Circus – The Festival of Commercial Creativity

Jeffrey has been studying people and their interaction with the internet for more than 15 years. His study entitled Surveying the digital future: The world Internet project looks at the lives of thousands of people the world over and has found key insights into our lives.

Teenagers in particular plug into social media for an Ambient awareness of online life – not to read every single thing going on in their friends lives. Game playing is a serious business. Teenagers watch TV on any schedule. Unlike their parents who have programs and time set aside for watching TV, teenagers tune into online TV shows any time. The Internet: shining light into dark places.

Agnello’s talk was inspiring and confronting at the same time. I didn’t know much about India or the culture, so it was interesting to learn about the problems faced by the second most (after china) populated country in the world. The Times of India has the largest publication of an english newspaper in the world. Agnello developed a number of ground breaking campaigns for The Times of India, Lead India, Teach India, Aman Ki Asha. These campaigns had a social conscious and empowered the people of India. The client went on to say the ultimate goal was not to make people buy more newspapers, but “if there were 10 journalists waiting to talk with the Prime Minister, he would allow The Times Of India in first”. Credibility really is the only competitive advantage for a news company.

Create projects not campaigns. Projects often offer something to society or the consumer. Campaigns often shout noise. The life-cycle of a project never ends, and should continue 365 days a year. The project needs momentum to keep it going, and often showing people what your brand stands for is a way to keep it 365. Insight is needed before advertising. Once you have an insight, something that will connect with people on a human level the advertising will fall into place. Engagement over reach is where we need to start. If you are producing advertising make it at least useful // relevant // entertaining.

We should be offering inside out marketing – where we  produce better than advertising and stuff (products).

If a project is to be successful you must be able to test your insight against these four pillars of convergence:

1. TV
2. Internet
3. Mobile Phone location based
4. Real world experience

We must be prolific, not precious. Be aware of what’s happening in popular culture. Building game dynamics into your project will make it fun for people to engage with. Have fun with technology, but remember it’s for actual people and you’re meant to respond to it in a human way.

 

“You want something to be social, you have to design it in from the ground up” – Mark Zuckerberg

Google is an engineering company from the ground up. They look at a problem and ask what can technology do to make it better. Google Chrome is the browser of the future. Why would people switch to Chrome? They have to be told not only what the product is, but the benefits of the product. They have over 100 million users already. Ideas can come from anywhere – and at Google it’s evident. Experiment and iterate is their process. Speed to market also plays a part in their experiment and iterate development model.

Erik proved award winning creative work is possible with no money, impossible briefs, & burnt out creatives. Brands just have to be brave, and agencies need to push themselves. If the work has a human emotion it will connect. Animation allows for greater emotional range.

Excellent insights into the digital world. Josh talked about the wealth of networks and collective action. Imagine a world of people who have grown up on Facebook, Wikipedia, Youtube or any other number of online networks. Using this network and collective action, people can affect the price of something they want to buy. A bank of Facebook is entirely possible. People have shared interests and it’s easier to connect online with others who share your interest.

Game playing is a serious business – World of Warcraft turns over $900 million a year in subscription fees. Farmville (Facebook) is making profits of $600+ million a month – all from virtual goods! An excellent business model that has no supply shortage – ever.

To tap cultural resonance you need: 1. Group of people, 2. The recognition of a unique culture 3. Amplified to affect wider society, 4. Traditional time and space

The Fringe – You either want to be the cheapest or on the other end of the scale the best, being stuck in the middle is no good.

The Internet is for:

1. Awareness
2. Persuasion
3. Sharing
4. Cooperation
5. Collective action (The Holy Grail)

Collective action examples -

Traditional advertising follows the same formulas and “Best Practices”. Best Practices are dangerous in an industry that is supposed to be creative and different. To get out of this same wind tunnel process of producing work we must start with:

The Provocation – we can use 1 or 2.

1 Same process – starts with consumer insight and ends with validation. Or

2 Ask is it different? (satisfy each of these categories – not just 1)

1. True
2. Relevant
3. Different

No longer a unique selling point (USP) but an Emotional selling point (ESP). The project must satisfy the wants, needs and desires of consumers.

Look for insight from many sources

1. Consumer insight
2. Brand insight
3. product insight
4. Consumer insight
5. Communications insight

Brands must take ownership of a point if view. It’s better to have Brand leadership than Consumership. Convention brands vs Conviction brands

Brand leadership & successful brands have,

1. Vision
2. Innovation
3. Dynamism

We must also recognize that all consumers are not created equal

1. Leaders
2. Followers
3. The rest

Where is the category going – look to the future not the past.

Use the formula P=40 to 70, where P stands for the probability of success and the numbers indicate the percentage of information acquired. Once the information is in the 40 to 70 range, go with your gut. Once you have 100% of the information it’s too late.

Put judgment back into the job spec.

Ideas are the only legal means we have to change the world regardless of money, distribution or heritage. Many agencies say they solve business problems but can only think in ad ideas, not ideas.

The (ideas) advertising process is thus:

1. Find out what the problem is
2. Solve the problem
3. Amplify it / Advertise

Clients talk about ideas but only want ads – or a process they’re familiar with – not a result. Research companies can’t see what’s really going on in a consumers life, they often only specify on one part of the consumers life, not the forces around them that contribute to this insight.

1. 1 dream bigger (and keep track of  it) Singapore is a city with an vision and solid plan to get there.
2. Embrace culture, not category (find the unexpected relevance) - Understand why people do things.
3. Focus on the prize, not the medium. Focus on the goal.
4. Make it real
5. Be culturally provocative. Creativity is born from emotional tension points, your work must mean something
6. Release your brand voice. It’s about values, not style/look and feel
7. Keep the idea alive. Respond and react with social media.
8. Collaborate & (know what you’re bad at).
9. Be responsible. Social capitalism, Don’t live in fantasyland. Turn over is vanity, profit is sanity. Know more about people, what they’re feeling and then how to influence them.
10. Be brilliant. (Target the highest common denominator, not the lowest)

José walked us through some of his inspiration and his journey so far. Showed examples of NIKE sportswear projects and how they came together.