Grinds my gears! - integrated

So audience what really grinds my gears this week is integrated agencies (not all but most).

• First of all office politics stopping me from doing a good job.
  Why is it that I need massage every departments ego to get stuff done.
• Offline team vs. online team and budget sharing
  Get it together people! Have one team on it come up with some good ideas then flesh it out.

Cross dept costing etc. Blah blah blah. What the hell! I am pretty sure this is why some companies are spanking money away.

Now this may seem like I am attacking integrated companies but read on as I have an important question to ask all people that have experienced this type of company politics before.

When did it become OK to compromise good work to meet targets? When was more important to make the numbers balance than making a name for yourself in the industry(company or individual).

This is the problem I have with a lot of so called "integrated" agencies, now this could be a management thing or it might not be I'm not sure, all I know is that this is how you wont get the best out of your company.

Concepting for online - part 1

So a few offline people approach me from time to time and ask "how should we go about doing the online part of a project?". Usually my reply would be "anything you want", as generic as this sounds it's actually what I believe.

I am going to release a 3 part blog post on this topic for:
- Offline
- Online
- Integrated

Now empty you mind. This is a rough guide of how I go about coming up with online concepts after a campaign has gone live.

Offline
Now for many Digital teams the line "Can you just make this print ad into a web page" is far too common. In my opinion you should be well within you rights to create a fuss, especially if you work in a "creative" agency.

When did rehashing a print ad to become a website become acceptable?

When did creating online for the sake of online become a good spend of budgets?

When did offline become such an after thought?

These are some of the things I say to account people that come up with briefs like that and let's be honest we should all know better.

Any way back to the point, when you do need to bolt online on to a camapaign I tend to look at the executions surrounding the campaign this is a good way to create content with out having to do much here's an example:

You have an event which you interact with people, the interaction could be very simple i.e. questions, experience etc. Why don't you video tape this type of interaction at the event? This is all "free" content, which you can use for the site.

Here's another common scenario, we have a print campaign running, we have some banners and a landing page which need to be created. Well after kicking off again into another rant it's time to get to work.

Recreating an ad from press is soul destroying if you do exactly as account management say, but why don't you go back with something more, take it another level it's online!!!!

Come up with expandable units, video, overlays, virals. Come up with anything if it works. Obviously if the execution is good and exciting enough the client should buy it.

Next post for concepting online is online ideas

Ed Morris at LOWE

I saw this on scamp and thought it might be interesting for people looking for a job or at the very least currently uninspired by your current job.

It's a guide written by Ed Morris, ECD at Lowe, which is apparently handed out to all teams starting placement at LOWE:

“If you are a placement team at Lowe you should do this…

Show me an idea at least every 12 hours (1 working day) without fail.

Make your presence felt. Out of sight out of mind. Out of mind, no job.

Fuck the system. No one in the agency should come between you and your future. Walk straight in. It doesn’t matter how good you are if I don’t get to find out how good you are.

Focus on the work. Don’t try and be my friend.

Work on briefs that you haven’t been given. Run your own show, don’t wait for someone to walk in and “take care of you”. Respect the traffic department, but remember thy work for you, you don’t work for them. Ask them for the briefs you want; tell me if you don’t get them.

Get under the skin of a product and a brief. Don’t show me work that the rest of the department might do. I don’t need people to do what we already can.

Don’t show it to me unless you like it or you think it’s good. That’s how I find out if you’re good.

You’re not here to solve a brief. You’re here to be brilliant.

If you don’t feel you can demonstrate your capabilities with the briefs we have, do it another way. Show me any idea for any brand on any problem.

Don’t join the club, there isn’t one. You’re not here to make a load of friends and get to know the local pubs. You’re unemployed, remember that. And, if you are any good you should be trying to make the rest of us look stupid.

If you put the effort into the work I’ll put the effort into you and helping you.
But it works that way around. It’s got to start with you.

Be confident, have faith in yourselves, work hard. Look after the work and the work will look after you. A placement is a moment in time. Seize it.

…or leave.”

I read this and found new inspiration on some projects I am working on.

Cannes 2008

Well Cannes is finally over and viewing some other peoples view on this years festivals, well they are mixed. Some with the view that its rigged mostly because UK won very little others felt it was less than inspiring.

Either way the results in certain categories were of no surprise to me.

So here they go

Cyber Lions Grand Prix - UNIQLO - UNIQLOCK
Comes as no surprise really, it's an amazingly simple and highly creative way to show off your brand in the most elegant way.

Interactive agency of the year - LEAN MEAN FIGHTING MACHINE (London)
Well enough said really

INTEGRATED GRAND PRIX - Mccann - HALO 3
Halo3 was one of the most anticipated releases and the campaign that went with it didn't disappoint. Well deserved I think.

Film Lions - Cadbury's Gorilla
That's another one to add to Juan's cabinet. Where does he get space???

Well that's it for another year.

How should online advertising be done? part 3

Talk to media planners
Media planners hold the key to getting your creative out there.

They essentially hold the budget to what you want to achieve creatively, for all the flamboyant executions you may come up with, it's going to cost money, so having a media planner as a friend is not a bad thing especially when you trying to convince them that your way is the right way.

In addition to this they know exactly what units work and what new technology is out this hopefully will get the most out of your creative.

Next post on online will be strategy

How should online advertising be done? Part 2

Today we'll be focusing on extending campaigns from offline to online.

Alot of you will know what I am talking about. So first of all lets go through the process of how the project comes in.

1. You have an initial briefing explaining what the current creative is.

2. You curse the creative to high heaven whilst trying to figure out how to adapt their message to online. This is usually the most annoying part, unlike offline we don't have exclusive attention of the user so we have to come up with a few lines, which basically top lines the ad.

3. Once you've figured out how best to re-communicate the same message online the next part is more fun (well for me it is anyway).

Usually this phase is coming up with the most elaborate way to get your message to the user.

Now you might all think how can this be fun?
Well my answer to you is there are no real rules for online, you have a space to do anything you want overlays, expandable banners, peel back and for all you aspiring directors and TV script writer there is video.

One thing I hate is how people class online advertising as below the line, seriously, can it now be classed as that anymore?

Anyway a rant for another day me thinks

Next post will be about Media

Some things just don't translate - Part 1

So here I am trawling through the usual daily award sites that I got to when I see a site for intel with a chicken next to it........ That's right a chicken.

The site is in Japanese and I have no idea what it's about. If any one has any idea let me know.

Would you add UNIQLO to your top brands?

Following a post from scampblog I decided to post who I thought would be a great brand to work on and I choose UNIQLO.

You got to love what UNIQLO has done in the last few years. Especially when you think how it was perceived before it expanded to Europe. Friends in Japan tell me the brand was perceived as awful in quality and design (Like M&S in the 90s). But you have to admire how they've turned it all around.

With the D&AD success 2008 where they won black they are once again doing something mind blowing online with a microsite promoting bra-tops which they call research entertainment. This is a simple site with real feedback from real people, it's actually reminds me of the Dove campaign but you have to love the simplistic execution.

If you're intrested have a look at the TV commercial.

Pretty text clouds

Wordle will take your delicious account and make in to pretty typographical pieces.



It's very nice for a dynamically generated piece.

How should online advertising be done? Part 1

This is going to be an on going argument for many posts to come.

For the first post on this let me tell you what you shouldn't be doing before you I explain what you should be doing. Why? I here you ask.

We quite simple, for me I had issues with concepting after coming from a relatively techie background, my problem was usually to dive straight in to the detail. So even though I might have had a potentially great banner visually in essence that was what was holding the whole concept together.

Now I'm not saying visuals are not important but it shouldn't be the basis. Also if you're working in online/digital it's possibly fine but in integrated the solution you have come up with will fall short of all your other deliverables (I'll go in to this one another day).

Concentrate on the main proposition and come up with ideas this is what will make a good banner the visuals and copy will follow.