Brains on Fire

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  Dale Turner

  Posted on July 31st, 2006 by Geno and currently 1 commenting.

  Do you know who Dale Turner is? Dale is 16, lives in a trailer park in a small town, his mom is a drunk, and he believes that he’s the only one living in his small town that knows what the internet is. Well that’s what his self-recorded video tells us. The only way I found out about Dale was my daughter ran across him on myspace. In real life Dale is Erik Knudsen he plays a 16 year-old on the new CBS show Jericho. Advertising in social networks is nothing new. And I think you will begin to see a lot of editorial coverage about this new form of advertising blurring commercial messages and member generated content. I just think too many advertisers are still not understanding social networks and how to interact with them. Stuckinjericho could be breakthrough stuff. The first step would be some real two way conversation. And what’s to stop Erik Knudsen from actually talking about his role. A little thinking by CBS could actually go a long way to help answer criticism about their quick cancellations of shows past. I’m watching CBS, I hope you don’t let me down again.

  Tags: advertising, CBS, Dale Turner, erik Knudsen, Jericho, MySpace, Stuckinjericho
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  Planning Beyond the :30

  Posted on July 27th, 2006 by Jennifer and currently 0 commenting.

  Everyone loves to talk about how much advertising is changing, how WOMM is the future, how cool nontraditional media can be. It’s something we heard a lot at the AAAA Account Planning Conference too, but we got to approach it from a slightly different angle. Planners are all about strategic insight, so the really cool case studies we got to see (and there were some REALLY cool ones) were focused in on the nugget - the little gem of insight from the desired audience that made all those really cool viral and buzz ideas possible. It was particularly encouraging that two of the three Gold winners of the Jay Chiat Planning Awards were brilliantly executed campaigns that launched themselves outside of the :30 spot and into a full brand experience. (The third gold [Martin's campaign for The Learning Channel], though still mostly confined to :30s, was still some really exquisite strategy.) But I want to draw attention to the other two golds for the purposes of this post.

  First, there was the release of the Audi A3, done by McKinney. It was a pretty impressive online and offline stunt titled The Art of the H3ist in which the first A3 in America was stolen (and they really did it… if you’d been walking by at 0-dark-thirty, you’d have seen the whole thing). This extended into a full Alternate Reality Gaming experience (not entirely unlike The Lost Experience… which I’m still hooked on), culminating in the eventual location of the car. Why choose this complex avenue, when it would have been so easy to roll out like any other car launch? Because they chose to focus on a small segment of their target market - the young, affluent gamers - to let their enthusiasm build excitement from the inside out.

  The second gold winner was by Bartle Bogle Hegarty for Axe Snake Peel. (This was not only a gold winner, but they won the Grand Prix - an honor that has not been awarded in 3 years!) The great insight in this effort to sell body wash to young men came from the all-too-well-known “walk of shame.” They heard from many of the young men they spoke to a resounding chorus of the regret over a questionable intimate encounter. Of course, they could have let the print and :30s speak to that insight and stop there. But instead… they created a cult. They developed The Order of the Serpentine, a secret society dedicated to helping young men scrub away their shame. But they didn’t stop with that online initiative. They also aired an hour ‘expose’ on Spike Network, revealing the secrets of this supposed cult.

  In the end, both of these are examples of really frickin’ cool executions… but they can’t just be that. They had to come from a real (and usually very simply) nugget of truth about their desired audience. It’s not enough to do kooky or unexpected or nontraditional. It all has to come from a genuine conversation with and understanding of your customers… and it needs to stay true to the strategy and message gleaned from that insight. Veer too far for the sake of far, and you’ll lose them!

  Tags: AAAA Account Planning Conference, advertising, Alternate Reality Gaming Experience, Audi A3, Axe Snake Peel, Bartle Bogle Hegarty, buzz, campaigns, gamers, genuine conversations, Insight, Jay Chiat Planning Awards, Martin, McKinney, non-traditional media, secret society, Spike Network, target market, The Art of the H3ist, The Grand Prix, The Learning Channel, the Lost experience, The Order of the Serpentine, Viral, WOMM
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  Worthy Tidbits

  Posted on July 26th, 2006 by Jennifer and currently 7 commenting.

  Well, I’m still in Miami, and it’s still hot. Seriously, people, my glasses fog up when I walk out side. At any rate, before the conference concludes and I rush back to Greenville to start some serious blogging, I thought I would share a few soundbites from the conference so far:

  • “There is no learning without emotion.” - Plato (via Chuck Porter)
  • “The whole world is a moving target.” - Chuck Porter (Chairman: Crispin, Porter + Bogusky)
  • “Just turn off your friggin’ blackberries and tell me something!” - Chris Wall (Chief Creative Officer: Ogilvy & Mather)
  • “It’s important that people have an opinion about you.” - Gerry Graf (Executive Creative Director: TBWA/Chiat/Day NY) (Note that he didn’t specify positive or negative, just that they have an opinion.)
  • “More verbs. Fewer adjectives.” - Mark Beeching (Global Executive Creative Director: Digitas)
  • “The quickest way to convert a prospect to a customer is to treat them like a customer.” - Gerry Graf
  • “Debunk the myths, reset the intents.” - Ann Hand (Sr. VP, Global Retail Mktg: BP)
  • “How can we be as nimble as our consumers?” - Andrew Deitchman (Partner & Strategist: Mother)
  • “Figure out what you’re really good at and build around it.” - Richard Tait (Grand Poo-Bah: Cranium)
  • “Go Personal, Go Particular, Go Primal.” - Dr. Bob Deutsch (Founder: Brain Sells)
  • “Have the courage to endure the wait to hear the real story.” - Dr. Bob Deutsch
  • “A lot of clients mistake research and strategic planning as the same thing.” - David Abraham (Executive VP and GM: TLC and Discovery Home Channel)
  • “Creativity isn’t random, but what sparks it may be.” - Russell Davies (Open Intelligence Agency)

  Now… I’m off to catch my plane!

  Tags: Andrew Deitchman, Ann Hand, BP, Brain Sells, Chris Wall, Chuck Porter, Cranium, Crispin, David Abraham, Digitas, Discovery Home Channel, Dr. Bob Deutsch, Gerry Graf, Global Retail Mktg, Greenville, Mark Beeching, Miami, Mother, Ogilvy & Mather, Plato, Porter + Bogusky, Richard Tait, TLC
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  JetBlue to Marketers: Own the Customer Experience

  Posted on July 26th, 2006 by Virginia and currently 0 commenting.

  This morning, AdAge ran a video interview with JetBlue’s CMO Andrea Spiegel. Spiegel’s background is travel and luxury marketing and, with that lense, she shared thoughts on the biggest challenges facing marketing executives today. She listed the number one being marketing that taking ownership for the customer experience:

  “Marketers should try to either get more involved in or take ultimate control over the experience from when a consumer (a customer) initially hears about your brand to them actually experiencing it and then the invitation for them to come back again. I think its really important for all the touchpoints along the way to be aligned.”
  
  While I think the above is a very smary comment and should be a rallying cry, my experience in the brand world tells me that the way most companies are organized impedes doing what Andrea is suggesting above. Could being able to do this boil down to companies being marketing-led vs. product/engineering-led? Anyone out there want to present counter examples of brands driven by engineering that just happen to provide a great experience along the way? I’m sure they’re out there, but I keep thinking the classic examples of Starbucks, Nike, eBay and Apple who proactively think about all touchpoints and have attracted throngs of kindred spirits.

  On a personal note, I have only flown JetBlue once, but they turned me into an instant fan. They claimed low ticket prices, free onboard entertainment, big seats, and gourmet amenities and delivered. I was actually disappointed when we landed. Next week, I am driving 90 minutes to fly out of Charlotte just to have the pleasure of flying JetBlue on our vacation to Maine (plea to JetBlue: the Greenville-Spartanburg Airport WANTS YOU).

  Tags: AdAge, Andrea Spiegel, Apple, Charlotte, Customer Experience, eBay, Greenville-Spartanburg Airport, JetBlue, Kindred Spirits, Maine, Nike, Starbucks, touchpoints, travel and luxury marketing
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  The Next Level (Is a Step Down)

  Posted on July 25th, 2006 by Spike and currently 3 commenting.

  I’ve written before about the marketing graveyard and a list of words and phrases I’d like to see go there to die. ‘The Next Level’ is one I need to add to the list. But it’s been stuck in my head lately. And I’ve realized that going to the next level when it comes to identity development and word of mouth initiatives is not going a level up, but going a level down. And by that, I mean getting a level closer to your customers and employees.

  It means coming down from the corner offices and the ivory towers, rolling up your sleeves and getting your hands dirty (and that’s dirty in a good way). It’s so easy to make a pretty multi-million dollar ad campaign, hope for the best and let it soar high above everyone (and their heads). But it’s not so easy to get down in there, elbow to elbow ” far beyond the comfort of focus groups ” and listen to the words and emotions that your customers are connecting with your identity as a company, product or service. And man, you’re gonna learn so much. And the rewards ” both monetary and other ” are so much greater.

  So the next time you want to ‘take it to the next level,’ think about it in a new way ” like taking a step down.

  Tags: "The Next Level", ad campaign, corner offices, customers, elbow to elbow, Employees, focus groups, identity development, ivory towers, Marketing Graveyard, product or service, Word of Mouth