Tag Archives: Advertising

It’s a wrap! What was your favourite Christmas campaign?

29 Dec

It was a hard choice this year don’t you think? Let me know your favourite.

2018 has been another tough year for retailers. In Australia, Myer has had it’s woes, while globally we saw Toy ‘R’ Us go into liquidation. In a trading period during the Christmas months which can be the busiest for retailers, getting your Christmas advertising right is paramount to seeing great returns, but also high customer experiences around the brand, brand love and engagement. If your brand can connect on an emotional level during this time, it can last into the following year, but also have high brand conviction and loyalty moving forward in what will be another tough year.

John Lewis

Elton John stars in this blockbuster and it doesn’t disappoint. A beautifully crafted story about thoughtful gifts and not just giving for the sake of giving. It is about how an inspired gift can change your life.

With the tagline of ‘some gifts are more than just a gift’, the John Lewis campaign called ‘The Boy and the piano’ takes you on a two-minute historical voyage through different stages of Elton’s life, with glimpses of early days of concerts, memories and parties.

Each scene features Elton at his piano, with the conclusion of the ad at his first school concert, before eventually showing the first note four-year-old Elton John played on his newly-regifted grandmother’s piano for Christmas. Heart stopper ‘Your Song’ plays in the background and agency adam&eveDDB have really hit success with this.

This campaign is totally integrated and John Lewis sold iconic Elton T-shirts. If you happen to be in London, the flagship Oxford Street London store was renamed ‘John’, but even more impressive was that the 3rd floor has been dedicated to an experiential space where customers can explore many aspects of the ad including the recording studio, living room sets, listen to recordings and immerse themselves while shopping.

Not a John Lewis fan? But still love Christmas lights and store windows? Well every 30 minutes from 4pm, you can see an amazing one minute light show featuring another Elton classic, ‘Step into Christmas’. Watch some footage here (32 min:46 is where you will see John Lewis, but there is cool footage of London lights 2018 and it’s worth skipping through if you have time over your Xmas break)

But do not fear dear readers if you can’t get to Oxford Street. There is  a very long video here of the Christmas lights around London. Watch it here.

Elton John T shirts

AirNZ

Always a winner, and this year, Santa and the elves are back and it’s a winner. This year Santa messes up and sends out his naughty list to one of the boys on the actual ‘naughty’ list – as Santa is not very good with email! This would have to be my favourite, even though I loved the John Lewis campaign. But I do love Elton John. But I did also enjoy ALDI Australia’s effort.

 

Pedigree

Get the tissues out. This ad is delightfully shot and like John Lewis’s theme, it is about a gift for life, and has many life themes. You can watch & read about it here.

ALDI Australia

BMF Australia’s second attempt for ALDI Christmas campaign is heartfelt and totally Aussie. Its images are funny as well as beautifully shot. All against the backdrop of the Australian outback. The narratives are easy to follow: friendship, pitch in just like Aussies do to help a friend, and if someone pops in, you’ll have enough food.

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ALDI UK – Kevin the Carrot is back and this time in a three part series! Part 1 is a Spoof of the CocaCola truck of happiness. In this case, our hero Kevin is driving the truck.

Read about it and watch it here. More links at the end of this post.

CocaCola saw the funny side to this campaign (and would have appreciated the parody and free advertising), after all isn’t the best form of flattery copying? CocaCola got in to the Christmas spirit and tweeted this clever response:

Coke ALDI

Part 2 & 3 – Kevin the Carrot fights to save his family from Pascal, a wicked Parsnip living in a dark castle. And Kevin saves Little Red (carrot) Riding hood in a spoof of the fairytale. Both fun productions with fabulous imagery of amazing food.

 

Let me know what your favourites were for 2018?

 

Extra viewing & reading:

ALDI Facebook page – https://www.facebook.com/AldiUK

ALDI – http://www.bandt.com.au/advertising/aussie-christmas-ad-ever-aldi-goes-outback-years-spot-via-bmf

John Lewis – https://www.johnlewis.com/content/christmas-advert

House Beautiful – https://www.housebeautiful.com/uk/christmas-adverts-round-up/

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Air New Zealand, your 18th safety video is another fine example with ‘It’s Kiwi Time’!

6 Nov

New Zealand have always pushed the boundaries with interesting and out-there advertising. I can think of  a couple of examples. Last year’s police recruiting ad, or this golden oldie from L&P from 2006 that you really have to watch to believe! Yes you won’t be disappointed by watching both.

And now, Air New Zealand have done it again. They are always trying to outdo themselves and this is their 18th take on safety videos. They usually use OS talent, but this time it’s all local. Their creative Ad agency must have so much fun pitching crazy ideas. Every year AirNZ’s safety and Christmas ads are always worth looking forward to. And this year is no different. My next blog post will be on the Xmas ads!

In a 600 strong cast, ‘It’s Kiwi Time’ takes the classic song, Tricky as it’s base for their safety video, which really is a music video disguised as a safety video. This song dates back to the late 80’s which means that many people may hear the song and be enticed to watch the video out of interest. A new target market I hear you say?

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And while some people are saying, ‘what happened in the 80’s should have been left in the 80s’, most viewers are hailing it as another success story for AirNZ. You can watch it on YouTube by clicking here. What do you think? Yes, it is long, but it is entertaining, and just as you would expect from this creative company. Air New Zealand really put their key stakeholders at the centre of their campaigns. Mostly it’s their staff (cabin crew, engineers etc), but this ad sees a lot of thought go into it by using various destinations from around the country, and using singers, dancers and talent from 30 community groups.

Air NZ have been proud of who they are and their country and locally grown talent, and it shows. You would be proud to be a staff member, or a shareholder. Or a passenger. It’s another aspect of marketing that often gets lost. AirNZ are all about relationships. They want one with you, and once they get your attention, you want to find out more. Just like I do every year when I write my Xmas blog post, as I look forward to their ads! You can read my AirNZ 2017 Xmas ad review here and watch the campaign. And if you head over to @FlyAirNZ twitter account, you can read the love coming in for the new ad. Also it’s great to see that AirNZ have a great social media team who actually respond to posts.

In previous years, The All Blacks have always been a feature of the airline’s TVCs and YouTube ads, this one is a take off of Men In Black back in 2015, and if you have a spare 5 minutes (yes it reads long, but it is worth your time) click here to watch it.

With the runaway success of The Lord of The Rings, AirNZ played on New Zealand being the home of Middle Earth. This meant a lot of safety videos featured cameos of many of the actors, AirNZ staff and the famous Director himself, Peter Jackson. Humour was always central to these videos. But also awesome scenery!

More recently, they have used talking and loveable animals, Dave the Goose (voice by Aussie actor Bryan Brown) and Pete the Kiwi. Pete’s voice is from another loveable Kiwi, Sam Neill (pictured below). Enjoy!

Sam Niell will be the voice of the campaign's mascot, a CGI kiwi named Pete.

Source: https://www.stuff.co.nz/business/96138062/sam-neill-the-voice-of-air-new-zealands-global-campaign

Other reading:

600-strong cast front Air New Zealand’s largest scale safety video ‘It’s Kiwi Safety’ via True NZ, Campaign Brief, 2018

Air New Zealand Safety video Divides a Nation, Stuff, 2018

#weareAMPR #AirNZSafetyVideo

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Christmas (advertising #3) just keeps getting better – but you will need tissues for both crying and laughing

10 Dec

Yes I may be a little bit obsessed with Christmas advertising, but after you’ve read my 1st post and 2nd one about Christmas, how can you not be?

Just to refresh your memory: amazing ALDI brings back spunk Kevin the carrot and he slays it promoting the movie Murder on The Orient Express. And my other favourite, Debenham’s clever modern day take on Cinderella.

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Bring out the tissues as these two latest campaigns are gold. 

BBC One – The Supporting Act (click to watch)

Another fantastic UK offering (aren’t they all?), this time by BBC One’s in-house creative team. This works for me because I remember that song lyrics to Cats in The Cradle,

“When you coming home Dad? I don’t know when, but we’ll get together then, you know we’ll have a good time then?” by Harry Chapin, or more recently Ugly Kid Joe.

We’ve all had a parent, sibling or carer that was too busy to play with us, to read with us, jut to sit with us and chat. Life is busy! This is a simple and gorgeous story as we see a single Dad trying his best, and the daughter just keeps dancing and being happy and thinks that Dad doesn’t notice her. You’ll be toe tapping and up dancing before you know it. Love it BBCs in-house team BBC Creative.

ALERT: More tissues

RSPCA Christmas 2017 (click to watch)

Sniff, tissues, heartstrings, RSPCAs tearjerking film highlights the kindness of RSPCA staff as they all contribute to saving animals’ lives. Woody the puppy, represents all the animals that the RSPCA cares for, from exotic pets, horses and small animals to dogs, cats, rabbits and everything in between. Also great message about a pet is for a lifetime, not just for Xmas.

Now to finish with a really good ROFL

AirNZ have done it again, with a(nother) rollicking and brilliant ad that plays on the Kiwi accent. Remember the brilliant safety videos when they played on The Hobbit ? Or the videos that saw real (and nude) employees covered in body paint uniforms with the Nothing to Hide campaign? First class (pun intended).

Remember last year 2016, with Ronan Keating’s hilarious effort with child actor Julian Dennison? Mixing up vowels and confusing the entire world with their crazy words!

If you were confused with 2016 lines such as ‘a brown bird instead of a blue bird’, and jandals, this year you’ll be even more confused! We love the Kiwis (aka New Zealanders)!

2017s offering is just as good. What starts off as fun phone calls from Chinese children talking to Santa about what they’d like for a present, we then see the faces of Santa and chief elf turn to horror, the music changes, bells toll and we know the story is about to start. You will need the tissues, but this time for crying with laughter.

We will have two weeks until Christmas, so I am assuming I have at least one more Christmas advertising post! Until then…..  have a look at this hilarious recruitment video for NZ Police (stay for the bloopers at the end, plus dancing to rival Miley Cyrus 47 seconds in, the actual Police Commissioner at 1.47 and so much more).

 

Further reading:

https://www.campaignlive.co.uk/article/bbc-one-the-supporting-act-bbc-creative/1451862, published December 5, 2017.

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Another successful year for Entertainment Marketing students undertaking real projects for real clients at QUTs Business School

5 Dec

For over 15 years, my QUT teaching teams have been enabling student’s real world learning for 2nd year subjects Integrated Marketing Communication and more recently Entertainment Marketing. This subject is part of the larger Entertainment Industries degree where Creative Industries students study law and business subjects. Our students engage with real businesses, startups, artists, not for profits: you name it. QUT students work in ‘agencies’ to problem solve marketing communication objectives set by their clients.

In 2017, our Entertainment Marketing students engaged with long-standing and very historical Brisbane Eisteddfod, Brisbane Writer’s Festival (or #UpLIT), Cystic Fibrosis Qld and Travello: a Brisbane based startup travel App that connects you with fellow travellers, solo backpacking enthusiasts, digital nomads and even groups of friends & families to make your travel experience memorable. We pride ourselves on the range of entertainment and marketing businesses that want to be involved in our student’s real world learning. In 2016, we had a different travel startup Tour Amigo, who is a QUT Marketing Honours alumni, who has set upa travel site where you can search, compare and book the best value package tours throughout 160+ destinations worldwide. The Tour Amigo team have cherry picked the best guided tours from international operators such as Contiki, Trafalgar, Intrepid and put them in one place. We love to welcome back QUT ex-students into our classroom.

The student agencies pitch their ideas to their clients at the end of semester. Face to face where you can’t hide. This experience helps sets up our students to be (a little bit) industry-ready. Their pitches are very professional, and clients are always impressed with the high calibre standards shown by our up and coming QUT graduates. Most groups undertake primary research, produce video content that would cost thousands of dollars.

Students conducted work experience and work integrated learning with Cystic Fibrosis then gained paid employment organising events such as the 65 Roses Art Prize, where schools across QLD were asked to donate their artwork and a silent auction for each one at the 65 Gala Roses Ball. The project that was run by one incredible QUT student who raised awareness for the plight of those living with CF in Queensland, as well as introducing budding artists to the power of philanthropy. She not only ran the promotion, but the call to action involved a huge amount of logistics.

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As I publish this article, 30 out of the 50 paintings (shown above) have been sold and the others are on display at the CFQ bookshop. Another amazing student helped with fundraising, social media and event profiling. It isn’t easy taking on an intern, but our QUT students learnt so much from their experience with CFQ, many staying on for months.

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Another client this year were Brisbane Eisteddfod. They came to us wanting an audit and some ways of how to stay relevant with their many audiences and stakeholders. Over 150 students pitched their ideas. Our client (also QUT alumni) was super happy and plan to have students working on implementing some of their strategies and tactics in 2018. Below is just one of the amazing student agencies, Ben Hardgrave their tutor and the Eisteddfod team.

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Christmas advertising take #2

13 Nov

Yes I know only a few days ago I posted a blog post about loving Christmas advertising (see it here). But over the weekend three amazing campaigns dropped…. all from the UK.

First I dove into Marks & Spencer’s brilliant campaign (much like the Murder on the Orient Express tie in by ALDI with Kevin the carrot), that sees the much-loved Paddington Bear save Christmas around his neighbourhood by confusing a burglar with Santa. The M&S ad has many messages, and hits the nail on the head with emotion, and of course ties in with the Paddington Bear 2 movie which was released in the UK today.

Second I watched the John Lewis ad. I connected with this ad as when I was little I was sure there was a monster underneath my bed! I watched Moz the monster and the young man Joe connect and play at night. That was a gorgeous time of bonding. I was wanting to cry, waiting to cry, but didn’t. (And I cry at the drop of a tissue)! I suppose you outgrow monsters, but Christmas isn’t a time for that. There have been mixed reviews about this ad. Read one from the BBC here. You can make up your own mind.

Moz the monster from John Lewis christmas advert

The final ad was my favourite from Debenhams. Based on the fairytale Cinderella, but with a modern twist (kind of like Rowse’s new three bears – see my post here), Debenhams take you on a wonderful magical love story, click here to watch the ad and tell me if you don’t cry! What girl doesn’t want to be Cinderella? The #YouShall Find Your Christmas is a great teaser campaign, which is really a love story. It captures the spirit of the season, and takes you on their journey.

Cleverly, Debenhams have allowed you to shop what Ellie and Josh are wearing at this site here, including personalised gifts.

personalised gifts

Which is your favourite ad and why?

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Do you love Christmas advertising?

8 Nov

What’s more to love about Christmas than family, feasting and napping? Yes, it’s Christmas advertising! I have just received the first of what will be many emails promoting brands, and it was from one of my favourite brands: ALDI.

It reminded me of last year and a fantastic array of Christmas goodness. Some of my favourites were Cadbury and love how the Myer one is truly Australian and shows true of Aussie culture of helping out your mates by repairing Santa’s star: Myer 2016 Santa’s Star TVC.

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Over in sunny UK, John Lewis for years have been coming out with fantastic ads, Marks & Spencer also had a great campaign where Mrs Claus steals the show from Santa in the M&S 2016 TVC. This very touching one from Heathrow airport – bringing families together was also another standout, Heathrow TVC.

My favourite ‘Come Together’ by H&M, directed by Wes Anderson and starring Adrien Brody channels Grand Budapest Hotel, watch it here.  I don’t want to spoil the ending, but it still brings me to tears. Be warned, it is 3.52 minutes, but it’s worth the watch.

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These three examples, and please share your favourites in the comments section, all use emotional based strategies: empathy, family and love and togetherness. Their messages are powerful, and not one bit of clothing or aeroplane to be seen (well maybe right at the beginning of the Heathrow TVC.

Bring on 2017 Christmas TVCs I say! ALDI have resurrected Kevin the carrot after the success of their 2016 campaign. This is their first instalment of the season and again the theme is love (and it only goes for a minute), ALDI 2017 TVC.

ALDI’s sales grew over 15% last Christmas, so why not bring back Kevin? The campaign has a clever movie tie-in with Murder on the Orient Express, and of course features a train, a gingerbread man, introduces a sexy female carrot Katie, and Kevin doing un-carrot hero acts! I’m sure ALDI are onto another winner here, as their Christmas food offerings are portrayed in a mouth-watering display. It is pure escapism and will win over more new customers. Let’s see what the sales figures show this Christmas.

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While I have been reading many articles about this Christmas being lean on spending, brands will be enticing us over the next month to win over our hearts. And spend we will. Using emotive and escapism are two strategies that have worked previously, and will work again. Bring on Santa I say! And more Christmas magic.

 

 

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QUT Business School marketing students take real world learning to a new high

6 Nov

QUT academics have prided themselves on engaging with industry and real businesses – and our advertising, marketing and public relations students in QUT’s Business School work in ‘agencies’ with real clients. In my Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) class, our students work on a range of objectives set by their clients: from brand awareness, brand loyalty, brand conviction, attitude formation and often creating copy and entire campaigns to deliver first class campaign strategies and tactics. Students conduct brand audits and work on achieving their client’s objectives.

During the final weeks of semester, the student agencies pitch their ideas and campaigns to their clients. These pitches from 2nd and 3rd year students are of such a high standard. They are very professional, and clients are always impressed with the high callibre standards shown by our amazing QUT Business and Creative Industries students.

Our incredible array of 2017 IMC clients included so many amazing businesses: Rio Rhythmics Dance Studio, Kerry Reece Art, radio stations, charity events, not for profits,  McGrath’s Fine Foods, Paws & Relax Doggy Daycare, a vegan food project, Grasses of Life, Kelly’s Candy, forfido – a dog walking App, Save A Horse, The Lucky Duck.

In many cases, many students end up conducting work experience for their clients implementing their ideas. It is a win-win situation for everyone. Di, Tegan & Annie of Paws & Relax (pictured below), heard IMC strategy ideas from 15 student agencies. Imagine what that would be worth in money terms if a real agency pitched?

IMG_3986.jpegOur IMC class is extra large (over 300 students each semester), we source clients far and wide, often many coming from past students and current tutors.

Another client was Stuart from forfido, a dog walking App which was supported by #RSPCA RSPCA Qld. The CEO Mark Townsend is pictured below with a group of students that presented an out of this world pitch.

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I am not lucky, but privileged to have such an amazing teaching team, and for the past 15 years recruiting from my past students has allowed me to find IMC stars. Many have stayed for a semester or two, and then their careers have taken off and they have moved to far and wide parts of the world. Running the worlds of advertising, marketing and public relations firms or starting their own businesses. They are all wonderful people and care about our amazing QUT students and their IMC learning journeys. The other half of my team have their own businesses and are industry specialists, many whom have been in the team for over 10 years, so draw on so much experience and change.

Since 2007, the IMC undergraduate subject at QUT has also been an educational innovator and leader in promoting student and industry engagement within social media environments. For the past 11 years, Facebook and Twitter have been used to build professional partnerships with industry, and promote real world learning and engagement experiences between current students, sessional academics and past alumni. Specifically, this was achieved by creating a subject Facebook page IMC@QUT. It  provides a space for outstanding connections, alumni events, industry best practice examples, creative inspiration as well as a go-to employment bulletin board, internship and networking opportunities. The IMC@QUT Facebook community spans directly from the heart of the QUT brand.

The longevity of this space has resulted in present and past IMC students sharing opinions, encouraging dialogue and ideas, marketing communication related inspiration and industry benchmarks.  It has also broken down traditional classroom barriers and maintained a consistent annual growth in members and now totals over 1200 members.

 

 

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Marketing: the core to any (successful) brand

20 Mar

When times get tough or crisis enter into a company’s boardroom, usually the first thing to go is Marketing. Many CFOs and CEOs confuse marketing with selling, and, marketing with advertising. In fact, many people think that they’re all the same thing.

For us marketeers, we know they’re not.

Marketing is how brands connect with their stakeholders. It’s all about communication, not selling. Marketing has so many facets to it. 

Once you decide whom you’re marketing to (or communicating with), the rest should fall into place. What media does this audience consume? When do they consume and how do they want to consume this information?

How do we create solutions for this group, not just by making more products and services? We should be providing extra value than our competitors are providing. Prove to your customers that they’re not just a number, but surprise and delight them with out of the ordinary service and value adding by allowing them two way communication and access.

Don Schultz founded the 21st Century SIVA principle that far outweighs the old Four Ps scenario. It makes far more sense in our modern world with consumers demanding two way communication and being involved in co-creational marketing where the brand and customer find solutions together. Solutions, Information, Value and Access is where it’s at. Yes I know bottom line is imperative, but without the customer and marketing at the centre of a brand, you can’t connect with your customers. You can’t build relationships. This is how you maintain long term success.

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