Weird week, two new clients seeking help, spookily linked by theme. Client one: A leading cosmetic surgery clinic looking to sharpen its brand positioning and overhaul its identity. Client two: A real top end lingerie brand looking for an eye catching new ad campaign. I really can't help thinking there's a joint promotion in there somewhere.
Banner ads as branding
We have been discussing the changing role of banners and sky scrapers recently. Click thro'' rates are so low at present the old purpose of a banner ad to generate clicks appears out dated. Question is what are they for? Well rather a lot of debate about there value as branding tools. Subconsciously building a warm feeling about a brand via repeated but not insistent viewings. This was all a hunch really in conjunction with Genna at AW Media, until Kevin sent me this great article "The Mere Exposure Effect" by Xiang Fang a professor at Oklahoma State University. In it he talks about evaluative judgements and perceptual fluency. Press release about it HERE. Very interesting to consider when looking at the true value of online brand spend. John Timmer at Ars Technica also covered it.
A Good day Ahead
Brand London looked tip top this morning. Bright sunshine while roaring across Waterloo bridge and down into the Kingsway tunnel (via a cheeky blast up the inside of a bending bus) Wow the clients are going to get good service today! I feel fine.
The 7th Floor
For awhile now I have been acting as Creative Director to a company called The 7th Floor, part of my role has been to sort out a new positioning and online presence. An intriguing sub-plot has been finding that there are simply loads of other agencies called The 7th Floor, not to mention film makers, bands, trendsetters, bloggers even a porn site. So in celebration of everyone works, lives, performs or posts on the 7th Floor we've set up a blog. allthe7thfloors.com (not live yet) a sort of federation of 7th floorer's.There is also the beginnings of a flickr set HEREUpdate on 2007-05-21 09:57 by Philip
All The 7th Floors is now up and running! yippee. It has also been pointed out the Ukrainian site we described as soft porn is in fact Black & White stylish photography, just happens to only feature naked women. We also missed out a number of flooring contractors with offices on 7th Floor's including a tiling trade event
It seems like ages
Sort of been doing a million things and not got round to writing a post for weeks. There are a load of things I'd like to write about, too much really so as a half way house and a way of getting to bed at a reasonable time tonight here is a list of things I may or may not write in the coming week to catch up. (in no order whatsoever)
1. Odd brainstorm style pitch for beer brand, gutted to be unsuccessful, winning agency's blog HERE
2. Dove poster campaign that looks spookily like the Uswitch TV spots
3. Our own TV spot coming unstuck at the BACC, air date now late summer
4. Iris's inspiration event/pub crawl that ended in cocktails with Andy from Manumission.
5. Still not using or talking about Twitter.
6. Easter; Children and chocolate in Woolworths versus the story of the crucifixion
7. MCCA Best Awards presented by Dave Gorman. A big night in so many ways, DG's bespoke act about marketing was inspired
8. Ireland's APMC awards, very glam evening in a fab venue, exuberant hospitality
9. Fish getting her work into a gallery in The Burlington Arcade and (finally) launching her web site
10. Moving from a Sony Errisson to a Blackberry Pearl and getting it to sync with a Mac -just. This post by Matt Haughey on the subject got 183 comments!
Size (and speed) matters
We are whizzing a whole bunch of massive photographic files to and from the States at present. Its the first time I've regularly used web file transfer services and am mighty impressed by both snapdrive and dropboks. Snapdrive appears the more pro' service (100m files, upto 50 GB storage) but has an ugly looking interface designed around the ubiquitous Google Ad serves. Snapdrive currently have a member get member offer to win extra capacity (10GB per), which is a pretty good deal all in all. Drop Boks (1GB) is all together nicer looking as they've skipped ads in favour of a request for a $3 donation.
On the subject of online file storage etc. There is a fantastic debate ranging (lifehack amongst others) over desktop Vs online applications and use. basically a privacy and control versus convenience and portability. I can the see the advantages of both sides if I was organised enough a data key and a web cafe does look appealing BUT I like the randomness of paper/books and a laptop. The whole issue of privacy and access I'll cover later, as I want to ponder that more. But an added bonus of staying in an office is I can regulate my caffeine intake (we're 7 floors above street level, and i'm still avoiding the lift)
Lets talk
I attended the new MCCA creative directors forum tonight. A great discussion rather than the expected soap boxing. Just goes to show the new openness we're pushing on our clients does actually work for ourselves. By the way it goes without 
saying that 90% turned up wearing black (me included for a change) also as Nick was hosting it, a supremely stylish room was provided. Marketing 2.1 is about blended disciplines, fluid teams and passionate people giving brands a voice. Part of this is sharing experiences to better our industry. Scott at the MCCA deserves a lot of credit for bringing us all together.
Job done
Six days of shooting in airports and on board planes has come to an end. It was all in all great fun and an experience in how long your body can keep going on caffeine, stress and large doses of airline food. We did however learn some interesting things.
1. American immigration is still two hours of misery, fast lane included. -and the British habit of trying to lighten the mood with a joke when you do finally get to the front of the queue REALLY REALLY does not work.
2. Soldiers in desert storm camo' in JFK got our attention
3. The public face of American security looks water tight, including 'close' body searches, however it needn't get in the way of some damn fine photography.
4. London Stansted security was a whole different ball game. They weren't even on high alert, Everyone was very charming, just very very keen at there jobs. One even told me as an ex-prison officer he knew hiding places I could never dream of -nice.
5. We're all kids at heart. First thing we do when given the run of a 767? yup. go sit in the cockpit.
Update on 2007-04-02 22:54 by Philip
Forgot to say we also learnt that even the calmest photographers crack in the end.
Shooting the blog
This is a live post from the laptop (being used as a prop) in a shot we are currently doing at London Stansted airport.
Great media buying
Fantastic bit of media placement in JFK, You can imagine the Grey Goose creatives having come up with the ice wall back
ground thinking ooh no don't Chivas use that graphic device? well yes, but no ones ever going to see them side by side, are they?
Doing your expenses
Best found item of the trip so far. Pinned on a noticed board in an office, a bunch of receipts awaiting attention, including this one from a gas station, I draw your attention to the volume of fuel delivered 12,000 litres!! that's alot of Nectar points.Shooting at JFK
Having a whole a bunch of fun negotiating security issues 
while taking pictures in the terminals at JFK airport. Before 9/11 a press pass and a smile would get you just about anywhere in an airport but for obvious reasons its a whole lot harder now. My chief feeling is being in New York but NOT, Kinda like standing outside a shut bar. as the picture shows.
Update on 2007-03-28 21:13 by Philip
The above is the vanilla version of actually a hugely entertaining time because while security is as tight as a gnats chuff, there are ways and means to achieve what you need and a whole load of very accommodating JFK staff put themselves out of there way to aid our progress. Its just for legal reasons even on a blog I've been told I can never say how we got the shots we did.
On the road again
Finished my duties in Dublin on Saturday, a great bunch of people who really believed in the power of good work - in fact the debate amongst the judges is still raging via email as I type. Currently sitting in the MAXjet lounge at Stansted waiting to go to New York to begin a rather intensive six day shoot. Made all the more fun by restrictions of time, budget and access.
Lovely full motion
I am some thing of a sucker for video based navigation.
This promotional site for the new Nokia N95 is pretty cool.Based around a fictional tailor Henry Needle & Sons and his amazing pockets, Psion did a similar gag many years ago, but without the wit and humour on show here.
Update on 2007-03-27 09:08 by Philip
I forgot to point out that the normally very cold corporate communications of the Nokia brand were being soften by some rather good use of disruption media. The on-line brand ads for this phone were accessed via links on both Popbitch and Holy Moly, nice media buying to find the eternally inquisitive. The Nokia brands music festival activity is also sort of well executed featuring as it does in both UK and European marketing awards this year, so the obvious question is why does all sense of adventure and innovation desert them when they execute in-store work?
Judge Slade
In Dublin for a couple of days helping to judge APMC the Irish Promotional Marketing Awards. Day one over and quite taken by some of the work I have seen. There is quite a bit of 'almost' brilliant projects. either great ideas and rather sloppy execution, or eye popping art direction with no soul or idea to back it up. Still another day tomorrow to find the show winner.
HD chef
Had a very long day last Thursday filming a remarkably unflappable Antony Worrill Thompson. Was amazed by the results, we shot on HD video with an incredible Director of Photography who has made the whole thing look like 35mm film. Today we saw the first edits and I really am staggered by HD capabilities. Busy week ahead.
What seems like ages ago i wrote a bunch of scripts for a new range of household cleaners. I don't do that much TV work so its quite a treat that after rather drawn out BACC approvals suddenly the time is upon us to shoot one. We have just done the final location reccie and Thursday is shoot day. The best bit of being a 'Consultant' to a number of brands is that life is really very varied right now. Tricky for a job title but good for the soul.
I am very nervous about Thursday. There is a lot to consider. Its a premium brand that needs the right 'feel' One of the investors is a celebratory chef and the script we are shooting is written around his wife. We are shooting on location in his new house that he only moved into 10 days ago (the builders are very much still in residence) what else? oh yeah, two of the cast are children, still the catering should be good.
Spare five minutes?
I've been using Stumble on! these past few weeks. Its a fab little application that can sit in the Firefox toolbar . 
It finds sites it thinks you might be interested and randomly fires them into your browser. There is a neat little community feature where you can access other peoples recommendations. Has separate video and image 'find' features. Seemly aimed at the hyperactive like myself, got a spare five minutes? Hit Stumble and bang! something from the blind corner of the web pops up, strangely appropriate to your life. weird but rather fun. Perfect web tool.
PS3 almost geek launch
The Sony Playstation3 launch (TBWA) seems to be spot on brand. Bringing as it does existing technologies together to make an easier to understand whole. I like the fact Sony appear to have mashed Second Life with Flickr meets The Sims linking to cinema and broadcast messages. Or rather the last 18 months tech' highlights for those who couldn't previously be bothered. Launch press HERE. Bit about the ads from Brand Republic HERE. tech insights to it HERE.
Trendy Vicars
'Like a vicar dancing at the school disco' has long been a phrase to describe out of touch communications. Saw this amazing site today from a youth church in Seattle. pretty dam fine work all in all.
Does make you wander what a pray based 2.0 app' might perform. Not withstanding the amount of praying that takes place every time an ad runs past the deadline.
Its been built on the expression engine platform from ellis lab, my chum Bill reckons this rocks compared with standard blogging apps. There is a really informative blog about it HERE.