Simply good

Every once in a while I see an ad that makes me think I wish I'd done that.

This is one of those ads.

I came across it on Facebook of all places.

Click the pic for a better look.

Stuck for an idea?

I'm working on a brief at the moment and the ideas just aren't happening.

I've had a bit of a cold recently so my head isn't as clear as I'd like.

I seem to be suffering a bout of "can't be arsed" as well.

And today in Melbs the mercury is expected to top 38˚.

Maybe Alex Cornell's book will help me break my block.

Only problem is I can't afford to wait for the book to arrive as I need to present my ideas on Friday!

Truck size!

Just spotted this on Pinterest.

No idea who did it.

Nor how old it is.

But seriously what's not to love!

Done before

Essanay was an early film company best remembered for their work with Charlie Chaplin.

This is apparently their standard rejection note for budding scriptwriters.

Don't know about you but I reckon about 90% of films today would have had their scripts knocked back by Essanay.

As a creative director I find the list fascinating as I've often killed off ideas based on issues or concerns in the list.

Especially number 5.

Do something new

Empty the bottom drawer

I listened to a terrific BBC interview with Paul Weller this morning.

The second part of the show featured Paul taking questions from the studio audience.

One of the questions was about his work in progress, lyrics and song ideas.

As you can imagine he always carries a notebook and scribbles ideas down as they come to him.

What he said next took me completely by surprise - at the end of the year he tears up his notebooks and burns them.

This took the audience and presenter by surprise too.

Paul's theory is if he hasn't used an idea by the end of the year then it isn't worth pursuing.

He went on to say he's far more interested in coming up with new ideas than revisiting old ideas.

I love that. In fact I do the same thing myself.

I've never kept a 'bottom drawer' of failed or rejected concepts.

If an idea doesn't fly I bin it. Simple as that.

Many creative types don't do this though.

They hang on to failed concepts and try to resurrect them whenever they work on a new client or start a new job.

Personally I abhor this sort of thinking. But each to their own I suppose.

The new Earth Hour?

Remember Earth Hour?

Of course you do!

I don't remember us having an Earth Hour this year though. Do you?

Anyway this post isn't about Earth Hour. It's about what happened after the original Earth Hour.

I'm talking about bandwagon jumping ad agencies looking to piggyback off Earth Hour in the pursuit of award show glory.

I've lost count of the number of Earth Hour related campaigns I've seen over the years.

This year it seems creatives have jumped off the Earth Hour bandwagon and hopped aboard a new one - Movember.

Seems like every day I see or hear about another Movember idea or campaign.

Most of them are borrowed interest at best. And look suspiciously to me like they were created for no other reason than to enter in to award shows.

Call me cynical if you will. And over the years many people have. But Movember is far too important to use it for personal glory.

My name is...

I suspect this is a fake but I really hope it's not.

Wanker of the week

Correct me if I'm wrong but isn't Marc Jacobs a luxury brand?

Google vs Print

Depressing news for creative people everywhere last week with the announcement by Google that they make more money from advertising than the entire US print media.

That my friends is one hell of a lot of little blue links. And very little in the way of creative opportunity.

I wonder what Bernbach and Ogilvy would do if they knew their agency's very being was under threat from something as innocuous as a bloody Google ad?

Well I reckon they'd use their much vaunted creativity and find a way to tackle Google head on.

Whether today's creatives will do this remains to be seen.

But if the industry doesn't get its collective thinking cap on this this surely can only be seen as a very firmly hammered nail in the coffin of classic print advertising?

My favourite new ad

This is hands down the best ad on Aussie TV at the moment.

Best of all they even got Devo to re-record their original song.

If this don't make you smile in the next 30 seconds nothing will. 

Sometimes shit just happens

Winner of the unlucky ad placement of the week. No contest! 

Great way to waste time

I know what you're thinking - the internet is full of useless websites.

And you'd be 100% correct.

But sometimes it's great to just go and waste a bit of time.

So click here and go visit some truly useless websites.

Just don't do it during work hours! 

Advice from The Don

The things clients say

Clients. Jim Coudal put it best when he said he wanted to start an agency without clients.

If only it was that simple!

Much as they've driven me mad over the years I've had great relationships with many of my clients.

Hell my wife is a client.

Not my client obviously but a client none the less.

Now if there's one thing that drives us creative types crazy it's inane client comments.

Luckily these are generally delivered by agency suits. So they're the ones who bear the brunt of our scorn.

A group of creative people in Ireland decided to put their pent up client frustrations to good use by using inane feedback to create posters to raise money for the Temple Street Children's Hospital.

I've featured only four of the posters here but there are loads more.

To see them click here.

Content worth sharing

Unruly has just released a white paper looking at the automotive market and social video.

One of the key statistics in the paper is the disparity between auto makers when it comes to the production of quality content that's worth sharing.

And when it comes to online video everyone knows that sharing is the name of the game.

Unsurprisingly Volkswagen came out on top by a significant margin.

I think pretty much everyone I know has seen the VW Darth Vader spot but I have to say I was shocked to see VW accounts for a quarter of all automotive video shares.

What really took me by surprise though is that Ford produce almost four times as much online video as VW and yet they don't even make an appearance in the chart above.

Which I guess proves what I have always believed - that quality beats quantity.

High water mark for NY

With all the hoopla over Obama and the election the ongoing effects of Hurricane Sandy seem to have dropped off the radar a little.

But let me tell you folks there are still tonnes of people in and around the New York in distress.

If you'd like to help why not buy one of these very clever t-shirts by artist Sebastian Errazuriz.

A guaranteed 100% of profit goes to Hurricane Sandy relief programs.

The power of Twitter

Melbourne Cup advertising

My friends overseas find it hard to believe we get a public holiday for a horse race in Melbourne.

But we do. So there!

Anyway I was flicking through my morning paper yesterday hoping to come across a topical ad or two.

Sadly this was the only one I saw.

It's a full page colour ad for Carsguide. An online car sales website.

No idea what the point of this ad is. I really don't

Piss weak pun. Dozens of little coloured horses.

A complete waste of money.

Advertising - A venn diagram

via

Gaga and the power of data

One of the issues many fans of long established bands have with their heroes is their insistence on playing unpopular songs and new material in concert.

I remember seeing Lou Reed at the Albert Hall in London about ten or so years ago and his set was almost entirely based on his brand new album.

Definitely not a memorable gig that's for sure.

Good old Lady Gaga however is a little more switched on than Lou.

At least when it comes to recognising the importance of the people who made her famous.

Her fans.

She works with Spotify to see which of her songs are popular and uses this data to assemble her live performance set lists.

Brilliant idea don't you think?

Apparently she also looks at data from different locations which allows her to add and subtract songs for a particular location.

We hear a lot about the importance of data in marketing. But who knew that Lady Gaga would be better at using it than a lot of big name brands?

A great US election ad

Election day in America on Tuesday and campaign advertising for the week is expected to exceed a billion dollars.

A billion!

That's a shitload of money in a country struggling with unemployment, recession and the effects of Hurricane Sandy.

Sad thing is that billion was probably spent on utterly crap advertising.

Except perhaps for the money spent on the ad known as Stage.

Apparently it's only been shown in a handful of states.

So if you happen to be reading this in the US the chances are you may not have seen it.

Either way this is a very powerful ad. Sadly it's also based on fact.

Digital resignation

I've departed a couple of high profile agencies on less than amicable terms.

And as much as I like that resignation note I've generally resisted the temptation to set fire to a bridge or two.

Looking back I sometimes wish I had.

But seriously there's a lot of water gone under those un-burned bridges now.

Gotta admit that note did make me smile though.

When will they learn Pt.2

Yesterday's post about Gap and their Hurricane Sandy tweets was much discussed on twitter.

As a result someone sent me a screen grab of this American Apparel sale.

Probably seemed funny to someone at the time but with billions of dollars of damage and a lot of people killed they're probably wishing they hadn't done it now.

But they did.

Fingers crossed American Apparel will see the error of their ways and give a share of profits to disaster relief.