This could be an amazing way to leave a temporary mark in a temporary world, or it could just be a mad dude from Christchurch chasing something only he can see under the New Brighton Pier.
Whatever you think of his intentions, the effect is mesmerising.
I’ll be spending this year trying to keep the same type of giggling enthusiasm for the creative work I’m lucky enough to undertake on a daily basis.
Ever wonder what happens to a creative after they win a Young Lion? They keep on creating beautiful communications.
My mate Frae won a Young Lion a couple of years back, after many years of working for little or nothing, based only on a belief he could do the job and do it well.
He now lives in the land of clocks and chocolate delivering ideas around the globe; the video above showcases the latest piece of work he and his creative partner have been been involved in.
I love the use of thermodynamic ink, the message strikingly clear that your hands can make a difference. I also love that in an increasing digital world, there are still ideas left that leverage the power of touch in building a memorable connection.
I’d encourage you to show some support and share it, and to go lend a hand if you have the time and resources to get to the Gulf Coast.
Sometimes, I look at the weird, human analogue robots trying to walk up stairs and think that no-one will will ever manage to make one that is both cheap and universally useful.
Then I see something like this that restores my faith in humans and their ability to mash up the tools that are available to them and create something that does an elegant job, enormously effectively. I for one have had countless occasions where I’ve been holding a rubiks cube and just wanting to get it solved, and now there is the perfect solution.
How do you encourage the creativity of your audience once your product is in their hands?
Humans throughout eternity have yearned for the horizon, been fascinated at the inner workings of the tiniest motes or simply striven to to articulate a better, more elaborate or possibly more simple story to convey their experience of the world unfolding around them.
Books, maps and the written word gave this movement for more much. The ability to share, learn and build on the ideas of others became possible and then prevalent.
Technology has continued to play a driving role, allowing humans to delve ever deeper into the world around them.
What does all this mean for strategic communications? I hear all who have waded through the florid sentences above protest.
Immense technology is now in the hands of the individual in all developed markets and many developing ones. In this brave new world considered thought or intellectual prowess are no longer the tickets of admission, it seems now that the whole world is embarked on a new age of discovery, one where it is no longer enough to discover. Many individuals display behaviours around the acquisition of social capital, a new form of value ripped from finding the best, the newest, the most authentic and sharing it with your circle(s).
As brands, how are you making your story discoverable? It’s no longer enough to buy your way in front of an audience, the value of finding a story is diminished if it feels like it has been placed there, and how do you encourage sharing and make it as easy as possible, without it seeming as though it was built to be that way.
I always used to think that the way Macaulay Culkin’s character in the Home alone movies came up with madcap ideas to foil the hapless bandits trying to do him ill were, well, Hollywood fantasy.
I stumbled across the article below however, and it appears that the thinking might not have been so far fetched. The research is old by today’s standards, published in Inc in 2003. It points to a stronger result from individuals than groups in the formation of ideas.
The prime stalking ground for the perfect brainstorm can be found at the University of Texas at Arlington’s Group Creativity Lab. That’s where, for the past 14 years, psychologist Paul Paulus has delved into the science behind eurekas, staging more than 1,000 brainstorming sessions, varying the conditions, and measuring the results. Want to know whether it’s better to write ideas down or say them out loud during a session? Paulus has tested it, and knows the answer. (Write it down.) How many breaks should the ideal brainstorm entail? (Plenty.) Do the best ideas come at the beginning of a brainstorm or at the end? (The end.)
An Army of One
Paulus’s first piece of advice will strike most as surprising, if not heretical: The group is not God. Group brainstorming, used day in and day out by countless business owners, really doesn’t work that well, according to Paulus. You’re almost always better off directing your employees to brainstorm individually. In one recent study, conducted at a Texas energy company looking for ways to be more innovative, Paulus found that groups with four members generated about half as many ideas as four individuals brainstorming alone. Back in the lab, the results were the same, whether it was students investigating new uses for the paper clip or university staffers looking to cut costs.
The problem is that the simple act of being in a group creates a set of distractions that is difficult to overcome, explains Steven M. Smith, a cognitive psychologist who studies the creative process at Texas A&M in College Station. While in a group, individuals are forced to deal with subconscious urges to conform to what others are saying, anxieties about pleasing the boss, and their own social inhibitions. In the midst of all that, who can concentrate on having an idea?
What’s more, research shows that groups often harbor illusions of their own effectiveness. Paulus will often interrupt a brainstorming session and ask the group to rate its effectiveness. In almost all cases, groups award themselves higher scores than do individuals–even though groups generate far fewer ideas. This means that groups are more likely than an individual to throw in the towel early. (Hey, that’s a great idea. Let’s stop. Where’s that beer?)
Obviously, when Macaulay hooked up with his party crowd, the quantity and quality of his ideas went down, resulting in the somewhat striking photo that leads this post.
Personally, I have found success in the brainstorming environment when large groups are split into smaller teams, ideally three or four. Ideas are generated quickly, often by a lead individual and then strengthened by the team. It also seems to overcome the fear that some participants have over the quality of their ideas and their own willingness to share their thoughts in front of the group when ownership is shared across the group.
The 6-3-5 technique also harnesses some individual brilliance while also opening up some of the benefits of a collaborative session too.
I often think I am blessed to have been born in New Zealand.
It is a place of great beauty and wonderful character, and while it’s history may be young in comparisonwith much of the globe, both the indigenous people of New Zealand and those who have come after have developed rich traditions of storytelling and ways of expressing themselves.
There is one concept in particular that I have been thinking about in particular of late, a concept encapsulated in the Maori word, Tūrangawaewae.
Tūrangawaewae means a place to stand. It’s history begins with the Maori King movement, but has evolved to be a concept understood by many in New Zealand, communicating a sense of connection and empowerment to a place, a person’s home in perhaps the truest sense of all.
From a brand communications perspective, I think it is often easy to ignore a brand’s tūrangawaewae in telling stories and executing campaigns in the wild. This disconnection saps much of the power of the message, disconnecting it from its most powerful foundations and often robbing it of purpose.
So how can you avoid this disconnect?
Think of fans as your extended family.
Fans of a brand do not pop up over night. They are born out of experience more often than advertising, although great work will always make a difference. Fans investigate your history and will often play a role in its chronicle.
They become an integral part of a brand’s story because of their knowledge and also their passion for retelling your tales to others. Harness this behaviour. Like a family reunion provides an opportunity for sharing stories, filling in gaps and collective dreaming about the future, try to imbue the outreach to your fans with the same type of feeling. Be happy to see them. Listen with respect. Reply with sincerity.
Fans will feel a connection to the brands home as well, when done well, your sense of place will become a part of theirs. Actions, intended or otherwise, that break the connection with a brands sense of place will often be met with hostility, or worse.
Don’t just have a brand position, have a point of view.
I lose track of the number of documets that come across my desk, articulating a brands position at an intersection of social trends, consumer needs or technological visions.
I’d agree that the exercise of establishing a position is an important step in articulating what your brand will become, but for many the process ends there. It seems like many companies these days misunderstand their stated desire to acquire brand love like an Apple. Talking about yourself constantly and unerringly, however eloquent, is a carryover from the days when TV advertising guaranteed an empty warehouse, a full bank account and Old Fashioned cocktails at a mid-morning meeting.
Articulating a point of view makes more sense in a world where social and informal media channels form an ever more valauble part of the mix. A point of view allows a brand to take part in the zietgiest, wrapping product and brand messaging in the relevancy of the now.
If your point of view is rooted in your brands sense of place, this activity will avoid its biggest risk factor, coming across as trite and opportunist.
Make the pilgramage back to your roots.
Many brands have discovered the value in returning to their roots. Be it a repackaging in the livery of yesteryear, or rolling out a spoke/person/muppet/cartoon/character of old, there is commercial benefit in harking back to another time.
The great thing with having an articulated sense of place is that you can travel away from it, visit new places and make new friends.
The key to longevity as a brand is the ability to reatin the sense of connection to it and keep the route back to your place open. Bringing back stories of travel, intrigue and drama will excite the base and give the fans you’ve dragged back a point of connection with your existing audience.
It seems like every business on earth is looking to get the consumer involved with their marketing efforts these days.
We’ll get them to submit videos, write stories, come up with our advertising.
We’ll incentivize them with prizes, cash and a money can’t buy experience.
I spotted this today on my feed from BoingBoing and, well, just loved it.
The Post Office on the island of Molokai in Hawaii allows visitors to post a coconut anywhere in the world. They have a selection you can choose from for free, or you can bring your own if you like. People are encouraged to get creative and decorate their nut. For an island of 7000 souls, without a dedicated tourism organisation, I thought this was a wonderful way to spread their message and involve people in telling the story of their visit. They don’t need an incentive, being part of a little magic by posting a coconut is more than enough.
This probably didn’t even start out as marketing, or at least doesn’t feel like it did. Maybe that’s what we should be striving for as we facilitate talkability with our clients.
I remember a few years ago in Shanghai, pitching a gaming company an idea of launching a game on the megalithic buildings on the Pudong side of the Bund, with real life gamers having a chance to play in a way they could never have imagined. It never got off the ground, but I was stoked to see the launch video from London of Crysis 2 on DigiBuzz yesterday.
Console gaming is now a truly ridiculous immersive experience, I wish some of the publishers and consoles here would break out of the “in-home” experiential sets, take things to the streets and really make a splash.
I’m a massive fan of the concept of popup. Be it the restaurant we ran here in Sydney on behalf of our client, Positively Wellington Tourism, or one of my idea’s from running my own agency up in Shanghai (albeit, executed in London), the idea of surprising people in their everyday lives with something physical in an unexpected space is one that obviously connects.
I guess that’s whay I’ve been so impressed by my friend, Jason Chan, and his involvement with one of the most ambitious popup executions I have seen, Greenhouse by Joost.
The Greenhouse started life two years ago, in Melbourne, with a large temporary gallery space nestled into the sharp and hard lines of the then new Federation Square. The project had at its core the concept of sustainability, from materials used in construction, to the re-appropriated jam jars from which you sipped your coffee.
Last year, this time in Perth, Joost once again used a combination of found and sustainable construction materials to build a slightly more compact Greenhouse, with a stronger focus on food and beverage and locally sourced ingredients to match the construction.
Now in the third iteration, Greenhouse once again is providing Joost with a playground for his ideas on sustainable construction living buildings. This time though, the project is not a bespoke build for a single unique location, this time the Greenhouse can travel.
Three shipping containers provide the core of the structure, housing kitchen, convenience and storage. The framing of the two level restaurant and bar fits into these containers as it makes the trek from location to location. Plywood cladding and the plants that literally cover the structure will be sourced locally as the experience unpacks in Milan, Budapest, London and a long list of other prospective locations. The striking herringbone floor of the Sydney expression recently functioned as a set of factory conveyor belts, now cut down to rectangular tiles.
Food wise, local ingredients rule. Flour is milled and bread is made daily on site, using a wood fired oven. Milk arrives farm fresh in a bucket to be processed into cheese and yoghurt. Kegged mineral water forms the basis of house made lemonade and tonic. Cut down brown bottles serve the beer, jam jars the wine and cocktails.
Oil from the deep fryers powers the onsite generator. Local straw bales line the walls as insulators. The furniture all is made from something else, billboard canvas covers the tables. Some folk are calling this the greenest structure on the planet right now.
What all this adds up to, is something very special. It is this unique story that has given them access to the fantastic site on Sydney’s foreshore, with views of both the Opera House and the Bridge. It’s a multi million dollar site that if you were simply flogging a product, it would be near on impossible to secure and would eat up the budget. So unique is the offer from JAson and Joost, Sydney’s Harbour Foreshore Authority has come to the party with funds not fees. London is offering Trafalgar Square, it is quite simply amazing.
How do you build out and idea for a client that gets this type of support? Is it even possible to do?
That’s what will be ticking over in my head for the next week and year.
The Sydney visit of the Greenhouse by Joost last for six weeks, get down there and enjoy it.
I am the Creative Director at Hill & Knowlton in Sydney.
I've worked in a few different parts of the agency world and ran my own shop in Shanghai for a while, launching super premium products into the world's largest marketplace.
I am fascinated by what's coming next, how new networks offer a company like H&K the opportunity to flex our earned media muscle and deliver great work for the clients we work with and the brands they breathe life into.
I write about campaigns that work and some that don't, from Australia and around the world. Sometimes the world of social media will hold me in its sway and occasionally I'll just post something that inspires me and hopefully you as well.
Please comment, I'll respond to as many as I physically can.
