In a low-lit room within Shoreditch House, our latest Digital Leadership Dinner played host to a captivating discussion where John Kearon, Founder and Chief Juicer of BrainJuicer got emotional about marketing.
We think much less than we think we think. There’s a new understanding of how we really make decisions, coming out of Behavioural Economics and it’s rewriting the way we thought marketing worked. It seems our higher order powers of mental deliberation which we rightly praise and prize, turn out NOT to be our Oval office of decision making but more our press office of post-rationalisations. In short, the vast majority of people on the vast majority of occasions make decisions emotionally and instinctively and marketing needs to drop its belief that rational messaging is an equal player in the secret sauce of successful brands and get much more emotional about marketing.
However interesting that sounds, I promise it’s even more interesting when you start to explore the detail of this new science. But a word of warning: though each brilliant, counter-intuitive example startles and illuminates, if you don’t have a map by which to navigate and connect things, you can quickly lose yourself in a forest of examples.
Paul Berney, CMO of Mobile Marketing Association, says that job of the mobile industry is to bridge the gap between time spent on mobiles and media spend.
“How will you know if you have been successful?” was the blunt question I was posed by journalist recently after reeling off the Mobile Marketing Association’s plans for 2012. “I mean give me a simple measure that everyone can understand” he continued.
It is actually a question I have been asking myself for some time and I think there is a simple answer. Recent studies by eMarketer and others have shown that on average US consumers spend 10% of their time on mobile but that only 1% of marketing spend is allocated towards the channel.
US consumers are not so different from others in developed economies, so it is easy to imagine the same divide exists. Indeed the BBC has published details of a survey which showed that children are increasingly turning away from TV and switching their time to mobile devices with over 60% of 7-16 year olds having a phone with internet access where they spend an average of 1.6 hours a day.
In our regular Monday article,SAY Media analyses the week in a Venn diagram. This week, it’s about their first attempt at reinventing digital publishing with the redesign of Remodelista.
“The way I see it, if you’re gonna build a time machine into a car, why not do it with some style?” Doc Brown
As a species, we’ve become obsessed with what’s next. From fashion to entertainment to technology, we’re constantly looking ahead to the next big thing, leaving a trail of fashion road kill, rehabbing pop stars, and obsolete electronics in our wake.
It’s no surprise then that in the heat of this progress-oriented delirium we’ve lost sight of a few things. When viewed through the lens of digital publishing, the push for faster speeds, greater access, multiple screens and even more impressions has resulted in a disregard for the art of editorial design and an advertising experience that respects the content. The industry has suffered for it. Read the rest of this entry »
Joss Davidge, Business Director of brand experience agency BEcause, is always on the look out for marketing ideas that get people talking. This week he looks at two different campaign approaches that try to encourage drivers to slow down.
When campaigning to get people to change their behaviour there is a fine line between encouraging good, whilst condemning the fault. We all know that speeding is dangerous and there have been countless attempts to get people to slow down. This week I came across an interesting idea from the Ukraine that tried to shock speeding drivers by giving them a taste of what could go wrong. In contrast, it made me think of a campaign run by Volkswagen that centred more on rewarding those who obeyed the limit.
Pedestrian Ghost
Apparently Ukraine has the highest rate for pedestrian accidents in Eastern Europe. To show motorists the potential consequences of speeding, JWT Ukraine came up with this interesting concept. A customised manhole cover was placed on a zebra crossing that stretched across an inner city duel carriageway. If a driver exceeded the speed limit a mechanism started to blow up a human shaped balloon that inflated in front of the driver causing him to quickly apply their breaks. The real impact of this campaign followed online. One speeding driver caught the inflating ghost on a dashboard camera and uploaded it to YouTube. It quickly became popular as people questioned what it was. Furthermore it sparked a debate about the consequences of speeding and the fact that the “ghost” could have been a pedestrian.
In our regular Monday article, SAY Media analyses the week in a Venn diagram. This week, it’s about how sometimes talent is more important than technology.
“In many ways, unexpected results are what have most inspired my photography”. Horold Edgerton
Just a few years ago, it cost tens of thousands of dollars to book a multi-track studio long enough to record an album. Now any band with a laptop, Pro Tools recording software and a basement have the same tools as the big boys. Same goes for film with the emergence of low-cost, high-def cameras and free software such as iMovie. Yet even though that basement band or wannabe filmmaker have the same tools and loads of passion, most aren’t producing the same level of quality content.
The reason is simple: talent. It takes more than great gear to create the other-wordly guitar of Jimmy Page in the Rain Song. Cameras can’t conceive of the brilliant shots and sequences in Coppola’s The Conversation. Our favorite artist-engineer, “Doc” Edgerton, tapped into a special brilliance with his unique stop-motion camera to stunning effect. Perhaps it takes some luck or a deal with the devil, but what really matters is crazy talent. No matter how great your tool set is, you still need passion and genius to make a masterpiece … for now. Read the rest of this entry »
Joss Davidge, Business Director of brand experience agency BEcause, is always on the look out for marketing ideas that encourage people to talk about a brand. This week he looks at two campaigns that not only get people talking, but get the right people talking.
When looking at how to amplify a brand message we think it is vital to stimulate conversation. And when budgets are tight, it’s even more important to focus efforts on discussing the right things with the right people. Here are two imaginative examples of brand campaigns that did just that.
Wimpy Braille Burgers
After introducing braille menus to all Wimpy restaurants across South Africa it was important to get that message directly to the people who would benefit the most. Yet, rather than just announce the news, Wimpy embarked on a campaign that would see the message spread to over 800,000 relevant people just by making 15 burgers. The burgers buns were a little different though, as Wimpy painstakingly created a message in braille on top of each one using sesame seeds. The special burgers were then taken to three of the largest institutions for blind people to deliver the “tasty message”. It caused quite a stir as recipients started to talk about it on Braille newsletters and e-readers spreading the news across South Africa.
Alex Markssuggests advertisers stop thinking of computers in terms of screen size but consider them as one happy family:
Once upon a time there were three screens. Big Screen (TV), Medium Screen (laptop/PC), and of course Baby Screen (mobile).
They were as much a part of modern civilisation as electricity. Big Screen was very old and rather stuck in its ways, although people were fond of its familiarity and it had a place in most homes and hearts. Medium Screen was still quite young but had to grow up fast. Although most people liked Medium Screen it didn’t quite have the sparkle it once had. Indeed, some people were choosing to ignore it in favour of Baby Screen. Baby Screen was very young but it loved the attention it was getting as people cooed at its shiny and ever-changing clothes and rubbed its plastic tummy.
Now, because these screens were so popular, advertisers loved putting their messages all over them – mainly on Big and Medium, but more recently on Baby, too. Some advertisers even recognised that these screens had different personalities, so they adjusted their advertising accordingly. Very clever advertisers.
Marketers are in a unique position to help people see the brighter side of life and to feel more positive in 2012 says Paul Hood, director at Archant London.
In Chinese there is one hieroglyph for opportunity and crisis. While we may be entering the new year against a background of negative harangue about how bad things are and how much worse they will be, let us take a moment to reflect on the other meaning of the hieroglyph. There is a lot of room for positive and constructive thinking around business opportunities that exist during crisis.
Marketers are in a somewhat unique position to help our customers see the brighter side of life and to feel more positive, so let’s celebrate the year ahead and enter it with our minds made up to make 2012 a fantastic and memorable year.
In our regular Monday article, SAY Media analyses the week in a Venn diagram. This week, it’s about how the shift in the viewing and use of advertising platforms.
“No idea is simple when you need to plant it in somebody else’s mind”. Dom Cobb, Inception.
It’s the time for parents everywhere to intercept their kids’ letters to Santa and satisfy the desires of our youngest consumers. My 8-year-old had one item on his list, a bullet-voting strategy meant to give Santa no room to disappoint. That item was an iPad. “Why do you want an iPad?” I asked. “I want to watch Phineas and Ferb on it.” Analyst Gene Munster, of Piper Jaffray, projects 13.5 million iPads will be sold in the fourth quarter of 2011. In all over 40 million units will have found homes this year. Many of them will be put to the same use my son dreams of – watching video away from the television. Like him, whole generations are growing up without a dependency on the box for entertainment. Read the rest of this entry »
In our regular Monday article, SAY Media analyses the week in a Venn diagram. This week, it’s the second of the two-part series about what got us thinking in 2011 and what to expect in 2012.
In 2011 we saw the introduction of the iPad 2, Kindle Fire and a new Android operating system, along with a myriad of other great products. It was undoubtedly a year for great gadget innovation, but the real story that’s defined these past twelve months, as tech journalist Larry Magid puts it, “is how people used the software that runs inside their heads to change the world through technology they can hold in their hands.”
From hacktivists to the 99% to the brave citizens of the Arab Spring, what we saw time and again was how technology and social distribution have brazenly empowered the new denizens of change … which is to say, all of us. In this second part of our two part series on what we learned in 2011, we explore the delicate, symbiotic relationship between technology and people, and how they are inextricably and forevermore this year’s power couple. Read the rest of this entry »
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#WLTM: Marketing Society Business Leader Paul Wilson, CMO, Sunguard http://t.co/xZYSkyovFebruary 3, 2012 2:39
@BrainJuicer: How Can Brands Show Us They Care? http://t.co/SoDI8XQnFebruary 3, 2012 12:13
@RobinHoughton Thanks for braving the cold last night and joining us @SohoHouse. We will send you another book to review for #bookclub soon.February 3, 2012 12:03
In a low-lit room within Shoreditch House, our latest Digital Leadership Dinner played host to a captivating discussion where John Kearon, Founder and Chief Juicer of BrainJuicer got emotional about marketing. 
