Online forum network CrowdGather is launching a new fragrance aimed at gamers and geeks who frequent online communities. Called Erox, the fragrance will contain a combination of human pheromones that are said to "increase feelings of arousal, excitement, social warmth and friendliness in both men and women.
CrowdGather hopes to combine social media with affiliate marketing to develop an online marketing strategy with mass appeal so that all the geeks who will, one day, inherit the earth will smell good when doing so.
Calling attention to the plight of small children and their place in the disturbing world of child sex trafficking and exploitation, comes this video from Love146, a group run by Rob Morris. In 2002, Morris, along with a few friends, traveled to Southeast Asia to see, first hand, what the trafficking of children looked like.
Morris was dismayed at what he saw. Children lined up behind a glass wall with numbers affixed to them. He stood there, along with other men from around the world, and watched as the children were bid on as if they were cattle at auction.
According to Love146, human trafficking is the second largest income generating syndicate in the world. In addition, two children are sold every minute. That's depressing.
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Writing on Strollerbaby, Rebecca Odes has an insightful take on the proliferation of brands selling products to young girls that are designed to make them look, well, less young. From padded bras to booty firming shoes, it would seem marketers are intent on turning 12 year olds into sexed up models.
Odes calls attention to a recent campaign from Skechers that promotes the brand's Shape Up sneakers for girls which, much like Reebok's ReTone sneakers, are designed to tone the thighs and butts of little girls.
And while Skechers says the campaign's message is "the same messaging as Michelle Obama's Get Moving campaign," Odes wonders why little boys don't need their thighs and butts toned as well.
We've written about this topic ad naseum wondering about the wisdom of marketers attempting to turn young girls into stripper-esque tweens and the industry's notion that using sex to sell is is a worthy business strategy.
What's the solution? It's simple. While sex and the use of it as a means of convincing someone to do something will never go away, marketers could very easily simply cease making sexualized products for children and stop glorifying and glamorizing a sexed up lifestyle to those under the age of 18.
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In acknowledgment of its creative achievements - in the form of the 50 Lions it has won over the past twenty years - Cannes will bestow the honor of Advertiser of the Year on Ikea. The award will be presented to Ikea Group Global Retail Manager Noel Wijsmans during the Festival in late June.
Ikea and its agencies are well known for their work which included the famed Crispin Porter + Bogusky-created Lamp ad that was awarded the Film Grand Prix in 2003. We thought the honor should have gone to Honda's Cog or Saturn's Sheet Metal that year but hey, that's just our opinion.
That said, there is no doubt the brand has done admirable work over the years and is absolutely deserving of this award.
So yea. Another flashmob. Who gives a crap, right? Well, no matter how lame, boring or amateurish, anything that features hot guys and girls in their shorts and bikinis is bound to attract at least a little attention. And that's exactly what this flashmob for PacSun got when they staged a flashmob at The Grove in LA.
The work is part of the brand's Dress Irresponsibly campaign which aims to hype the brand's focus on fun and creativity.
PacSun partnered with Passion Pit to remix a PacSun track titled "My Body's Not Your Toy" featuring La Roux's "I'm Not Your Toy" versus Young the Giant's "My Body." We are told this same flashmob played out in 15 other retail oocations across the nation at the same time.
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From the moment it starts, you can tell exactly what's going to happen in this Glass And A Half Full Productions/Ogilvy Johannesburg work for Cadbury. It follows the classic unexpected - except in advertising - behavioral shift a group not known for the unexpected suddenly displays as if they were magically set free from the bonds that confine them to their routine.
In this particular case, it's reclusive monks who spend their entire day is respectful silence and study. That is until a balloon falls from the ceiling, helium hilarity ensues and a monastery transforms into a dance club with monks raving to Flo Rida's Low.
And of the monks, Director Erik Van Wyk, speaking in classic adver-babble, said, "What this endearing group does so beautifully and simply, is reflect humanity back to us. The part of humanity we like." Um...maybe they were just glad to get up off their asses for a while.
Snark aside, we like the work. After all, who doesn't love seeing a group do something fun and uncommon?
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Amstel Light has launched a new campaign today which refocuses the brand's messaging from that of the beer's Amsterdam heritage to that of the beer's actual benefits; that it doesn't taste like a light beer. The campaign, shot by Dutch photographer Maarten de Groot, will include national print and online as well as radio and OOH in Boston.
Agencies Mizbala and twentythree created an eerie location-based campaign for If I Die, a Facebook application that lets people record a message that will only be published after they die. Of course, no one think they're going to die anytime soon so people needed a bit of prompting.
Mizbala used th APIs of popular location services such as Foursquare, Gowalla, Facebook Places, Twitter and Google Latest to track checkins all over the world. Once they located a person, they'd place a call to the location the person had checked into and asked to have the establishment to put the person on the line. Once they had the person on the line, they'd leave a creepy message and tell the person to go to the If I Die Facebook app.
You can check out the demo call to Mashable's Adam Ostrow in this video to see what it's all about. Did the campaign work? Oh yes it did. Without any advertising, the campaign received lots of press in newspapers, blogs, radio and TV coverage which resulted in an 800 percent increase in recorded messages being left on "If I Die".
But ask yourself. Do you really wants to be found this easily?
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- Apparently, it's all about the D cups when it comes to Seafolly advertising campaigns.
- The Festival of Media, held in Montreaux for two days last week, has announced its Media Awards. The full list of winners can be seen here (PDF).
- Fiat Street Evo is a new app that recognizes traffic signs and transforms them into features of the new Punto Evo. The app recognizes traffic signs as if they were QR codes and it associates each sign with a feature directly related to that sign.
- Lenny Kravitz has signed a deal with Jeep to become its brand ambassador and will appear in a national advertising campaign and an upcoming short film.
- Here's some interesting non-profit work done for the Salvation Army.
Justine Ezarik, otherwise known as iJustine, has partnered with MASScanvas, an organization that brings together celebrities, designers and charities, to launch the Fluidity Challenge. And the challenge is simple: Create a T-shirt design, in any style, that best address the theme of fluidity.
Five winners will be awarded $1,000 in cash following a public vote and final selection by Justine. And, after a 30-day period of the 5 winning designs being available for sale in the MASScanvas online store, the top-selling T-shirt designer will win an additional $1,500.
Who is Justine and why should you care about her? For those who have been living under a rock, Justine is an American viral video comedienne, actress, life-caster, vlogger, freelance graphic/web designer and video editor and, of course, famous on YouTube. She is the most subscribed to female comedienne/personality on YouTube with almost 1.9 million subscribers and over a million twitter followers.
And if you haven't already noticed, she's hot. Really hot. In the same month she was named one of the Hollywood Reporters 50 most powerful digital players, she was also named one of Maxim Magazine's Hot 100. She has worked with brands from Mattell, Ford, GE, and Carls Jr. and been featured in The Chicago Tribune, Fast Company and many others as well as made numerous guest appearances on shows including Law and Order and Criminal Minds.
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