Pussi

Swedis branding fail, or is ot?

Peruvian (Advertising)

In the realm of sexist advertising this is the first piece to catch my eye since the BMW premium selection used cars ad.

Although I found the BMW ad better, this one is still funny even though I am sure it wont get as much viral attention.

Tactical advertising

You’ve gotta love these

And, although not an advert, Some eCards covered the event with typical charm:-

The art of WTF?!ness

A great find by Chimp Media Monitoring and quite rightly the strangest TV spot I have ever seen (apparently advertising Mac’s – a chain of 7-Eleven style stores in Canada). On watching it I felt a little bit spooked and compelled to hunt down more of the ads to try and make sense of it (and there’s a few – each as mind-boggling) another here.

I love this campaign for its bravery (can you imagine pitching this?) but also for getting the balance right. The potential problem with being esoteric in advertising is that it can be confusing and, even worse, alienating BUT get it right and people find it intriguing and will get people talking (Cadbury Gorilla, anyone?).

Also, as opposed to the self-styled “weirdest clip ever made” from Nokia’s shitty Open At Your Own Risk campaign, the TV ads are being spread and posted on blogs and discussed because it has put itself out there and leaves itself open to interpretation. And, as everyone will tell you, it’s so much better to be caught unawares and surprised than to have your expectations raised and then be let down.

JungleSmash – Make Videos, Win Money

From Freakonomics

JungleSmash is a little experiment from James Altucher.

James also started Stockpickr.com, the first user-generated investing site, and, in ancient history, he was a pioneer in the online video space, doing original web-only videos for HBO.

JungleSmash is a bit of a mix-up of everything that’s come before. James picked a random brand, Crest toothpaste, and is offering $2,000 to whoever makes and posts to YouTube the best video about Crest.

It is an experiment to see if the buying public, when properly incentivised, can create advertising that’s as compelling as what firms and ad agencies create (on much, much, much larger budgets).

Do customers appreciate products in ways that firms don’t understand? Can ad agencies be eliminated from the food chain?

James plans on doing a new experiment with a new product every couple weeks or so, and giving away $2,000 each time.

You decide, here’s the winning entry for Crest

Wassup 8 years later

Love the idea how some characters of an ad last in memory and can crossover different campaigns.

Global warning from Ogilvy NY

Nice piece of guerrilla ad on global warming from Ogilvy NY.

Wario Land: Shake It

This is an amazing takeover….

Looks like a normal You Tube clip until…
the page itself starts to be affected by the video as it breaks out of the screen!

Then when everything has fallen down, you can pick it up and thow it around the screen….The physics on this thing area pretty tactile.

Check it out

Wario Land: Shake It

Ogilvy’s latest for Ford

Noah Harris’ latest video for ford with Ogilvy and BlinkInk, Brand republic has a full article here, basically it says that it is targeted at women and aiming to establish itself as a style icon, maybe they should have thought about that when they designed the car as-well? I mean the new Fiat 500 is a potential style icon, the new Ford Fiesta is in my eyes pretty bland, and the micro-site is shocking, nice TV ad non the less.

Yours,
Mr Grumpy

Work hard play hard sucks

Work hard play hard seems to be the motto of every agency. The idea being that hard work should be rewarded with fun activities, like parties or social outings if you like. Many advertisers and marketers believe strongly in this principle ,”Oh yes, here we certainly work hard, but we play hard to, hehe”.

I believe that this is a motto of the past, at least i think it should be. It is a hard motto to challenge because people might assume that you are a slacker with little social life. How ever this mind set can potentially be very damaging for a business, it can result in negative work environments where your worth as an employee is measured by the amount of late hours on your time sheet.

Hard fun is where it should be at. Hard fun is the concept of that everybody likes hard challenging things to do. When you are having hard fun you are sufficiently challenged and creatively stimulated within your skill set so that the hours fly. Organizations that genuinely treat employees as their most valuable asset are the ones that will prevail in a market where the workforce is shrinking and the fight for talent tougher.

However the concept of hard fun does not make the need for good parties redundant.

Yours, slacking on a Saturday night
Andreas

Work in Norway

Meeting room, originally uploaded by amelvaer.

Top Norwegian advertising agency M&L are looking for people. Interactive designers are top of the whish-list along side artdirectors. M&L are based in Stavanger in the south west of Norway.

Stavanger is a truly beautifull city with a bustling nightlife and a rich cultural scene. It is also located among some of Norways most spectacular nature.

The Norwewgian kroner is very strong at the moment and in general as a junior designer your looking at a starting salary around 30K a year. Norway is not part of the EU but is part of the EEA meaning that European passport holders does not requier a visa to work there.

If you are interested in working at M&L please email me with folio and CV at andmel@mac.com

Cheers
Andreas