El Gaffney

Making a Brand Statement

Earlier this year I posted about the Coca-Cola Happiness Machine and had a handful of friends outside of the industry send me emails about how cool it was. (Side note: They weren’t comfortable commenting on the blog even though it’s mine because they aren’t in advertising. However, they’re the harshest couch critics of commercials – especially during football season.)

Anyway, a conversation about creating something (an ad, event, application, etc.) that makes “a brand statement” – gets people talking and shows them a company’s values, personality and/or mission – led me to think about some of the work that’s broken through and resonated with me over the last half year or so. You guys and dolls in advertising have probably seen most, if not all, of these but figured I’d post them for the other nine visitors who aren’t scouring award show winner lists. Plus, I truly believe it’s important for everyone in our industry to talk about the work we see out in the marketplace – whether “creative” is in your title or not.

The idea that sparked this post originally is closest to the Coke example in that it’s a stunt that documented made for some pretty interesting video. What I love is how Heineken thought about their audience and decided to use the people who have the most influence over their soccer fan consumers to reach them.

Also in the sports world (my world) are Gatorade’s Replay, Nike’s Chalkbot and Puma’s Hardchorus. Definitely check these out – they’re really fun.

Given my history working with The Islands Of The Bahamas’ tourism board, I can’t deny last year’s big winner on awards show circuit. Here’s its case study video:

Other award winning ideas brought to life that I admire are BK’s Whopper Sacrifice, Axe’s 100 Girls and our Old Spice Swaggerize Me.

Lastly, two very different uses of film (hundreds of very short clips to show off a limited-run of shoes and one long tale about whiskey) have caught my eye and sucked me in. They are New Balance’s 574 Cilps and Johnnie Walker’s “The Man Who Walked Around The World:

P.S. Kevin, there’s your credit list.
P.P.S. W+K London just released an extended version of Impossible Dream for Honda.

Tags: brands, lists

Quarterlinks

Title inspired by Top Chef Masters’ “clamesco” sauce in the first quickfire challenge.

Every few months I look back over my delicious links and pull out some of the interesting and relevant things. A handful of you probably contributed to this list without knowing it via Twitter or email, so thank you. In the spirit of Age’s weekly “Teh Radness” and Greg’s annual 99 Things You Should Have Seen on The Internet—but not nearly as ambitious as either—here’s my quarter list of Ten for ESPN.

1. Just because March Madness ended doesn’t mean you’ll have to lose Gus Johnson’s calls.
2. Plus now you can fill out your Consumerist’s Worst Company in America Bracket.
3. With baseball season underway, there’s a new product for Red Sox (and music) fans.
4. From brands we’ve seen create this type of content before, the secret of Nike Air and RayBan “Never Hide Films” face tattoo.
5. To new brands making stuff, like Reese’s bridge jumping video and Tropicana’s lighting up the Arctic.
6. A couple of Social Media FAIL’s from Nestle and TGI Friday’s.
7. One of the most bizarre sports I’ve ever seen.
8. For LOST fans, the Saul Bass credits and the Old Spice commercial frame by frame with Richard.
9. OK GO’s latest video and The Muppets got mashed up with Lady Gaga.
10. Finally, a Presidential handshake and wipe.

Hopefully something on here you haven’t seen. If not, a handy list for next time you’re looking for it. Have a nice weekend. And don’t forget to watch Sunday Night Baseball on ESPN. (Shameless plug.)

Tags: lists, socialmedia, viral

Best [Advertising] Ideas of 2007

There’s no reason why I’m any more qualified than most of you readers to giving out these awards. In fact I may be less qualified considering I don’t even know what those brackets around advertising in the subject even mean. However, I still say most because I do know a few friends reading who really are quite single-minded in assessment of advertising ideas—”Funny” or “Not Funny”. But maybe the unsophisticated scale is dead-on-balls-accurate (yes, that’s a My Cousin Vinny quote). I mean, shoot, look at the most liked Super Bowl commercials poll each year…you know Career Builder does. Oh word? Word.

The inspiration for a list like this came from my disappointment not to see any advertising agency ideas on The New York Times Magazine’s 70 Ideas “that made 2007 what it was.” While I have to admit, I wasn’t surprised in the least, it is a bit disconcerting considering many of us see ideas as our currency. Plus, claiming we create (pop) culture in many cases, can we ever have the longevity to make a year what it was? I mean, I need a Bahamavention! Yes? No? Word.

Take a look at the 70 – or at least 3 or 4 before they tell you to log in. Most of the blogs I read didn’t even cover these ideas other than Radiohead’s pricing model innovation, of course.

I was also surprised not to see more companies on the list. I’m sure innovative companies have their own list. It is actually heavy on interesting research findings. And apparently as an industry, we did not come up with any earth-shattering research, uncover a relationship that exists between two unrelated things and put to use the scientific method we all learned in high school. Though I think I did hear that one big agency did find that moms shop for cars and electronics too.

Anyway, here are my nominations for the best [advertising] ideas this year. Please do not use old definition of advertising that’s based on one-way messaging to a waiting audience; rather, use a more modern meaning (communications and conversations) as well as keep it broad enough to encompass any ideas from ad guys and gals and agencies. Okay, enough of that explanation – here are ideas that I loved in 2007 (in no particular order):

1. The Tap Project (Simple and simply amazing idea brought to life)
2. Cadbury Gorilla (Pure joy and completely memorable)
3. Planning for Good (Born at a Conference, who would have thought)
4. CMPB’s Get The Glass (Visually stunning and engaging site)
5. Nike’s Leave Nothing (I’m a huge Last of the Mohicans fan…and now I work at W+K so I’m biased)

Crazy both milk and chocolate in the top five, and I’m not even a dessert guy. Also would like to give a “quik” shout-out to Dynamite Surfing, Fight for Kisses, and Good Things Should Never End. Not that I couldn’t make them numbers 6 and 7 I guess. Oh well, too late.

After starting this post, I realized that Johnny Vulkan already did a nice job summing up the year. And Contagious Magazine did an even more comprehensive recap of 2007 including everything from social media to design. However, what would be great is if people added to this list by emailing or commenting and then we put it to a vote.

Who knows, maybe by the end we’ll be inspired to aim to make NYTimes Mag’s list next year?

Tags: lists, magazines