Million

I have no idea what cricket is about (and pretty much think of it as this) but I think everyone can still appreciate some of the great catches, even when they come from the crowd. Tui Beer capitalized on this by holding a promotion that promised a share of $1,000,000 to anyone in the crowd who caught a ball from the game with one hand. Check out the video below to see how this took off.

Bonus fact that I learned about cricket: They only change balls every 50 overs (which takes about 3 hours or so), so that the way the ball spins and bounces changes quite a bit throughout a game. Compare this to American Baseball, where I think they change up the ball almost every pitch to keep it consistent.

There were a lot of other great pieces of work at the awards, but those were my favourite. The full Effies results are here.

-Parker

Instagram Now Allows Photo And Video Embeds

I really like Instagram, so I'm excited to see that they've made it easy for users to embed photos from the site on other sites. It will be interesting to see what this does to spread Instagram photos and engagement across the web. Here are a few of my own favorite Instagram photos (follow me! Like elsewhere on the web, I'm ParkerNow on Instagram:

How Jewish Is Your Favourite Movie?

If you like movies, you'll probably have fun with the new website that DDB Canada (the place I work) developed for the Toronto Jewish Film Festival. To prove that you're already a fan of Jewish movies, DDB created a website that analyzes everyone who was involved with the movie (from writers to actors and producers) and gives it a score (or gentile percentile) for how Jewish it is.

Check it out for yourself at J-Dar.ca (and then check out some of the great movies that are playing on the Toronto Jewish Film Festival website)

Instagram Badges

I'm a pretty big fan of Instagram these days, so I'm pretty excited that they've introduced both web profiles (check out mine at Instagram.com/ParkerNow) and badges, like the one below:

For both myself and a lot of my friends, Instagram is pushing Twitter and Facebook aside as a way to see what my friends are up to and sharing. I'm not saying it will replace either, or that it will last forever, but it's fun for now.

Radar DDB 10am One Thing: Pepsi Lives For Now

The following post appeared originally on the the DDB Canada blog as part of the Radar DDB 10am series of blog posts and emails I contribute to at work. 

A few months ago, Pepsi launched a global campaign, “Live For Now,” by redoing Pepsi.com to feature a waterfall of branded content and fan comments about the beverage. It was a unique way to embrace social media while not relying too heavily on third-party networks. More recently, Pepsi also partnered with Twitter.

On Tuesday night, we started to see what that partnership was capable of as Pepsi delivered on that “Live For Now” promise by streaming a Nicki Minaj concert on any Tweet with #NickiMinajNow hashtag. As the go-to site for what’s happening now, we think Twitter was a perfect channel for Pepsi and this campaign. It’s also a great reminder that the world still loves a super-star endorsement deal.

Check out an archived version of the concert or just take a look at some of the tens of thousands of Tweets from users talking about it.

If you liked that, you might be interested in knowing that Nicki Minaj also wrote a song for Adidas just for the “All Originals” video.

We also wrote about Pepsi’s year-long partnership with Twitter here.

I'm hiring! #Toronto #Jobs

Good news, everyone! Tribal DDB is going to be hiring a number of Community Moderator/Writers for a five-week contract starting in mid-September. These positions will be for a high-profile, national campaign. It won't be an easy job, but it'll definitely be interesting. The official job posting from the DDB website is as follows:

 Tribal DDB is looking for 4 English writers with a passion for social media for an intense, 5 week contract on a high profile national campaign, beginning in mid-September through to late October. This role involves constant and ongoing interaction with our client's target audience – from adorers to detractors – around a sensitive and polarizing topic. Common sense or street smarts are mandatory.

As a high-energy creative, you have a solid understanding of advertising, are an active participant in social networks and have a history in community management and moderation. Strong writing skills are a must and a writing sample is required along with your resume.

RESPONSIBILITIES: You will be responsible for responding to consumer questions with engaged, quality written responses on a social media website in Tribal DDB's Toronto office. Primarily, this will include assessment, triage, moderation and creative responses to consumer questions. Developing answers to these questions will require navigating detailed product information.

QUALIFICATIONS: - 1-2 years experience is required - Passion for social media and marketing/advertising - Strong written communication ability (grammar, formatting, creativity, spelling) - Ability to follow a process - General understanding of agency process and capabilities - Bilingualism a plus - Proof reading/copy-editing ability a plus

Interested candidates please send resume and cover letter to hr.toronto@ddbcanada.com.

We appreciate all expressed interest in this position, however, only the candidates selected for interview will be contacted.

"Our Food. Your Questions." = My Summer

If you're a regular reader of BlogCampaigning, you might have noticed that we often slow down our posts during the summer months. Normally it's because I'm outside enjoying the great weather, but this year it was because I was working on an amazing project for McDonald's Canada called "Our Food. Your Questions." You might have seen this video that was part of the campaign:

Or you might have just seen the site, McDonalds.ca/YourQuestions:

Or you might have just seen some of the great answers that my team of writers wrote in response to the thousands and thousands of questions that Canadians asked about food at McDonald's Canada:

No matter how you saw it, I hope it gave you new appreciation for the food that McDonald's Canada serves. I also hope that all of the hard work by an incredibly talented Tribal DDB team was able to shine through.

-Parker

What kind of car should you buy?

Have you ever wondered what kind of car you should by? Check out the autoLyzer, a Facebook App developed by DDB for autoTRADER.ca. It works by analyzing your Facebook profile (including Likes, Friends, City, Age and a number of other factors) to determine the perfect car available on the autoTRADER.ca website for you.

Try the app for yourself on the autoTRADER Canada Facebook page, and let me know which cars it chose for you.

-Parker

Prometheus & The Animated .Gif

A few weeks ago I wrote about the Radar 10am Meetings we hold at the DDB Canada offices. The following blog post was written as a result of one of those meetings, and I'll be sharing others in the future.

If you're like some of the Radar DDB team, you've been pouring over every piece of content that's been created to promote the Ridley Scott film 'Prometheus.' From a powerful TED talk in 2023 with one of the film's characters to a futuristic Facebook-style timeline for the fictional Weyland Industries, the marketing for this movie has lots of highly-shareable pieces of content that provide a rich backstory.

We especially like this animated .gif of Michael Fassbender's android character David 8. This image was released to those who had signed up to learn more about the movie, and was accompanied by more detailed information about character.

Despite having been around since 1987, animated .gifs are seeing a resurgence in popularity and are shared widely on social networks (learn more here). These are frequently user-created, so it is great to see that the team behind Prometheus recognized that they too, could create and use these lo-fi but highly-shareable pieces of content.

See the image here, or visit the Weyland Industries website to learn more about David 8. You can also check out some of the films fans sharing David 8 content on Tumblr.

View this blog post on the DDB Canada website here.

You might also be interested in reading our post about the Renaissance of the Animated .gif

The September That Never Ends

Ever since I took a class called "Cyberculture" while attending Griffith University* in Australia, I've been fascinated by internet lore and the stories of  how the web was built. One of these stories that I recently came across was about "Eternal September." It comes from the thinking that when the internet was mostly restricted to university students, websites were flooded every September with new users that hadn't yet learned netiquette. Over the course of this first month, their upperclassmen taught them how to behave online. The result was what were probably pretty well-run little communities.

In 1993 the web became more accessible to the masses with AOL and Compuserve, with new users not yet savvy in the rules of online behaviour arriving year-round. Thus, September 1993 was dubbed the "Eternal September."

If you're super into this type of thing, it looks like there is a little program that you can download here that will calculate the current day of September, 1993 that we're at (looks like it's day 4242 of Eternal September).

Source 

-Parker

Having Trouble Viewing This Blog Post?

I've never been a huge fan of email marketing and the fancy, HTML newsletters that are such a big part of it.

These are the emails you get that start off by saying "Having trouble viewing this email? View it on our website."

How many other advertising (or communications) formats start off this way?

Somehow, I don't think companies would be willing to invest in TV commercials if we said "This TV commercial is going to be great, but most people won't be able to view it right away - they'll have to push another button, or watch it on our website."

Yet these fancy HTML emails persist. They persist at the expense of wasted hours from talented designers and coders whose time could probably be spent creating something way more beautiful and useful.

For a time, my hosting provider (DreamHost) used to send out plain-text emails. They were very simply formatted. They could be read easily and quickly digested. One of these was even sent from an Apple store on one of the demo versions of the first iPhone.

And yes, I'm sure I could set up my email so that that it always displays images and I always see how great these emails are. But I don't. And I bet a lot of other people don't either.

What do you think about fancy, well-designed HTML emails? Worth it or not? Do you read them? Does your email tool display the images for you, or block them?

-Parker

The Radar DDB 10am One Thing

 

Almost every weekday, digital and social media teams at DDB Canada gather at 10am to discuss new online trends, tools and technologies. The half-hour meetings involve various team members discussing the merits of a particular site or video, and how it fits into greater online trends.

For me, the meetings are a great opportunity to get insight from my colleagues into what's happening online, and it definitely exposes me to things I might not have noticed or found otherwise. They are a highlight of my week and one of the cool things about working at DDB Canada.

To see what we've discussed, check out the DDB Canada blog or follow Radar DDB on Twitter. If you're interested in getting a daily email from us with the 10am One Thing (and a weekly wrap-up!), leave a comment her or send me an email.

-Parker

An Obituary From The Future

Yesterday on Reddit, user NoFlag posted an obituary he wrote for himself as part of a project for his journalism class: John X. Noflag was pronounced dead at the age of 225 this Thursday at the Mons Olympus Medical Combine, following complications with a voluntary nanotech experiment.

Observers say a procedure to fully immerse Noflag within a nanotech swarm ended abruptly as his body dissolved before their eyes. Due to the failure, most of the nanotech was collected and deactivated, although some escaped. The escaped sample is not believed to be self-replicating, but it could not be confirmed.

Born on Earth in Somecity, California, Noflag was one of the later immigrants to Mars after the Earth ban of age enhancement technologies and strict regulation of nanotechnology, being commonly heard to say “Earth will pay for its lack of vision.” He is survived by two fully mature clones and a youngling.

A public funeral and ceremonial burial is planned on the grounds of the Noflag Estate.

In lieu of flowers, mourners are asked to send money or weapons to the Nanotech Defense Front.

He's seems like a pretty smart kid, and I'm sure  he can probably see far enough into the future to know that he probably won't be a journalist when he graduates.

-Parker

Gaming for Good

Do you consider yourself a gamer? Think carefully about how you answer that question, as the reality may surprise you. The typical definition of 'gamer' is usually someone who looks a little something like this --> But the reality is that games have begun to infiltrate our lives to the point that we don't always recognize when we are playing one. The Entertainment Software Association's 2011 Report found that 72% of American households play computer of video games, with the average game player being 37 years old. Female gamers are also on the rise, making up a whopping 42% of game players. With so many people online, gaming can and is being used to spur some pretty amazing ideas and initiatives.

PSFK recently released a study on the Future of Gaming. Since it costs $150 and I'm low on cash this month, I perused the abbreviated version, posted below. It covers off all of the major gaming mechanics and tactics and includes a bunch of pretty amazing examples.

PSFK Future of Gaming Report [Preview]

View more presentations from PSFK

There are a few that I really wanted to draw attention to for their ability to take game mechanics and turn them into real, applicable and useful tools to further our society and do good.

1. Realitree: A digital manifestation of our local environments and the role that we play in keeping it healthy. Realitree is a huge projection of a

tree and it's surroundings (sky, earth, etc.) that thrives and suffers based on the health of its surroundings. It takes into account news media so that stories that are in conflict with climate reality decrease the visible health of the tree and expose agents of the fossil fuel industry who propagate smears and lies.  Groups, cities and even countries can compete across social networks for the healthiest image of their environment.

2. Fold.it: A web based platform that allows users to compete against each other to design new proteins. This work can be used to help spur innovation in curing diseases such as AIDS/HIV, Alzheimer's and Cancer. Researchers recently engaged gamers to compete in configuring an enzyme structure related to AIDS/HIV. The result: A breakthrough structure in a matter of weeks that had stumped scientists for years. Big win for collaborative gaming!

3. Astronaut: Moon, Mars and Beyond: A collaborative game from NASA intended to grow interest around science, math, technology and engineering. The game is set in a fictional community in the year 2035 and allows players to undertake authentic solar system exploration using resources like NASA's Astronaut Handbook and complete renditions of real Mars exploration missions. I know this is definitely up one Blog Campaigner's alley (@parkernow)

4. Interactive Ping Pong: This one is a little less "for the good of the people" but still a pretty cool idea. An advertising campaign for McDonalds in Sweden asks pedestrians to play ping pong on a giant screen in Stockholm Square. Pedestrians download an app and play an interactive game of ping pong using their mobile phone and the billboard. If a player can play for 30 seconds or more, a McDonalds coupon is sent to their phone.

If all the predictions hold true, some pretty incredible initiatives should come to life all thanks to gaming.

What examples of gaming have inspired or amazed you so far?

(Gamer photo courtesy of Holy Taco)

Going Off The Book

A few weeks ago I was listening to a RadioLab podcast about Games. In this episode, hosts Robert Krulwich and Jad Abamrod spoke to Brian Christian, an author who recounted the story of the checkers craze of the 60s that culminated in the World Checkers Championship in 1963. Apparently. this championship was a series of 40 games between the world's two top players. All 40 games ended in a draw. 21 of those 40 games were the exact same.

"Checkers had gotten to the point where there was a perfect game of checkers," Brian said as he discussed how the top players memorized previous games and knew the ideal countermove for the other player's moves. "This was rock bottom for the checkers community."

The name for this knowing of all the games, all the moves, is The Book.

Brian continues on the podcast to say that the same thing happens in chess, and that there is an equivalent book  (actually a computer program called "Fritz" these ays) of every chess game played by grandmasters for the past few hundred years. Although there are way, way more variations, there are occasions where two grandmasters will play the exact same game that has been played years before. Nowadays, the first 20 moves or so in major chess games are totally by The Book: the two players playing moves that they've memorized, just like their checkers predecessors.

To chess enthusiasts, the most exciting part (and true brilliance) is when players go off The Book: that moment when they make a move that hasn't been done before in the history of recorded chess.

When I first started my career 5 years ago, there were no best practices for social media. There were no case studies. Everything was new. Everything we did was off the book.

Now it seems that everyone is staying on the book. Facebook brand pages are almost cookie-cutter copies of each other. Pitch emails to bloggers feel about as personal and special as a Hallmark card.

I still think there is a ton of opportunity to go off the book. I just worry that we're too concerned with playing that perfect game.