December « 2005 « Cool Marketing Thoughts

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Archive for December, 2005

Microsoft’s Mister Jefferson Viral

16 Dec 2005

Microsoft has a good one running with this :) I had tears in my eyes from laughing. It’s about a certain mister Jefferson who managed to get a very well-paid job, arranged by his father in law. He’s a huge sports fan, losing thousands of dollars a month online – but that’s okay he says, because he makes a lot of money. He doesn’t spend a lot of time at home, but when he does, he loves to download porn. His wife has had plastic surgery and is clinically depressed, his son likes to dress up in his daughter’s clothes and his daughter was caught for possession. A hilarious clip that ends with a statement, saying you leave this information out on the web daily for crooks when you surf and don’t protect your data right. The links then go to the Microsoft site, either for IT-professionals or for home users.

Go there and laugh !

For the original English version, click ‘Nederlands’. It’s subtitled in Dutch.

Credits :
Viral concept and design: Inspire
Development: Smartberries
Campaign (original version): McCann-Erickson Advertising Belgium

The interactive part is the yellow button down-right, where you can trick a friend by sending him a personalized version of this story. Very cool !
- via [ad-rag.com]

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Posted in Advertising, Campaigns, Interactive, Marketing

I Have An Idea

16 Dec 2005

I have an idea is a service that doesn’t focus on money, fame, awards, or the clients you have, but the know-how of the many talented individuals in the creative industry. They want to serve the industry as a mechanism for communication, self-analysis and intellectual growth. They will document the world’s creative community and disseminate this priceless knowledge to help it grow and flourish. Questions will be asked, establishments and norms challenged, they’ll make every possible effort to add fuel to the industry we so passionately love.
I think this is about the most interesting site I’ve found this year. You should really look into this and bookmark it. It’s a must !

“Advertising people who ignore research are as dangerous as generals who ignore decodes of enemy signals. (David Ogilvy)”

The ‘I Have An Idea’ team consists of : Ignacio Oreamuno, founder and director –
Jay Thompson, VP of Stuff – Brett McKenzie, Lead Writer (SBN2) – Emily Bergeron, Marketing Manager – Nat Salgueiro, Education Editor – Mimi Martinoski, Communications Manager and Brendan Watson, Events Editor.

Check out :

* A showcase of the best advertising work in the world
* Ask Jancy
* The Evergrowing Collection of Useful Resources
* Your Indispensable Guide To The Advertising Industry
* Blog/Articles
* Interviews With Creatives

Right now they have 3 ads running to promote the initiative :

via [ad-rag.com]

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Posted in Advertising, Campaigns, Marketing

Rent-a-Drunk Marketing

16 Dec 2005

Think how many times you’ve seen a guy passed out at a party, and how many pictures are taken of that guy passed out at that party. Now think of your merchandise on that guy forever doing stupid drunken things that people will take pictures of and keep posting over and over online. Isn’t that an opportunity for your brand?

The guys over at rent-a-drunk are prepared to do this for you and your brand. They’ll come to your party and drink a lot, wearing your merchandise, handing out brochures on the show floor, spreading your message. It’s a good idea, but there are a few things to keep in mind.

Would you like your brand to be associated with this kind of behavior? Depending on what you’re selling, I can imagine not all companies will appreciate a drunk on their party. Not everybody likes the idea of some guys you have to pay and give free drinks to party-crash your event. Basically, I find it an opportunistic idea of these three men to look for sponsored hangovers. It might work for some companies in the entertainment industry that are looking for a special something to add more flavor to a party, to have something ludicrous to catch the attention of the rest of the world. But to be honest, I don’t know any company that would. Good try though. – visit the home of [Rent A Drunk].

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Posted in Advertising, Campaigns, Marketing, Thoughts

Blog Awards

14 Dec 2005

Okay, since everybody is either organizing an award show or collecting awards for a living, I’ve decided to hand in my two cents. Last night I opened up the subscriptions for the Coolz0r Blog Awards, but since I forgot to tell the rest of the world, I’m the only one nominated. According to the only two rules, I closed the subscription phase and skipped the voting round, since rule number one says subscriptions are only open 24 hours, and rule number two says I can do whatever I want, whenever I want to. Since I’m now no longer nominated but directly approved and elected, I’m the winner of this award. No need to send flowers, no need to come back every day to vote. No voting buttons, no nothing. Let’s all skip that and be happy for me.

The award is a lot of cash which I will spend on X-mas presents for those I love and/or cherish, and since I don’t have to wait for bank transfers or whatsoever I can start to spend it right away, which I obviously will do. I’m nominated in all of the categories from A to Z, and I won it all, which means you won’t have to browse through many pages and long lists and again saves you a lot of time.

What’s the point of this post? I get tons of emails about blog awards all over the world, I’m invited a gazillion times to go vote for many blogs that all deserve to win something. Every day for about a week or so, I’m invited to revisit some page to see progress and cast a vote again and if I have to do that, I’ll be voting all day and have nothing else to do. This is a call for one, two or maybe three official blog awards, instead of the dozens that are popping up everywhere on the net. Honestly. Let’s get it together, let somebody like Technorati or any other massive blogcrawler have a go at it. I don’t want to have 20 blogposts on who’s nominated where for what award. I’m tired, my final exams are coming, I have papers due – time is precious.

To all people I know that are nominated: I’ll vote once, and one time only. I’m sorry, it’s not because I don’t like you, it’s not because your blog isn’t worth it. I simply don’t have the time.
Thank you for understanding.

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Posted in Blogs, Humor, Thoughts

ECB Viral: Anna, Alex & The Monster Of Inflation

13 Dec 2005

The European Central Bank, in cooperation with the national central banks of the euro area, has produced an information kit entitled ‘Price stability: why is it important for you?’ for young teenagers and teachers in all the official languages of the European Union.
This tool consists of an eight-minute animated film, leaflets for pupils and a teachers’ booklet. The film features two secondary school pupils, Anna and Alex, finding out about price stability. The leaflets provide an easy-to-understand overview of the topic, whereas the booklet covers it in greater detail.

See the movie : [Windows Media] – [Quicktime] – [Real]
Download the leaflets for pupils in pdf [here] (3.7 mb)
Download the teacher’s booklet in pdf [here] (3.6 mb)

Or visit the ECB website – This viral is available in 20 languages, including Dutch.

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Posted in Advertising, Campaigns, Interactive, Marketing

Corporate Ethics, Bananas & Frogs

12 Dec 2005

For my paper of Ethics I interviewed George Jaksch from Chiquita, currently the senior director of corporate responsibility,
responsible for social and environmental matters within Chiquita’s European team. The interview was recorded on Friday, November 25th and took 48 minutes. Today the paper was due, so this weekend I’ve been busy making the transcript of the conversation which had been put on DVD from the MiniDV of the Cam. It’s a really long interview in which we talk about the code of conduct of Chiquita, about the efforts they’ve made to comply with the Rainforest Alliance standards and about the green frog they’ve added to their banana logo. I felt it would be a waste of effort and time I’ve put in the transcript if I didn’t share it with ‘the net’, because what has been said really was interesting. I learned a lot about how a company like Chiquita deals with corporate responsibilities, how they live by their values and make every employee aware of the importance of living by the code of conduct, which is in fact a 35-pages code.

First there’s some info about George Jaksch, then some related links, and then there’s an 11 page long transcript. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.

George Jaksch was born in London and grew up in the UK and Germany as a citizen of both countries. Following studies of economics (Cambridge, UK) and agriculture (Seale-Hayne, UK), he for several years developed his own farming business in Colombia. He first joined Chiquita Brands in Colombia, then later held management positions in banana production (Panama, Ivory Coast), quality assurance in Europe and the USA, sales and marketing, and recently corporate responsibility and public affairs with residence in Antwerpen, Belgium.

Om Malik On Linkage And Credits – Blogiarism Series

11 Dec 2005

Together with Jason Schramm from Shiwej, I’ve decided to start a guestblogging series which will run on both our blogs at about the same time.
Today (December 11th, 2005) is installment number eight of the series and this time we turned to a blogging journalist who’s very well known in the blogosphere: Om Malik. Om writes mostly about the next generation of internet and he also has a weekly 20-minute podcast session with Niall about technology. Besides this he has a big archive of articles he wrote for the Business 2.0 website, where he is a senior writer.

1. How did you get into blogging?

I started blogging back in 2001, when I was working for Red Herring, a monthly business magazine. I got so much additional information on stories I wrote on a daily basis that I decided to share it with others. Of course, you know what they say…. out takes of movies are better than the movies themselves. same for me, I decided to publish my out takes.

2. What is your blog’s name, what is it about?

My blog is called, Gigaom.com /Om Malik on Broadband [rss]. I write mostly about the latest developments in the broadband world and how they impact the world of technology at large. It is an extension of my work for Business 2.0 magazine, where I write about the fast changing tech landscape and innovation.

3. Are there any policies you follow when reporting on an issue?

I follow the same policies as I do as a reporter. Three sources are a must, or otherwise the story is reported as a rumor. I never do single source posts, and have to confirm facts from diverse sources in order to put it on the site.

4. What guidelines do you follow when linking to an outside source?

I simply link to whom ever is the author of the story, and try and include folks who got me to the link in the first place.

5. Do you think you are trustworthy? Why do your readers trust you?

I think this is a question you need to ask the readers.

6. Do you think bloggers should be treated as journalists and be privy to the rights and protections that journalists enjoy?

Again, I am a journalist who blogs. So perhaps, I am not equipped to answer this question.

Initiated together with Jason Schramm, this guest blogging series will continue to make people aware of the power of linking and the need to give credit to the people who earn it.
Together, we’re improving the Blogosphere, you can help too if you start linking here !
And be sure to check out Jason’s post here.

Note :

Jason and I are not related but have a common field. Jason writes for the BlogNewsChannel, and takes care of Apple Watch, very surprisingly the Apple section of Nathan’s network.
I sometimes write on Inside Google & Inside Microsoft.

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Posted in Blogiarism, Ethics, Interviews, Thoughts

Celebrity Geek Dinner

09 Dec 2005

Yesterday was incredibly cool. I met Robert Scoble and Maryam, who were on their way from Paris to London and we had a great time. Frédéric picked me up right after my classes were finished and we drove off to Zaventem for a geeky (but pricy) dinner at the Serenata. I sat next to Maryam and we had a great time talking about almost everything you can think of. Scoble himself sat right in front of me. I expected a lot more people, but then again, it probably wouldn’t have been so cosy and pleasant. Now we really had the time chat about life, internet and blogs.

After dinner in the cafe : beer makes you happy. Love even more.

When we arrived at the Serenata, we were asked: ‘Microsoft?’ to which many of us, for the first time in their life -and often a bit hesitating- replied: ‘yes’, looking around a bit embarrassed, hoping no one was blogging this. We then got pointed to the first floor where it was about to happen. Robert and Maryam went to do some sightseeing to fill the day, but of course one day just isn’t enough to see all there is. Belgium might be tiny and very ‘petite’, there’s a lot of things to be seen. A few minutes after Frédéric and I arrived to the scene (some familiar faces where already there), the Scobles made their entrance.

Some of us where pretty amused to see Robert was still wearing a ‘Longhorn’ jacket, and Maryam… well… damn. She’s so charming. I had a great time and a good laugh. I couldn’t have wished for a better person to sit next to. On my right side was Will from Hamstersoup.com, who actually promised to start blogging and already did his first posts today :)

Robert: How will you know I got fired at Microsoft? The day Google Ads appear on my blog! (heheheh)

The Scobles were very amusing and made great company for a very entertaining night, and a bit of advice for the other blog dinner organizers : soup, bread, cheese and ice cream with fresh fruit is actually all they need. In this case it wasn’t like that. Too bad.

After dinner, we went to a cafe to try out some Belgian beers, and Robert paid for all the drinks, which is something everybody appreciated a lot. If you ever want to be friends with Belgian folks, just buy them a drink. Instant access to the heart :)

We left Zaventem at midnight or something and Frédéric and I stopped in Mechelen on the way home, because he absolutely wanted to show me a great place where he often drinks. A few beers later (it was 2am already) we left and he gave me a ride home. What a night !

Some other pics :