Portland, Oregon-based TAOW Productions just nailed a contract to manage Diamondback's BMX bike team. This means they manage their events and activities, getting the BMX lifestyle out in the open and hopefully also increasing consumer demand for Diamondback's products and services.
TAOW thinks it's looking at a new kind of model for experiential marketing intended to nail "cool market" influencers, a phrase we find lame, but short of "jaded and bitchy" we can't think of anything more polite to address the demographic they're referring to. TAOW's other recent efforts included icons like hip hop's Kanye West and Rodney Pete, formerly of the NFL. Their brand partners also include prominent lifestyle labels like Red Bull, Diesel and American Express. So maybe "the little agency that could" knows something other marketers don't.
While Advertising Age's Jonah Bloom has had issues with what we've written a couple times, we are, without doubt, sure he's going to take issue with what George Parker recently wrote about a column Jonah did on Crispin Porter + Bogusky backlash. Commenting on Bloom's statement about ads being "events" and hatred of Crispin's work actually being a good thing for the client, Parker wrote, "Listen Jonah baby, do me a favor, go and rent a copy of 'The Hucksters' and check out the scene where Sydney Greenstreet as 'The Soap Baron' spits up a huge gob of phlegm on the boardroom table to show agency guy Clark Gable how you go about catching the consumers attention. It's disgusting, just like holding a pile of dog shit, or having a crazed Nazi with a Nurse Diesel assistant shilling for VW. You don't have to spit in someone's face to get their attention."
Parker's gleeful criticism doesn't end there, adding, " And don't give me that shit about 'Ads as events.' They're fucking ADS... Get it. If I want an event, I'll go to the Super Bowl, and not for the ads. This is what happens when you have people who've never worked a day in advertising, writing about advertising. Pathetic!"
So who's right? No bullshit George who has years of advertising experience or CP+B-defending Jonah who's made a successful career in journalism?
For her 2008 Presidential bid, Hilary Clinton has gathered together her advertising team including GSD&M CEO Roy Spence, Voluntary United Group of Creative Agencies CEO Andy Berlin and former BBDO Senior Executive Creative Director Jimmy Siegel. Spence is a close friend of Clinton and has known both Bill and Hilary since 1972 and worked on Bill Clinton's bid for the Presidency.
Already, the Hilary Clinton campaign has been seen advertising on blogs through the BlogAds network in an effort to reach the several very powerful political influencers who inhabit that space.
London-based Lunar BBDO doesn't just want to find a typographist, they want to find the typographist. To prove worthy of this destiny, the right candidate needed to decode a want ad cryptically written in Webdings, Zapf Dingbats and Wingdings - picture fonts that appear in everybody's Word program for reasons we never understood. We also suspect they're the language of preference for the makers of crop circles.
Copy reads, "Mac-based typographer/designer wanted. Award-winning ad agency seeks help with its Mac/design output. West End space provided in exchange for negotiable hours of work. Contact Daryl Corps on 07802 499 658." The ad was disseminated at art colleges and typography mags. And apparently it really did nail a hire.
Kudos to Lunar for being far cleverer than we, because when we need new hires we get drunk and try releasing smoke signals in the shape of martinis from our backyards. This has yet to yield interest outside of the local police force, and the occasional cat.
Here's an intriguing proposition. Kean University of NJ is building a new building and wants an advertising agency or design studio as a tenant. Since we all know academia doesn't properly prepare those interested in advertising for the realities of the business, setting an actual agency right next to classrooms might not be a bad idea. Called the Design Center Building, the building would be about six stories and would also house retail businesses such as: a digital printing company, a full service bank, a restaurant, and a Barnes and Noble Super Store with Starbucks. If you're interested in doing something different and want to check this out, call Rose Gonnella, design department professor at 908-737-4432 or email here at [email protected].
Oh this is beyond good. This is genius. If we could all leave our jobs this way, a career in advertising would be a very satisfying experience. Imagine getting back at all your idiotic asshole co-workers you had to deal with during your stay at the agency. Imagine pulling a knife on that fat ass, know-it-all account director that made you do all his work. Imagine cutting the nads of that smarmy jerk in accounting who couldn't keep his eyes off your breasts. Of course, they are huge and bulging out of your cleavage-enhancing tops all the time but that's besides the point. Imagine TBWA\CHIAT\DAY Executive Creative Director Chuck McBride murdering all the employees in the San Francisco before he leaves to start his own agency. Imagine...oh wait...it's just a spoof YouTube video. Everything's going to be OK.
For Recruit Ireland, agencies Head Gear in Toronto and Chemistry Dublin create Beep and Creak, two took-for-granted everyday noises who depart answering machines and door hinges in favour of the big-time. Now Beep censors F-bombs and Creak adds a creepy extra something to coffin doors.
If your lowly house noises can pursue the bigger picture, why not you? Just one catch. To use Recruit Ireland, you have to beep and creak in a twang. And it's too bad we're not Irish considering even our employment boards have been bit by the consumer-gen bug. You know what would be awesome? A little bit of beep and creak for some Creative Directors. Because we need new ones. Badly.
One trend that's been bubbling around in agencies for some time now might, aside from its other important benefits, may result in the elimination of the most dreaded operational activity: filling out time sheets. In recent history, following the shift from old-school 15 percent compensation, agencies have based revenue on the time it takes to complete a project mapped against the cost of hours to accomplish the project. There was then a shift to performance-based marketing that tied campaign performance to agency revenue. Now, the notion of value has been added to the compensation equation with several agencies, including Crispin Porter + Bogusky and Anomoly, setting fees based on the perceived value of the work they do for clients.
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BLM Flint Creative Director Guy Blaskey took on the Apprentice/Donnie Deutsch role in the UK's Wag Boutique, an ITV1 reality series that pits two teams of UK football player's wives and girlfriends against each other in a clothing shop competition. Each of the teams hired BLM Flint to create their identity and promotional campaigns and Blaske found himself in the middle of a nightmare.
At first, the nightmare wasn't so bad with soccer wife and Page Three model Nicola T offering to bare her breasts for creative inspiration and soccer wife Krystelle Sidwell giving him the full on flirting treatment. Unfortunately, the fun devolved into the usual idiocy with the two teams taking on the role of nightmare clients.
Blaskey said of the experience, "I was initially surprised how switched on, determined and knowledgeable the girls were, but it soon descended into farce. The Bows team were the perfect clients, apart from Nicola wanting to show me her breast. But working with the 'Better Half' team was a living hell, they were worse than the worst clients."
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Wieden+Kennedy/London art director Gwen Yip sets forth a feel-good series of comics about her journey from Hong Kong to London, and her consequent search for ad work. It is cute. It is allegedly also inspiring, as according to AdCritic Yip peddled her work the old-fashioned way before ultimately landing a role at W+K. Everybody loves a good Horatio Algier story.
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