Weblog Consulting Register Login Subscribe to Free Influx Emails Join our Facebook Group Branding Street Cred Technology Lifestyle Style Entertainment Interviews Art InfluxTV Map Widgets RSS — All Subjects RSS — More Feeds

Search

Advanced Search

Contact Privacy Policy

You can't create something culturally relevant without an understanding of contemporary culture and its manifestations.

The "Unboxing Video" category has been with us for years and its format is widely recognized and understood by tech geeks.

It's a sub-genre of new media that's ready, primed and waiting for someone to do something creative with.

Nice work!!

Via Random Culture




Posted by Ed Cotton It's Chipchase day here at Influx Insights, so here's another post with a great slide from his deck.

Mobile is a huge business and I am not sure we quite realize how big.

One billion + phones are sold a year!!

Worryingly, 400,000 phones a day are retired in the US.

One surely has to question the sustainability of a fashion driven business.

Bring on the modular eco phone...


Posted by Ed Cotton Nice piece from The Economist that follows the life of Nokia's Jan Chipchase (see our previous post)

It's a film that uses photos and a phone recording.

Jan offers his observations on technology in his work life and life in general.



Posted by Ed Cotton Blyk is a UK mobile phone service targeted at the 16-24 year old market. Instead of users paying for the service, they agree to receive 6 ads a day, this seems to fly in the face of conventional thinking.

I have often written about the privacy invasion problems of advertising on cellphones, but this Blyk is looking like a big success in advertising terms and in the build out of an installed base.

The advertising appears to be performing amazingly well, the network has achieved an average 29% response rate for the close to 500 campaigns it's run to date. The advertising success is due to the format, Blyk sends text and picture messages to its user base who see it as part of a conversation and don't have the hassle of browsing around mobile websites.

The company's installed base in the UK currently numbers 100K.

Advertisers seem to find the opportunities of brand conversation and interaction appealing with the likes of Adidas, Ford, L'Oreal, McDonald's all participating.

It appears Blyk is worth looking at for mobile operators and MVNOs in the US who are struggling to find ways of adding advertising revenue.

Blyk has looked at its whole model from the perspective of the user and provides the low-cost service that this demographic requires and thinks about advertising as an on-going information-rich conversation that the user interacts with, rather than simply media placement to grab eyeballs.

Posted by Ed Cotton I am not going to try and match JWT’s list of 80 things, but here are 8 things that I believe will be preoccupying our minds in 08.

1.Slowdown?

The terrible “R” word is everywhere, with Wall Street looking nervously at every seemingly contradictory figure. It’s clear there are massive issues with housing and personal debt doesn’t look so great. The impact on communication spend is obvious and it looks like its time for people to dust off all those famous papers and books about the importance of brands spending during a downturn.

2.Attention Spikes

It’s now clear that agencies are competing on something of a level playing field in the war for attention. They don’t have the luxury of just hoping to be best ad in the pod or best in the break; it’s now about the most viral idea of the moment on any medium. It's now clear that television isn't the only way to do this. This year, Fallon’s Gorilla for Cadbury and Crispin’s Whopper Freakout showed us how.

Interestingly, although the campaigns had similar goals to spike attention, they approached it in very different ways. Fallon went all out for entertainment based on the strategic premise of joy and Crispin integrated the product into the heart of the idea.

Look for more of this type of thinking in 08; more media neutral ideas, more shock, and more entertainment from brands looking for attention.

3.Brands and The Social Network

The role of brands is the big question hanging over Facebook and all its competitors. It’s clear that advertising can and will continue to exist on these platforms in the form of links and banners, but the networks are promising brands an opportunity to be a part of the conversation. Certainly, there will be opportunities for the right brand, if the product is interesting and relevant enough.

There are two viable routes currently open:

a.To build or buy an application that adds tremendous value to the community and is discretely branded
b.To create a brand page that offers content to fans that is unavailable anywhere else on the Internet.

Brands will be trying feverishly to crack the code on both these areas in 08.

4.Collaboration

Collaboration will be the word of 08, with more layers of complexity being added to communication plans everyday, collaboration has become an essential component of success. It’s no longer possible for a duo of authors to crack the code on everything. Success will come to those who turn collaboration into an art, seamlessly blending media, creative thinking, digital outside partners and clients into the mix. This is all about culture and the willingness to learn and experiment.

Black Swan thinking is required.

5.The Digital Holy Grail

With content being unleashed and re-distributed across the internet, banners seemingly becoming less effective and all the questions about pre-roll, it’s unclear exactly what options brands have on the web. The build your own big website and expect people to visit theory isn’t necessarily a winner, unless you can do something interesting with it. It’s clear that those brands that are “Attention Spiking” should have a digital component to their efforts and then there’s the whole idea of Brand Utility.

How can a brand build something that helps people out in a way that they aren’t being helped already? 

This is the Holy Grail and something that requires an incredible force of thinking.

6.Environmentalism is Dead

It’s clear the issue of the environment is now mainstream, but the big question is what happens next? It’s likely that the biggest problem is going to come from separating the fact from the fiction. The more consumers and industry learn, the more complex the questions become and it’s not always clear what solutions are best or better.

The uncertainty will have a damaging impact on the issue with consumers and brands feeling paralyzed over choices.

The next phase of the environmental movement will revolve around the establishment of standards and practices that gain widespread acceptance.

We’ve already seen some of the impact things like LEED standards for buildings can have and we are starting to see carbon audits developing to a point where they can become standardized. 2008 will be a tricky year for those looking to push green credentials for all the reasons listed above.

The smartest brands will be looking to do two things this coming year:

a.    Take real action-do things that are measurable and have an impact
b.    Look at the issue as one of social responsibility and not just the environment

7.What the Hell Are We Measuring- ROI?

Media measurement has always been a questionable issue ever since the day it was invented. Methodologies and samples have been picked over and analyzed. This is not going away, but as more layers of media get added to the mix, you start to multiply the complexity. This issue is far from being solved and the conversation keeps changing, often to the benefit of the media owner. Surely, brands spending billions of dollars a year on communication should understand what’s working on a cross media basis? Again, this is an area where new standards and new tools are urgently needed and we are likely to see the emergence of some in 2008.

Interestingly, many of these will be proprietary, as global agencies and clients use their muscle to build their own, instead of waiting for industry bodies and research houses to get up to speed.

8. A Year for Mobile

The success of the iPhone in 07 showed everyone a new vision for the mobile device. Elegant, simple and designed with the user in mind, it gave everyone the chance to see a future where television, video, The Internet and location specific information could be used on a mobile device. 2008 will see Apple build upon this with a 3G version of the phone that offers high-speed access and GPS functionality. The race is now on to develop mobile applications for brands that benefit the user. The issue isn’t too different from the Social Network, privacy and personal space are of critical importance in the mobile environment and brands will abuse that at their peril.

Clearly, there’s massive appeal for location-specific applications that link brands to users and perhaps their social network as well. It’s likely we will see some interesting first moves in this space in 2008 from the fast food chains and the big retail brands. The iTunes, iPhone and Starbucks initiatve in 2007, is a taste of things to come.

Posted by Ed Cotton Dolce and Gabbana started it, Prada was next and now Levi's plans to continue the trend by launching a mobile phone of its own. It makes total sense that fashion brands should move where fashion is moving. Since technology has now acquired fashion status, fashion brands should be there.

How they do it will be the secret ingredient to success.

Just another phone with a fashion brand's name on it, isn't going to seal the deal, but if it's different and truly represents the equities of the brand, it might stand a chance.
 
Perhaps the real win, is for partnerships between the handset guys and the fashion houses.

You can understand why Levi's wants a piece of the fastest growing element of teen expenditure in the last ten years, but it's got to compete with brands who've been building credibility and equity in that space for a long period of time.

Handset makers aren't going to be rushing out and embracing deals with the fashion houses, they don't think they need to do it.

The houses will need to come to them first, perhaps the opportunity to gain additional distribution avenues could be very attractive for the handset guys.

Any takers for a Gap phone?


Posted by Ed Cotton