links for 2009-11-11

• Schering-Plough's Experiment With Digital Out-of-Home Ads
  When Schering-Plough, the pharmaceutical/package-goods giant behind brands like Claritin, Dr. Scholl's and Coppertone, sought to move $8 million to $10 million of its $372 million TV ad budget into digital out of home earlier this year, vendors were eager to accommodate them. In what is believed to be the fledgling medium's biggest dedicated ad buy, Schering-Plough and its media agency, Havas' MPG, and its out-of-home division, Chrysalis, met with more than 30 member companies of the Out of Home Video Advertising Bureau in the spring to discuss which networks would be the best demographic and creative fit for seven of its portfolio brands. Participating brands in the digital out-of-home buy were Claritin Liqui-Gels, Claritin For Kids, Dr. Scholl's for Her, Dr. Scholl's Massaging Gels, Tinactin Chill, Lotrimin Ultra and Dr. Scholl's Pain Relief.
  (tags: advertising digital marketing ooh)
• American Airlines Meets Mr X
  A blogger apparently trying to help American Airlines inadvertantly gets an AA UX employee fired.
  (tags: americanairlines socialmedia)

Agencies: Traditional agencies too resistant to digital … Digital agencies not ready to lead …

Agency bosses too old and change resistant, claims Sorrell
WPP chief executive Sir Martin Sorrell (aged 64) claims that brands are not spending enough online because the people who run their agencies are too old and resistant to change. Delivering the opening keynote session at ad:tech New York, Sorrell criticised brands for investing an average of just 13 per cent of their marketing budget online despite the rapid increase in digital media consumption.

Why Digital Agencies Aren’t Ready to Lead
Ana Andjelic opines: “Any conversation about digital marketing these days includes at least one mention that traditional agencies just “don’t get it.” While this may be correct, it’s equally true that digital agencies are not ready to take the lead. Look at the typical digital agency. It excels in exploring new horizons. It supports a flat and loose organizational structure in which a developer has access to the CEO. And it makes sure everyone’s opinion is heard. It’s one big crazy family. Digital agencies are having fun experimenting with ideas, technologies and strategies to find new alternatives superior to obsolete ways of doing marketing. That’s what they do best. The problem is, this is the only thing they are doing. When they are asked to actually follow through on their ideas, they often come up short. It is because they don’t know the business of marketing (or want to know it, for that matter), and they rarely have the organizational structure or past practices to guide them.”

Possibly related

“Sir Martin Sorrell: Rupert Murdoch’s pay wall plan is right (telegraph.co.uk)

Profits halved at advertising firm WPP (guardian.co.uk)

Does Sir Martin have another motive for peddling his alphabet soup? (telegraph.co.uk)

WPP profits down by nearly 50% (guardian.co.uk)

WPP sees little evidence of ’stouter hearts’ needed to spend during downturn (telegraph.co.uk)

Stunts: Colonel Sanders Goes To The UN, Fake Meteorite Goes Down In Flames

KFC’s Colonel Sanders and the UN
Apparently, if you dress like Kentucky Fried Chicken’s Col. Sanders, you can get in anywhere. An actor wearing “the fast food icon’s familiar white suit and black bow tie” was able to “gain access to the restricted areas” of the U.N. headquarters in New York and even meet Ali Treki, president of the U.N. General Assembly. KFC is “lobbying” the U.N. for “the fictional Grilled Nation to be accepted as a member state” as part of its campaign promoting its new menu. Officials attributed the fake Sanders gaining so much access to a “lapse in security.”

Meteorite stunt goes down in flames
A publicity campaign involving a hoax meteorite in Latvia has backfired spectacularly with the Swedish telecoms company behind the stunt losing a government contract. Tele2 has admitted that it staged a meteorite crash in the Latvian countryside, resulting in a 10-metre wide crater. Emergency services attended the scene followed by scientists, who quickly identified that the meteorite was a hoax.

Demographics: No such thing as Average American (but Boomers aren’t happy)

No More John Q Consumer in America

The 2010 Census is expected to find that 309 million people live in the United States. But one person will be missing: the average American. “The concept of an ‘average American’ is gone, probably forever,” demographics expert Peter Francese writes in 2010 America, a new Ad Age white paper. “The average American has been replaced by a complex, multidimensional society that defies simplistic labeling.” The message to marketers is clear: No single demographic, or even handful of demographics, neatly defines the nation. There is no such thing as “the American consumer.”

Baby Boomers in 50s Among Least Happy Americans

Young adults in their late teens and early 20s report the highest levels of happiness among all Americans, while their counterparts in their 50s and 80s are the least content, according an analysis of more than 600,000 Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index interviews from 2008 and 2009. The research, which examined study participants’ answers to a series of questions about how often the feel happy, experience enjoyment, smile and laugh, found that while highest in early adulthood, happiness drops among Americans in their 30s and 40s, and – in particular – among those in their 50s. It then rises among Americans in their 60s, drops among those in their late 70s and 80s, and then rises again among those older than 90.

Possibly related:

Baby Boomer Entrepreneurs Hot (myventurepad.com)
Tall people are happy (marginalrevolution.com)
Study finds people residing in poor communities not benefiting from recent drop in colorectal cancer (scienceblog.com)
Women, Boomers, and Growing a Careforce Through Healthcare Reform (healthcommentary.org)

Twitter: Court Orders, Movies

Twitter Fair Game for Serving UK Court Orders

The British High Court is permitting an injunction to be served to an anonymous user on microblogging site Twitter. The user, who has been posing as right-wing political blogger Donal Blaney of website Blaney’s Blarney, is accused to breaching Blaney’s copyright. Blaney, who felt the content appearing on Twitter under his name was “mildly objectionable,” approached the courts to find out whether an injunction could be served via the social network — as opposed to contacting Twitter headquarters in California and entrusting them with managing the issue.

Social Media: How Twitter Makes or Breaks Movie Marketing
Can the so-called Twitter effect boost a movie’s box-office performance faster than any traditional form of word-of-mouth? Not yet, say many top movie marketers and researchers, but the social networking platform’s impact on a studio’s media mix and campaign management has already taken shape.

Court order served over Twitter Court order served over Twitter (innovationtoronto.com)

UK Court order served over Twitter (textually.org)

UK Court Order Served Over Twitter, To Anonymous User Posing As Another (yro.slashdot.org)

British court okays serving injunction over Twitter (cbc.ca)

Court Order Served Over TWITTER: Blaney’s Blarney Impersonator In Breach Of Copyright (huffingtonpost.com)

UK High Court Allows Injunction To Be Delivered Via Twitter (techdirt.com)

Branded Entertainment: In-Game, Around Programs

Game Designer Who Doubts Value of In-game Advertising

By their very nature, static in-game ads may be the least effective way for marketers to engage video-game players, says game developer Kevin Slavin. At the same time, he finds that ad agencies in general don’t really understand the dramatically different process of communicating with consumers from within a video-game system. This is second part of our interview with Slavin, a former ad agency executive and co-founder of New York’s Area/Code. The 4-year-old game-design shop has created games for A&E, Discovery and MTV.

Dramatized ads weave plots around products

In television’s latest quest to discourage viewers from skipping ads, actors from NBC and ABC shows are appearing in character in commercials to interact with products in parallel story lines. This new kind of commercial further blurs the line between program and advertisement and comes as traditional product placements within shows, an early response to fast-forwarding, have become common. A series of spots that debuted this week weaves Palm Inc.’s Pre phone more deeply into the story line of two prime-time dramas.

Dramatized Ads Weave Plot Lines Around Products (thaibrother.com)

ESA: Record number of game development classes offered in U.S. (joystiq.com)

links for 2009-09-14

Augmented Reality and Social Media Marketing

Interesting visual, even if you aren’t bought in to AR’s possibilities …

999!

Today put me in mind of one of my favorite bands of the post-punk era …

Guardian Members Club

Guardian considers ‘members’ club’ to boost revenue
The Guardian is considering launching a “members’ club” that would provide extra benefits to readers, such as exclusive content or live events, for an annual or monthly fee, as its digital director Emily Bell ruled out bringing in a paywall. The paper sent a survey out to its registered members yesterday which asked what would entice them to sign up to the scheme.

Automotive: Kerri Martin and Coda, OCC and Siemens, Honda Eco Grand Prix, Mustang 2010

Kerri Martin to Head Marketing at Electric-Car Maker Coda

Kerri Martin, once a high-profile marketer who did stints at BMW Mini and Volkswagen, will join electric-car maker Coda Automotive next week as its first chief marketing officer. Industry observers will be watching Ms. Martin, 39, to see whether she can make marketing lightning strike again. She and Crispin, Porter & Bogusky, Miami, created non-traditional blitz for the U.S. launch of the Mini small car in 2002 that was unique for the auto category, received rave reviews from industry pundits and created the concept of “motoring” for the brand. This time Ms. Martin will be working on the launch of the Coda sedan, the Santa Monica, Calif., company’s first car, next year.

Siemens Partners With Orange County Choppers To Build An Electric Motorcycle

Siemens has paired up with Orange County Choppers, the custom bike building outfit of TV fame, to build a one-off electric chopper. The “Smart Chopper” showcases Siemens technology, boasting a 60-mile range and a 100 mph top speed compliments of a 27-hp electric motor. Charging time is anywhere between 1 and 5 hours depending on the voltage available. In addition to leveraging Siemens electric technology, the bike also features LED lights compliments of Sylvania, a Siemens subsidiary. The bike has OCC’s characteristic flair, the least of which is a rear tire that wouldn’t look out of place on a car. The Smart Chopper will be making its way around the country for the balance of 2009 and is slated for auction in 2010.

The Honda Eco Grand Prix

Honda Formula E is an advergame launched in Japan to teach people how to drive with an eco-friendly attitude. In the game you don’t have to use the steering-wheel, but just the brake and accelerator to find the ideal speed to drive in the city, saving gasoline, and therefore saving the planet.

Ford Mustang 2010

Firstborn are attempting to build a community around the (probably poor-handling, low miles-per-gallon) Ford Mustang 2010. Presenting a very powerful car-configuration tool, you can customize a template Ford Mustang the way you want or even customizing collaborating in real time with some people, in the end it’s about “experiencing” the car and also sharing it to the gallery (almost 2k submissions in a week) or, the main purpose for sport cars fans, downloading the image to use it as a wallpaper.