… in a good way that is.
Somehow this emphasize the stuff that we seem to forget in this digital age … the art of learning a craft, the beauty of not choosing the easiest way. Everything about this little video is just. Well … genuine!
And at the same time it is a very obvious piece of advertising for Stella Artois. Yes I admit it … I spent 12 minutes looking at a Stella Artois mural. But who cares when advertising is this beautiful!
If you’ve read my blog before you know that I have been pointing fingers at the record industry for a while.
Last night I ran into this clip of Jeff Jarvis:
And it was kind of an eye opener to me. He actually somewhat said some of the same things that I have said before (which could mean that I have a point) but his words just kind of made the whole problem crystal clear to me.
The businesses that are currently struggling are the ones that are desperately trying to keep their media of distribution. Again – distribution is the key word here, because that is the one thing the internet can do better than any distribution network or channel have been able to before – it gives every single person the ability to chose exactly what he wants, when he wants it and in what form.
As I have previously mentioned Record companies are struggling because they still see themselves as “record distributors” – they have been, and still are, focused on the media of distributing the music. But the actual product that they are selling is not records. It is music, and if people want that as an MP3 or on their cell phone, that shouldn’t really matter. But if you focus all effort on maintaining music on cds because that is what used to make you money, then you will fail miserably.
Newspapers are struggling because they still see themselves as “papers” – they have been, and still are, focused on the media of distributing the news. But the actual product that they are selling is not paper. It is journalism, and if people want that in an RSS feed or on their cell phone, that shouldn’t really matter. But if you focus all effort on maintaining news on paper because that is what used to make you money, then you will fail miserably.
Advertising agencies are struggling because they still see themselves as “advertisers” – they have been, and still are, focused on the media they reach consumers by. But the actual product that they are selling is not advertising. It is telling companies how to best reach their customers, and if people want to be reached on blogs or on twitter, that shouldn’t really matter. But if you focus all effort on maintaining talking to your customers through advertising because that is what used to make you money, then you will fail miserably.
The list is long but you catch the drift.
As everybody now know, Microsoft paid Seinfeld an alleged 10 mio. dollars to appear in a series of commercials for them. There have been a massive outcry all over the blog-world and in main-stream media alike. Everybody is talking about how bad these commercials are, and how wrong Microsoft are for choosing Seinfeld to represent them.Here are just a few samples of the responses:
And Vanity Fair even had seven advertising professionals give their view on the campaign
Now it seems like they have decided to stop the Seinfeld commercials because of the bad responses.
Yes. I said “it seems” because I believe this has been the plan all along.
I am willing to bet that this massive negative reaction, and all the people saying “i told you MS are old and out of touch” is EXACTLY what Microsoft and Crispin+Porter have been aiming at all the time.
One of the hardest things in advertising is getting people to care about what you tell them. But now they have the full attention of everybody – Windows and Mac users alike.
First they have affirmed the old myth about Microsoft being older and less fun than Mac while getting an amazing amount of attention. And now they open up the second part of the campaign showing people that in fact Microsoft is not Jerry Springer and Bill Gates trying to “get in touch with ordinary people” – in fact PCs are used by all kinds of smart, trendy and young people and thus are very much in touch with everything.
It will be interesting to see what happens on this.
The Vacationeers have made this series of four five short films featuring Google products. Now I can’t really figure out if Google somehow has anything to do with these films (other than being featured in them) – it doesn’t seem like it though. But what is interesting about all this is that each of the four films show one of Googles services in action, explaining how it works, while being entertaining. The first video was put on youtube in january and has almost 2,000,000 views on Youtube alone.
Check them here:
I think this goes to show that a video explaining a somewhat complex service or feature do not have to be boring or technical. The production cost on these videos can’t have been high, but that doesn’t really matter. What matters is that after watching these four videos I bet even my mom could explain what all four five google services do.
Rats can smell if they are genetically compatable with a potential partner. This way they can simply sniff out a rat that will result in deformed offspring and avoid mating – making sure the rat race is always healthy.
Now a Swiss dating firm use genetic profiling in order to match the right people. So now you will not only both have to be equally interested in bird call recognition and salsa but you will be sure that your children will be strong and genetically sound.
I am tired of people (mostly old fashioned advertising people) who believe that they are making “viral marketing” by putting a TVC online.
Yes there have been good examples of a TVC – or at least a short video – making a big viral impact. The two that I have top of mind is the Quiksilver Dynamite surfing and the Nike Football video with Ronaldinho. They made a huge impact, no doubt about that.
But the success of these two videos unfortunately gave many of the people in the advertising business struggling to understand this new media a fake revelation.
Heureka! You make a short video and just put it online, and it is “viral”. But there are (at least) two fundamental flaws to this thinking:
I am not against video – just to prove my point I think Nike’s new “Take it to the next level” video is extremely cool, and it is making it viral big time right now.
The problem is that the term “viral” is being abused. You can put a video online, but if nobody watch it, it is not viral. On the other hand, if 2 million people come and look at your animated gif because a friend sent them the link, your animated gif is certainly viral.
* How many hits does it take before you have gone viral? I do not know if there is a specific point when something has gone viral. Per definition if one person receives something and sends it on to just two more people it could be argued that it is viral. But here I am talking about the term viral in a “massive spread across the web” sense.
Recent Comments