Imagine it’s a Monday night and you’re sat on the sofa watching Coronation Street. Roy Cropper is cooking up 2 Walls sausages on Warburton’s bread with a dollop of Heinz ketchup for Steve McDonald. Normally we wouldn’t know which brands Roy uses in his cafe, nor see any brands at all on the street – except for fake ones like Newton & Ridley ale in the Rovers Returns! But this could soon be the future of your favourite soap thanks to the new ruling by the Government to allow product placement on UK television.
Product placement is a form of advertising that uses branded products or services placed in a context devoid of adverts – like a TV programme or a film. Previously the government had always denied commercial broadcasters the ability to take payment in return for placing products on screen; however earlier this year Culture Secretary Ben Bradshaw announced that the Government would be allowing it for the first time in television programmes.
So imagine this. You’ve been tasked by a major TV Network to promote an animated series with a guerrilla marketing campaign. Your idea is a winner, and involves you sending some electronic devices (that resemble a character from the Aqua Teen Hunger Force) to several major cities so that some hired help can place them in places that have a high footfall.
Then you wake up on the morning of day one of your campaign to hear that a member of the public has spotted one of your devices and thought it weird enough to report it to the police. The police then call the bomb squad asking for help in identifying a device. They then shut down part of a major highway and the public transportation system while they disable what they think is a bomb with a smaller explosive filled with water.
A very talented retoucher by the name of Dan Watkins introduced me to TED last year and ever since I have been a massive fan. Over the weekend I got a chance to catch up on my TEDGlobal 2010 viewing. The highlight so far has to be this talk from British author Matt Ridley entitled ‘When ideas have sex’.
In the talk Matt Ridley shows how, throughout history, the engine of human progress has been the meeting and mating of ideas to make new ideas. It’s not important how clever individuals are, he says; what really matters is how smart the collective brain is.
Click the ‘read more’ button below to watch his talk.
I’ll admit it to you all… I love Star Wars. And I’d love to have the powers of a Jedi. If I did, I’d use my Jedi mind-trick powers to stop unwanted ad clicks. Or better, I’d use my mind-tricks on an imperial storm trooper and get him to tell people to move along.
Ah well a man can dream… a man can dream.
Google does have a few tools, however, that we can use to help us direct our PPC ads at the people we want to see them and hopefully by-pass the ‘looky loo’s’, saving us money and improving our return on investment.
Have you heard of Direct Mail packs receiving multiple bids on ebay? I hadn’t either until I searched for ‘Rapha’ on ebay a few weeks ago. Rapha produce super stylish, retro tinged clothing for the road cyclist and is quite an aspirational brand for me. In fact completely aspirational as I don’t own a single piece of their clothing yet! The direct mail pack that was subject to intense bidding on ebay was a simple 16-page leaflet with ravishing full bleed black and white photography, no prices and few words except for the web address and a list of products. It sold for an incredible £8.50. Extraordinary customer behavior by any brand’s standards I think, let alone one that only launched in 2004 with one core product; a super expensive softshell jacket. Did I bid for the DM pack? Of course not. I already had a copy of my own stashed safely away.
We have been producing a monthly e-newsletter for our home shopping client Freemans for a few years and it’s called the “Style Bible”. The purpose of the newsletter is to position the brand as a fashion expert and to give the customer value added content in the form of videos and advice. It also needs to look different to the rest of the email plan (whilst retaining Freemans branding) so that a customer recognises it and looks forward to receiving it. At the beginning of the year we decided to revisit these aims and decided it was time for a re-design.
I was delighted to be put in charge of this and have really enjoyed the challenge. We have updated the look of the newsletter to make it look fresher and feel more like an editorial magazine. Each month I work with both Freemans and the Red C studio to produce a Style Bible that is jam-packed with news about the latest fashion trends and bodyshape advice. Getting under the skin of the customer is important when it comes to briefing and as someone who is interested in fashion; it’s definitely enjoyable because I get to research the latest looks and trends!
Google Analytics is a fantastic FREE tool for showing you everything you would need to know about your website: who’s viewing it, how many are viewing it, what they are looking at, how long they are looking at it and whether your advertising campaigns are working. But with so much information available at your fingertips it’s difficult to see what you should be looking at and how you can use it.
Below is my detailed guide that should help make things clearer. It shows the top reports you can get through Google Analytics and more importantly how they can provide insight that will help when making important business and marketing decisions.
If I had a pound for every time a client asked “Are we emailing our customers too much?” I would be a very rich man. However, if I had a pound for every time a client asked if we were sending too much direct mail or are we broadcasting our TV or radio adverts too much then my bank balance would be no different.
Did the marketing team behind the infuriatingly more-ish Go Compare campaign debate whether their adverts were being shown too much during peak times? I very much doubt it. On New Years’ Eve 2008 did Pepsi worry that they were going a little over the top when they launched their new logo with a week-long ‘promotional extravaganza’ in Times Square. Of course they didn’t. So why do email marketers continually question their strategy when it comes to frequency and volume?
Before we go any further… no… the 14 times World Darts Champion is not moonlighting as a Commercials Director… the Phil Taylor we’re talking about is far taller, skinnier and has considerably less hair! Phil recently finished filming a new advert for us for Cottages4you… an ad that everyone here at Red C is incredibly proud of and was brought to life by both Phil and Sharon Gunnel, the Producer at Velvet.
Our first introduction to Phil was through his reel which immediately grabbed us for his clever subtle use of humour and ability to capture some lovely moments on films as well as getting some memorable performances from his actors. On meeting him I was instantly sold by his passion for both our concept and his desire to stay true to my original idea and deliver an advert that had high production values and quite simply and beautifully converted a singular message in a memorable way.
Banksy is probably one of the most famous artists alive. His stencil-style ‘guerrilla’ art became his trademark along with his strong anti-war, anti-capitalist and anti-establishment messages. His first pieces appeared on the streets of Bristol and London in early 90’s and many more have appeared around the world since.
Although his art carries strong political messages they are also quite amusing and daring… in 2006 he left an inflatable doll dress as a Guantanamo prisoner in Disneyland to bring attention to the conditions of the terror suspects. He’s also believed to have smuggled a fake picture he created of a smiling Mona Lisa into the Paris Louver museum and hung it near the real one.
Imagine it’s a Monday night and you’re sat on the sofa watching Coronation Street. Roy Cropper is cooking up 2 Walls sausages on Warburton’s bread with a dollop of Heinz ketchup for Steve McDonald. Normally we wouldn’t know which brands Roy uses in his cafe, nor see any brands at all on the street – except for fake ones like Newton & Ridley ale in the Rovers Returns! But this could soon be the future of your favourite soap thanks to the new ruling by the Government to allow product placement on UK television.
Before we go any further… no… the 14 times World Darts Champion is not moonlighting as a Commercials Director… the Phil Taylor we’re talking about is far taller, skinnier and has considerably less hair! Phil recently finished filming a new advert for us for Cottages4you… an ad that everyone here at Red C is incredibly proud of and was brought to life by both Phil and Sharon Gunnel, the Producer at 
Banksy is probably one of the most famous artists alive. His stencil-style ‘guerrilla’ art became his trademark along with his strong anti-war, anti-capitalist and anti-establishment messages. His first pieces appeared on the streets of Bristol and London in early 90’s and many more have appeared around the world since.
