Welsh Wales…
Give us their Newport (not New York), state of mind…
Not sure this came the tourist board, but who cares. It’s a perfect slice of Friday afternoon joy. I think the China / twinning line be my favourite. What’s yours?
Iain G. Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry. And is loving the Welsh…
THAT’S how Su sees it…
Glee is genius – trash TV everyone can watch.
I commissioned a pitch for a youth campaign recently. One enterprising agency ran some focus groups and during the process, glee came up. I was truly astonished how many teenage boys grudgingly admitted to watching it (but only after the girls waxed lyrical of course, that’d be ‘gay’ otherwise), and how much love there was in the room for our American ‘teenage’ singing and dancing chums.
In my humble, it’s only ever at it’s best when one of two levers are being pulled furiously:
- Demented ‘teens’ singing their little lungs out
- The evil twisted genius of Su Sylvester on her missions of destruction
So, from one old hag to another, this is one for the gleeks.
Having just launced on Fox in the US, the new episode sees evil Su do a very faithful homage to Madonna’s Vogue. Thanks to Perez Hilton (as I couldn’t ruddy find it on Youtube), and roll on April 19th when glee returns to our UK tellybox on E4.
Iain G. Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry and is predicting multiple gleegasms will sweep the nation again post April 19th…
Hollywood or bust…
So, Hollywood is a closed shop. To make it there, you need wealth, incredible connections. Or both?
Well, maybe in days gone by.
Fede Alvarez’s decided to take a short cut. Harnessing the power of that phenomenon you may have heard something about (social media), he shot a little video, uploaded it onto YouTube, sat back, and waited to see what sort of response it’d get.
It helped him (a modest producer from Uruguay), get a seat at Hollywood’s top-table without the years of begging, lip service, crappy b-movies featuring those faded stars and talking dogs…
How I hear you cry?
He simply uploaded a short film to YouTube in November 2009, which came in a fraction under 5 minutes. And cost about $100 a minute. And people found it. They told their friends, who told theirs (etc. etc, repeat to fade). And it became a hit.
Pretty quickly, it got in front of some big studio types, and they began to tap him pretty swiftly…
His short film has that Hollywood-esque Will Smith / Independence Day / Earth be doomed’ness about it. Giant robots invading and destroying Montevideo, the capital of Uruguay.
Compared to Su-bo’s 120 million views, it’s racked up a somewhat modest 1.5 million views on YouTube. But, it’s helped him secure an offer of $30m (£18.6m) to make a Hollywood film.
Bargain.
Iain G. Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry. And loves the power going to the little guy…
Publicis Xmas debacle
Well, in true YouTube style, the Publicis Xmas card has had a few responses. This has probably been the funniest…
Iain G. Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry. And is sad this response didn’t come from Publicis (whose back-story was somewhat wooly).
Publicis
They really have churned out some great work in their time.
And, with Nigel Jones at the helm (bloody clever man, was lucky to see him in action in the Claydon Heeley glory days), they SHOULD be destined for greatness in the UK once more…
But, their Christmas card. Well, what can one say about this?
Would they (hand on heart) have recommended this to a client? I am sure what started of as a pointless bit of fun at an internal meeting may actually do them some harm. A senior industry suit told me ‘with ads like that, they could win the DFS account’.
Couldn’t have put it better myself…
It’s already started to rack up negative remarks on YouTube, and as we all know, once that little social snowball at the top of the hill starts rolling, it has the power to take out big guns, buildings (and possibly an exec or two), at the bottom of the hill when disaster strikes.
For a creative agency, this is a really poor Christmas effort.
Sorry Publicis, but I know you are capable of more. I would suggest coming back (very quickly), with something that blows us all out of the water. And please don’t do a Habitat and blame an intern…
Iain G. Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry. And wonders what Campaign will make of this monstrosity…
P.S. I do understand how hard agency Christmas cards are to do if they are to be ‘done properly’. But having seen Steve Harrison turn them (into yet another), award-winning opportunity, this just seems bone idle in comparison…
No animals were harmed in the making of this film…
Some things shouldn’t be funny.
But they are…
Iain Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry. And laughed so hard, well, you get the picture…
Chocolate anyone?
Balloon optional...
Now, I wasn’t keen on the TVC, but this is great piece of work from Cadbury, a home page take-over on MSN UK. Good online display ads are few and far between, but this one is a corker as its;
- Engaging, the playability factor is high (watch lots of people move their ‘brows, just like the ad)
- Technically brilliant, the simple web-cam synch is seamless (at the click of a button, the ad synchs to your webcam, allowing you to show us what you’re made of. If you’d rather, you can watch the kids ‘brows dance instead)
- Simple. The spot has been aped by people from all over (including Lilly Allen / Alan Carr of the Sunday night project, and a host of other celebs). Giving Joe Punter an official brand forum to do the same is a wise move.
Only downside?
Its a bit late, as people have been aping the spot for weeks.
Just spend 5 minutes on youtube and see how many you find. I appreciate Cadbury may have wanted to encourage a second outlet to engage with the brand after the initial wave of interest, but the gap between the TVC launching and this could have been a little shorter…
Still great work that utilises the power of the channel incredibly well.
Iain Morrison is a senior marketer in the British Tourism Industry. And is still sticking with Green and Blacks…
Chocolate anyone???
Well, the Cadbury / Fallon entertainment wagon rolls onto our screens (be that computer or TV), yet again.
Hot on the success of the outstanding gorilla and trucks TVC’s, we now have eyebrows. And I’m sorry to knock an ad I’m sure many of you love dearly, but I have this nagging feeling that the pressure is now on….
Cadbury are clearly loving the work /Fallon (their agency) are bringing them and I’d surmise after the gamble they all took on gorilla, Cadbury are willing to trust their agency and work very closely with them in order to get the best possible work out the door. An eye on the awards cabinet, as well as the engagement barometer…
Cadbury made it clear that if the job of advertising was to inform or to entertain; they were firmly opting for the latter. And what a storming start, gorilla and trucks were massive blog / YouTube hits (a useful and swift barometer when looking to chart the ripple effect), as I am sure eyebrows will be too.
But this one just has that slight nagging rumble of the difficult album; the one where the band just didn’t quite agree at every turn. The one where the really great riff that could have lifted the song to the number one spot for 8 weeks instead of 1 got slightly lost somewhere between the mixing desk and the coked up lead singers diva-ish hissy fits…
Don’t get me wrong, it’s far better than the vast majority of ads out there. But I’m just not quite sure this one lives up to the hype of its predecessors; this watercooler moment will be a lot more fleeting than those which came before…
The balloon is its saving grace. She rocks, we need MUCH more of her. In fact, I reckon she could carry an ad on her own next time (Fallon, feel free to give me a call).
Big things will be expected in the next chapter of the glass and a half full productions.
And I for one hope the next one is a stormer. With or without the balloon…
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