It all boils down to knowing your target audience.

Source: Oddee via 2Leep via @tom_siwik. I spend way too much time online.

hilo is an Emmy Award-winning creative production company representing a group of filmmakers led by directors Jose Gomez and Andre Stringer. Internationally known for creating original and commissioned work that is powerful, provocative and visually extraordinary, Shilo’s deeply held passions for design-infused storytelling and innovative application of live-action, design, and animation techniques deliver breakthrough experiences for screens large and small. From its studios in New York and La Jolla, California, where recent projects have spanned short films, commercials and music videos, Shilo has the capacity and experience to originate ideas and handle all aspects of production. A good example of their creativity is the spot “Piano” (see link & pics below). To have more information and get in touch with Jose & Andre do not hesitate to visit : www.shilo.tv

Title: AT&T “Piano”Length: :30 Debut Date: Nov. 23, 2009 Film Location: Studio D at Broadway Stages, Brooklyn, NY: www.broadway-stages.com Advertiser/Client: AT&T Wireless Advertising Agency: BBDO SVP, Creative Directors: Darren Wright, David Skinner Senior Art Director: Michael Bae Senior Copywriter: Ashton Rose Agency Producers: Becky Burkhard, Bob Emerson Senior Account Executive: Kitsy Fischer Director: Shilo Production Company: Shilo Creative Director: Andre Stringer Associate Creative Director: Cassidy Gearhart Lead CG Artist: Christopher Fung Director of Photography: Max Goldman 3D Lighter: Craig Kohlmeyer, Christopher Fung 3D Modeling: Youngmin Kim 3D Previs: Richard Cayton Compositing: Dorian West, Christopher Fung, Cassidy Gearhart, Shiouwen Hong, Helen Kim 2D Animation: Shiouwen Hong 3D Tracking: Eric Epstein, Matt Broeska, Emily Meger Roto: Jihyae Ham, Adriana Vallejo Editors: Nate Caswell, Cassidy Gearhart Line Producer: Chris Palladino Production Coordinator: Damon Smith Production Manager: Rob Smyth Executive Producer: Tracy Chandler Post Producer: Amy Fahl Sound Design & Music Company: Mophonics Final Mix Company: Sonic Union Mixer: Mike Marinelli Talent: Kwan Yi

See video at : http://www.vimeo.com/7967340

On the surface, YouTube appears to be a rather simple social media tool. It’s free, it’s easy and – from the many viral success stories that have emerged – it seems like all you need to do is post a video and wait for the masses to come a-runnin’! Of course, if you’re a marketer, all these new eye-balls will translate into instant sales and your investment of $0 will turn into millions!

Far be it from me to suggest that this strategy could never work. This is the internet – anything’s possible! I would, however, suggest that this is likely the exception to the rule.

A good example of this kind of strategy is Blendtec’s “Will It Blend?” series. A marketer (Blendtec) decides to use social media (YouTube) to promote its product (a blender) and the videos on the channel have been viewed millions of times, resulting in an increase in sales and a level of promotion not normally seen in the blender business!

Easy right? No fuss, no muss!!

Ok, in this case, it does seem to have happened rather effortlessly, but the key here is content. Blending objects like hockey pucks, oysters and an iPhone is a unique concept (though inspired by Saturday Night Live) and one that was able to draw attention. But what made it profitable was its ability to hold attention. Had it just been one video of an object being blended, it would have quickly faded, but Blendtec was ready to blend more.

So, how to emulate this success? I’m a firm believer that it all starts with content. If you have something interesting to share – whatever it might be – you have a greater likelihood of attracting attention. Just because you have a solid brand, or a loyal customer base, or double-digital increases in sales year-over-year, doesn’t mean that anyone will care about the videos that you post on YouTube. I doubt very much that Blendtec had a rabid audience or a highly recognizable brand before “Will It Blend?”, but because they created interesting content, their idea – and their brand – caught on.

Let’s take that a step further. I recently encountered two prime candidates for YouTube exploration. One is big, the other is small. One has been around over a decade, the other is still in its infancy. One has a highly recognizable brand, the other does not. You see where I’m going… In both cases they were looking to engage their audience on a new level and offer them content that would be helpful.

The first company, we’ll call them Mr. Big – now where have I heard that before? No matter – decided to put the time and effort into a dedicated YouTube Channel with all the bells and whistles. For the content, though, they decided to go with years-old infomercial-style clips that had previously been run on a different medium. So they now have a beautiful platform with content that leaves more than a little to be desired. Now certainly there is room to develop new content, but as in life so too in YouTube: you only get one chance to make a first impression. They need to grab the audience from the first viewing and give them a reason to come back for more, (think blending marbles) and the educational-type clips they’ve got going are not going to create much of a buzz.

So how about company number two? Since we have nothing but positive things to say about them, we’ll call them TalentEgg, as that is what they’re called. TalentEgg is a very impressive little company that seems on the cusp of greatness. Their founder, Lauren Friese is a bundle of energy and brains who seems like the kind of person you probably want to get to know today!

TalentEgg is a career site that focuses on careers for students and new grads and is fast becoming the go-to place for Gen-Y recruiting. They’ve currently got a toe in the waters of social media, but are keen to jump in. They have yet to build a YouTube strategy, but I have a few ideas that I think could work.

They could very easily go in the direction of Mr. Big. Put together some informative videos that highlight the strengths of the company and the underlying services, but who’s going to watch that?? Not me! As they’re targeting a younger audience, I would make it character based. Give the audience one character to keep coming back to. That character absolutely needs to be talking about things the TalentEgg does, but more in the way that Blendtec did. Lucky for TalentEgg they have a ready-made character all ready to go in Lauren. She’s already the face of the company so why not put her out there and make her even more recognizable? This could also be a useful tool for Lauren as a popular web-series could be spun-off into a number of different business ventures.

As for what specifically I think Lauren should be doing in this series, I’m not quite ready to divulge. If they’re reading this and are interested in this venture, I would be happy to sit down anytime and discuss all this in more detail.

And to be clear, I’m not suggesting that this video series – or any other for that matter – needs to be big and splashy and over the top. I think there is lots of room for videos like that, but there is also room for well-written, informative videos that are helpful to your audience. The key here is that the material is fresh and thoughtful. Remember, for every “Will It Blend?”, there are 1000 ”Something New Is Hatching”!

11th Floor Creative Group has been recognized for creative excellence by the 30th Annual Telly Awards.  The award is for a documentary short that chronicles the work of the Marine Mammal Stranding Center in Brigantine NJ, as they rescue, rehabilitate and release seals that are sick or injured. 11th Floor Creative Group filmed in and around the Stranding Center facility and traveled to Rhode Island to film the release of three rehabilitated seals.

The documentary short was produced for The Aquatic Experience at The Pier Shops at Caesars. It can be viewed at The Pier Shops, on The Boardwalk Level near the fountain and at  www.11floor.com.

The say, “write what you know”. While I’m sure I’m not the first, I tend to agree. On the surface – of course – this seems quite obvious as writing about something you know nothing about would be a tremendously difficult task. But as with any great pearl of wisdom, the true meaning is tucked away.

For me, “what you know” is not necessarily what you know, but rather what you feel and who you are. To me, if you’re not writing – or less specifically, creating – “what you know”, then you don’t stand a chance of creating anything of great meaning. It is from this “what you know” that great art is spawned and that unique voices are born.

And it doesn’t matter what you’re creating: music, sculpture, dance, math and advertising all require that unique voice to be heard. What sets the masters apart in any of these fields is that at one point it was like they were speaking their own language.

Sometime in the ’60s, (I say sometimes because it’s nearly impossible to get exact times with this guy, but I digress) Jim Morrison wrote:

I wanna tell you about Texas Radio and the Big Beat
Soft-driven, slow and mad, like some new language

These words have stuck with me since I first heard the songs, but it wasn’t until I read Ignore Everybody, by Hugh MacLeod, that I really found the right context for them. One of the many topics that MacLeod explores in this brilliant book is the idea of a new a language from the point of view of the young artist, creating, without pressure or expectation, and establishing “a new language that other people could also speak to the world with”.

What Morrison is describing is a feeling that I’m sure most of us have experienced. That feeling when you hear a song for the first time and something about it stops you in your tracks. It’s happened to me countless times, but one of the most vivid was hearing Kurt Cobain perform “Where Did You Sleep Last Night?” on Nirvana’s Unplugged record (see below for the clip). It was a tape at the time, so I had to stop and rewind again and again because I couldn’t get enough. There was intensity and pain in his voice that I’d never before encountered. His somewhat-flawed vocals spoke to me and yet I couldn’t really understand them. It was truly like as if he was speaking a different language.

And in a sense, he was. Like him or not, Cobain changed the way the language of music is spoken. Just like Lennon & McCartney and many others did before him. And the way the Simpsons writers changed comedy, the Google guys chaged search algortihms and Lee Clow changed advertising.

They didn’t, necessarily, do it by being better than their competition. They did it by writing what they knew in a language that was all their own, but would soon become the language that the audience – and the world – spoke with them.

Please, take the time to check out this clip of Nirvana’s performance, as you can watch the transformation occur in Cobain. Pay close attention at around 4:46. It’s as if he slips out of the trance for a second. When he opens his eyes, either he’s looking at your soul or you’re seeing his. Either way it’s a very intense moment.

Click Away

Filmkveld med verdens fineste kusine i kveld. Hun er på vei. hurra!

Mens jeg venter nørder jeg med reklameboka mi.Den bærer navnet “Creative Advertising” og er kjempefin, selv om jeg har lest den 1000 ganger før.

Greit å titte i slikt for litt inspirasjon, for i disse dager sitter jeg en del med portfolion min. Hadde vært deilig å fullført den før det nye året starter, for da kan det nye året bli HELT nytt liksom.

Synes det er mye bedre med “før året slutter” løfter enn nyttårsløfter…Skjønner???

Since its birth, Coyaba has been the little-store-that-could. With constant growth and a die-hard customer base, could little Coyaba go social media? – And would it need to?

Coyaba’s biggest strength in its first 5 years in business was its culture. Customers feel at home in the store and have got to know the owners and staff on a first-name basis. This has led customers to bring family and refer friends and allowed Coyaba to grow significantly without a massive marketing budget.

In many ways, it feels like Coyaba and social media would be a terrific fit: a small, loyal customer base that trusts the business and the owners and is happy to talk up the brand. With a manageable audience like this one, there are number of social media tools that would work well. But the first step to any successful venture into social media is knowing your audience. There are two main things that Coyaba will need to learn about their customers: 1) where they are online, and 2) what they’re doing online.

How their customers behave offline could be entirely different from how they behave online, so before they go anywhere, they need to dig into a little research! It may well turn out that after asking some questions and doing a little probing that what they’ll uncover is an audience that is not yet ready for social media. This is not necessarily a bad thing. What would be a bad thing is barreling into a new social media venture, without first asking these questions, only to discover that you’ve created a lovely network with no one in it!

As I like to say: If a tweet falls in the forest…

(Ok, I just Googled that and it turns out I can no longer say “as I like to say…”. So my apologies to all those who wrote it before me, but I’m not taking it back this time as I still think I’m clever!)

Now, where was I? Oh right, building a network of one…

Asking questions should not be difficult for Coyaba as they have a key tool that no small-business should be without: a mailing list. Coyaba’s email list numbers in the thousands and they use it regularly (but not too regularly) to keep in touch with their customers. The large list combined with the personal connection between business and customer should mean a higher than normal response-rate to the survey, which will hopefully provide the most accurate data.

Now that we know how to ask them, we need to determine what to ask them. Ultimately, what Coyaba needs to learn is what online category/categories their customers fit in to. Do they use the web to create (blogs, videos, photo galleries…) or to observe (read blogs, watch videos…)? Do they share knowledge (post product reviews) or gather knowledge (read reviews and forums)? Are they members of social networks (Facebook, Twitter…) and, if so, how do they use them? There is, of course, a very big difference between a Facebook member who checks in now and then to see new photos of their grand-kids and a Facebook member who logs-in multiple times a day to post links to their status updates and maintain the various Group pages that they run. As I’m sure you can see, the questions must be quite intricate in order to uncover the real answers.

The plan with Coyaba is to construct and administer this survey in January – after the Christmas rush. Once this has been accomplished, I will post an update on the data that was uncovered.

Then the fun part… what to do with all this new knowledge!! I’m hoping that we discover an eager online audience so that there’s something to build on, but I’m a little nervous as Coyaba’s greatest marketing successes thus far have come from Radio and Newspaper advertising! This leads me to believe that we’re dealing with an older audience that may not be ready for this kind of campaign, but I’m really hoping I’m wrong!

I was recently asked to define luxury. It was in relation to the luxury automobile-maker, Infiniti.

My answer was centred around price and the belief that with luxury-price came luxury-goods.

What I left out was the idea of exclusivity. There is no doubt that exclusivity is a key component to luxury and one that will certainly be in my answer should this question ever be posed again!

But not simply as luxury = exclusivity, as I don’t agree that the equation is as simple as that, as exclusivity has changed. I would argue that with the world moving to digital, exclusivity does not necessarily mean that a product is in limited supply, or that it is reserved for a few.

Two examples of this are MINI and the iPhone.

MINI

MINI has worked very hard through their messaging to make MINI owners feel a part of a club. From inviting MINI owners to a special premiere of the 2003 remake of The Italian Job, to their use of RFID-activated billboards to allow MINI drivers to customize billboards as they drove past.

MINI – though made by BMW – is not a luxury brand, and yet they have found a way to incorporate exclusivity. Apple’s iPhone, I feel, is very similar.

iPhone

The iPhone is far from exclusive in the traditional sense of the word. With unit sales in the millions, and growing, it could potentially become to most popular smartphone on the planet. Like MINI, the iPhone’s exclusivity rests on marketing, but also on its’ App Store.

The App Store is home to over 100,000 applications that are – in many cases – exclusive (there’s that word again!) to the iPhone. This means that when you see those clever “There’s an App for that” Ads on TV, if you don’t have one, you can’t get them.

But this is only one way that Apple uses its’ advertising to create the feeling of exclusivity. The other way is by creating ads that people love and look forward to (It’s not just me, right??). The ads are the kind of thing that people want to share with one another, which strengthens the feeling of the club.

So that’s my thinking on the subject. But let’s assume for a minute that luxury does in fact equal exculsivity. Here’s what lead me down this path to begin with:

If luxury means exclusivity
And exclusivity is finite
Can Infiniti be luxurious?

Company: Indie Pool
Location: Toronto, Canada
Employees: 10
About: A slim business model that’s built for growth, a culture that defies description and an Owner/President with the kind of charisma and magnetism that most business leaders would kill for!
Problem: In its 10+ years in business, Indie Pool has always flown beneath the radar. Indie Pool services independent Canadian musicians, so with such a niche market, traditional marketing and advertising don’t really hit the mark, so outside the box thinking is required.
Brief: Without the use of traditional media, create exposure for the Indie Pool brand and organically promote the company’s unique culture.

Here’s what I have in mind…

What distinguishes Indie Pool from any other company in the world is its culture. That’s not to say that other companies don’t have as “good” a culture, but Indie Pool’s culture is so unique, and matches its customer-base so well, that to not expose it seems to me a terrible waste.

A few examples…

1) Christmas Parties:
- The annual Christmas party normally enters the planning phases in late-Spring. The plans are over-the-top and no expense is ever spared. One year, it was an overnight trip to Niagara Falls for some company-sponsored gambling. The next it was two nights in Blue Mountain for skiing and Rock Band back at the chalet. In all cases, ridiculousness ensued.

2) In-Office Wagers
- From the banal (whether the latest Killers record will outsell the last) to the insane (whether or not an employee can eat an entire 5lb. chocolate cake in one sitting), the office wagers are the stuff of legend and the stories live on for years.

3) Killer Boss:
- The President is the kind of boss that every employee wishes they had and that every boss wishes they were. Fun, caring, passionate, driven and extremely knowledgeable about his business and the industry.

Part of what makes the culture of Indie Pool so fun and unique is that it exists in its own space, unspoiled by the outside world. So exposing it can be a dangerous thing, but I feel that if done properly and with the right goal in mind, it will only help the culture and the business. This is not a “push” campaign. We will simply be recording what’s already happening and sharing it with the audience.

To make this work, we will need to employ four social media channels: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and a Blog. The company’s corporate site will remain untouched, save for adding a few links to the new channels.

FACEBOOK

Facebook will be used as the home of Indie Pool’s social activity. Photo galleries and info on the staff with be here along with info on the company itself.

This will also be the hub for communication back from the audience. Messages and Wall Posts will be monitored by a staffer to ensure a constant stream of communication.

Here the audience will also be able to link off to the other channels.

TWITTER

Twitter will be used as Indie Pool’s broadcast medium. Whether a new YouTube clip has been posted or a new blog post has gone up, this is where the news will be found. We will also install the Facebook-Twitter App so all Tweets will automatically update the Facebook status.

The Twitter feed will also be used to share little tid-bits of information throughout the course of the day. Could be to let the followers know that a cake-eating contest is coming up, or that they’re trying to decide on a Christmas party theme and are looking for suggestions.

YOUTUBE

With such a wide-range of wild activities always on the go, capturing some of these moments and sharing them with the audience could be a very valuable tool.

Again, the clips could be a simple discussion within the office, or a video from a dog sledding excursion (this clip actually exists!).

BLOG

The company blog will be run entirely by the President. Aside from being knowledgeable and charismatic, he’s also a terrific writer, so having him share thoughts and ideas with the audience will be tremendously valuable.

While the blog will certainly share the company’s sense of humour, I envision this being a more serious channel. A resource for the customer base.

Tied-in with the Twitter feed, this could be a terrific way to replace/enhance the company’s standard email marketing campaigns.

By having the Facebook page direct the audience to the Twitter feed, which promotes the latest YouTube clip, a sphere is created where the audience can truly become immersed in the brand. And as all of the content provided will be real and genuine, they will feel that they are a part of this very special team.


As the audience will be made up primarily of Indie Pool’s clients – independent musicians – this is a terrific way to engage them and build brand loyalty. The independent music scene in Canada is like a club. The staff at Indie Pool is also very much like a club. Demonstrating this to their clients and giving them another place to feel “part of the club” will be extremely rewarding for all.

As I mentioned earlier, Indie Pool has been sheltered, but this sheltering was done intentionally and with good reason. When Indie Pool began in the late ’90s, the “clubhouse” for an indie band was a basement apartment or rehearsal space. Today, indie bands live online. Of course, they still jam in the same rehearsal spaces, but their worlds exist in social media and they expect the same from the companies they do business with. It is for this reason that I feel it is time for Indie Pool to move into this space and not only join their audience, but also to show these artists how to properly use social media to better their own marketing plans.

Like many, I am a big BlackBerry fan. I started simply with a 7250 that let me keep up with client emails, but have now graduated to a state of constant connection with a never-ending stream of content flowing to and from my hip!

I’ve currently got a Curve, but am very intrigued by the arrival of the Storm II.

The Storm II will, of course, be in direct competition with the iPhone and others, so rather than try and out-tech these devices, I thought the spots should be fun and playful. This would help the Storm II differentiate itself not only from the competitions’ smartphones, but also from other BlackBerries.

Here’s an idea for a TV spot that plays on the current H1N1 fears while also positioning the Storm II at the top of the touch-screen, smartphone ladder.

————————————-

Our world is changing, and even the most basic human contact is being frowned upon…



Business contacts have come to expect fist-bumps, while close friends are not as close as they once were…

The Bettter Way To Touch.

Think Yes goes negative!?!

The Shock! The Horror!

But to be fair, attack-ads are ads too! And what would a political campaign be without them??

This ad is Toronto-specific, so my apologies if you’re not in the centre of the universe… 

I envision this ad being run similar to an attack-ad in a political campaign, but in this case coming from the people rather than from a political party. Why can’t a group of citizens get together to push out a political figure??

To give you a bit of background, our transit system is called the TTC (Toronto Transit Commission), and it is run by a young man by the name of Adam Giambrone.

Adam is a nice enough guy and seems to have his heart in the right place, but as far as I can tell has absolutely no relevant experience to be running the largest public transit system in Canada.

They’re looking at 60-something-million-dollar deficit this year and have decided that a double-digit percent fare increase is the way to go. Without boring you with all the details, let’s just say I disagree. And nothing personal against Adam, I just think his talents would be better suited to a different profession.

To help with that, I present GiamBrownie…

Oh, in case you missed it a few years back, Mike Brown was the head of FEMA when Katrina hit New Orleans. He was appointed to that position by then President Bush Jr. and the only experience anyone could find in his background was his top-notch work as a judge with the International Arabian Horse Association.

Well, we all know how that ended…

One of my favourite cars on the road today is the Nissan Cube. I’m really not much of a car guy, but there’s something about this “mobile device” that’s always grabbed my attention.

Artist: Nele Azevedo

Ice sculptures in the shape of humans are placed on the steps of the music hall in Gendarmenmarkt public square in Berlin September 2, 2009. Hosted by the German World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), 1,000 ice sculptures were positioned on the steps in the German capital at noon, to highlight climate change in the arctic region.

]]> http://themeaningofnight.wordpress.com/2009/10/14/rolighetsteorin-se-the-fun-theory/ Wed, 14 Oct 2009 22:25:43 +0000 bmbroggie http://themeaningofnight.wordpress.com/2009/10/14/rolighetsteorin-se-the-fun-theory/

We believe that the easiest way to change people’s behaviour for the better is by making it fun to do. We call it The fun theory. http://www.rolighetsteorin.se/

Advertising Agency: Tribal DDB, Stockholm, Sweden
Creative Director: Andreas Dahlqvist
Art Director: Simon Higby
Copywriter: Martin Lundgren
Account director: Martin Larsson
Planner: Jerker Fagerström
Web Director: Simon Mogren
Web Producer: Pontus Kindblad
Web Producer: Daniel Alinder
Web Designer: Karl-Johan Vogelius
Film Production Company: Birth

I have been struggling to write something these past 48 hours but nothing doing! I don’t know why. It feels like starting with so many headlines and topics! But as soon as I commit pen to paper whatever I wanted to write about just fizzles out. So I got to thinking! I need to be a bit more creative. Sometimes the best posts come by when you are least expecting the sort of stuff you end up writing about and publishing. I reckon the best approach is to start writing, whatever comes to mind. Perhaps look through your collection of photos – remember there’s a story behind every photo! Dig deep into stuff you’ve done, places you’ve visited, events you’ve atttended, food etc.  So hey, I am going to practice what I preach. This post is about the arrangement of mugs I saw at a Garfunkels restaurant recently. This experience helped me overcome my momentary writers’ block.

The light through the gaps in this mug arrangement. Amazing!

I was most impressed by the many displays of mug arrangements around the restaurant. I have been to many restaurants but none as keen on in-house advertising as this Garfunkels restaurant in Central London. I have never seen anything like it! It seems to me by these mug displays that Garfunkels is not taking its business for granted nor its customers.

This creative line-up was my idea...hmm...different...

I also think that the mug displays do not only serve as Garfunkels advertising but also serves souvenir seekers with discerning tastes in food, service and ambience. Yes, the creative mug arrangements and displays add to the ambience of the place. Well, I left the restaurant not only satisfied with the fare, service and cost but also the ambience.

A beautiful castle of mugs...

I heard somewhere that often times the customer pays for the ambience more than the food, service etc. In the case of Garfunkels, the one I went to on this particular evening, it had it all!

The great friendly service, the great food enjoyed – most delicious, the cost, the ambience and of course the amazing mug arrangements that were pleasing to the eye, were a great ending to a wonderful Sunday with my family.

What more can a woman ask for? Quite right! what more could I have asked for.

Driving home that night, I looked back on the day and decided that having dinner at Garfunkels that night was a great decision. A fantabulous time was had by all.

Close up of the line up...garrrreat!

That’s a pretty cute headline I saw in the lobby at my local Bank of America the other day. “Buy Pizza, Get Dough.” Get it? Don’t worry, not many other people do, either.

Tabletop poster with flier, at a Bank of America branch

It made me think of some less cute headlines that have been in the news lately:

• BofA to Get $20B More From TARP, Plus Backstop on $118B
• TARP Will Likely Be A Money Loser For Taxpayers: Fortune
• Bank of America Gives Bailout Money to ACORN
• CEO Lewis Under Fire As Bank of America Probe Grows Personal

Is it too much to ask BofA to be less jovial about their schemes to stockpile more of our money — especially when they’re back-dooring fee increases on things like safe-deposit boxes and giving Merrill Lynch executives huge bonuses?

A few BofA headlines I’d like to see…

• “We got $138 billion in bailout funds. You get .05% interest on your savings.”
• “We used your bailout ‘dough’ to buy Merrill Lynch!”
• “Home loans now available for just a silly little percentage point above the national average!”
• “Talk with one of our ‘vice-presidents‘ today — none of whom makes 1/100th of what our CEO makes!”
• “Use your BofA debit card to buy more pizza — we’ll reward you with peanuts!”
• “For just $15 a month, we’ll let you bank here!”
• “According to RateItAll.com, we satisfy 3 out of 10 customers!”
• “We handle deposits — but not complaints!”
• “May as well read some of our promotional material. You’ll be waiting in line for quite a while.

Maybe you can recommend a line or two?

When working with photoshop…It’s important to first design things on paper.

Here’s my process…

Come up with 10 ideas…

Then turn 4-5 of them into pencil drawings.

Then present the mock-ups to your clients (explaining that they are simply drawings and the photoshop rendering will be 10 X’s more effective (hopefully).

Execute 1.

Ask everyone around you for their input.  Ask people how it would look better.  Then, decide if you think they are right or if your original idea standing as is will work better.

Akad Nikah Kamal & Amy
August 13, 2009
Jabatan Agama Islam Sarawak, Jalan Satok, Kuching

“+6 086 311840

or

No. 45, Lot 3331, 1st Floor
ParkCity Commerce Square
Jalan Tun Ahmad Zaidi
97000 Bintulu, Sarawak”

You are just driving along and suddenly your kid in the back seat cries out, “Look, a BIG balloon!”  You look up and the teacher in you absently corrects the child, “No, dear, that’s a blimp.”  Then you pause and the next thought that crosses your mind is, “I wonder what that’s all about…”  To satisfy that curiosity, you look up and try to find the words that would put an end to the mystery…. Aha!  It’s an advertisement for ….

That’s a typical reaction when there are blimps in the sky or for that matter, when there are inflatables in the sky or even on the ground.  These are not only eye catching but arouses the curiosity.  Both very necessary in the world of advertising.

USA Blimp has it all in terms of eye catching inflatables.  Choose from blimps, balloons, spheres, dancers, animals, sports, tents, holidays, costumes and patriotic inflatables to advertise your event or business.

The increased visibility will make your location more noticeable and increase the odds of stopping and shopping as potential customers drive by.

We’re new around here. So new we haven’t had time to get our agency site together just yet, so keep an eye out over the next few days and we’ll post some stuff up here that will show you just what we’re capable of.

In the meantime if you want to know more please contact Kate Emery on 07877025966.

Thanks. More later…

One of the benefits of getting acquainted with new randoms is uncovering gems like these:

1. Petronas Chinese New Year 2002 by Yasmin Ahmad

I’m not proficient enough in the Hokkien dialect to attempt a blow-by-blow account of the dialogue, but a synopsis of the script would be -

Old ladies are sitting around a table talking about their kids’ achievements: doctor, lawyer, the works. Through it all, one lady is conspicuous by her silence. How about your son, they probe. Her face lights up as she tells them her son is coming to pick her up, and insists on bringing her everywhere he goes. He pulls up with his family in a car and tells his mother they’re going to Cameron Highlands together. Her grandchildren in the backseat beam excitedly at grandma as she hops on board and waves to the mates she’s leaving behind.

The camera zooms out to show the other ladies looking on wistfully, mindful that they will be spending Chinese New Year without the offspring they are so proud of.

So real, so poignant. The switch from palpable pride to barely suppressed jealousy is masterfully expressed.

Watching the ad a second time, I can’t help wondering why I didn’t notice the first time round that the ladies were describing something painfully distant.

Enough’s been said about Yasmin Ahmad and her work, so I’ll leave it at that.

2. Scotts emulsion TVC by Lim Sau Hoong

Here’s an ad I grew up with, based countless jokes on, and still remember. It’s no exaggeration to say it’s also one of the early influences, way before the internet entered our vernacular, that shaped my career choice.