The rougher and readier cousin of Marketing magazine. You'll find ideas, gossip, commentary and a touch of cynicism as we flex our journalistic muscles beyond the constraints of our monthly mag.
This morning, a small section of our office had been debating whether or not Cloverfield is a bad movie with good marketing or a good movie but only if you don’t pay attention to the marketing.
Thanks to Getty Images who furnished my colleagues and I with tickets to watch the screening at VivoCity which I thought was an “awesome” movie – however, my colleagues had far less enthusiasm for it and after a few more “awesomes” from me this morning…I was hardly the most popular man at Lighthouse.
So what is the cause of this polarised opinion? Taking out of consideration that certain genres of movies just don’t appeal to some – I reckon the marketing and the hype the filmmakers attempted to stir prior to its release should take some of the blame.
The colleague, who had the most negative things to say about the movie, was the one in the office who knew the most about the movie, and had seen its viral marketing efforts, and was already raving about the film she hadn’t seen. In short, she was the one who had been infected the heaviest by Cloverfield’s viral marketing game plan which involved the strategic release of two trailers with the first trailer disclosing the release date and not the movie title, and second trailer confirming the title months later.
The appearance of an untitled trailer fuelled media speculation over the film’s plot that generated global hype and in the case of my colleague – led her to put the film on a pedestal just as so many did with the Blair Witch Project where an amazing amount of people within your inner circle of friends passed on the message that you’re about to watch the most scariest show ever… I was pretty disappointed at the end of that show.
This time however, I didn’t buy into the hype and watched Cloverfield without knowing anything about the film except that it was going to be told from the point of view of the protagonist’s video camera and that the statue of liberty’s head gets ripped off – cool I thought to myself.
At the end of the day, the basic success measurement of the marketing will be judge on crowd numbers that watch the film but it will interesting to wait and see what happens when disappointed film-goers start ripping into film via online platforms. Will that make more people want to see the film to judge for themselves or will it deter people from buying a ticket?
If you go to watch the film though, make sure you sit near the back because the shaky camera theme can be nauseating to some.
Let’s start with a little bit of history: Web (Browser) War I ended with IE’s victory over Netscape - that has since close to vanished.
Then it got a little haughty and a little lazy, sitting on its laurels and no new version from IE appeared for years.
2004, Mozilla roared into the picture. Web (Browser) War II between the victor of Web (Browser) War I and the noob thus started.
Oct 2006 was a significant month for technology. The unavoidable face-off occurred - IE retaliated and catapulted IE7 and Mozilla blasted out Firefox Ver 2.0.
The IE7 guys as a gesture of goodwill sent over a cake to congratulate Mozilla’s launch.
Since then, according to http://www.netapplications.com/, Mozilla’s market share rose from 7.82% (Feb 07) to 15.8% (Dec 07) last year. An amazing feat already but IE still reigns with over 75% of the market share.
Now back to the story.
To start of the year with a blast, Mozilla secretly launched a viral Campaign to push Firefox and announced it exclusively on TechCrunch on 7 January around 6am (so much for it being secret and viral) which can be described in a simple equation IE = Boredom - this formula it adopted to snigger at IE and keep its 'I’m Cool and Snazzy' status.
The foolhardy-daredevil planted a website http://www.fightagainstboredom.org/ , popped into blog sites, entered Facebook and posted a You-Tube video and decided to use STATISTICS probably with the intention to scare and wow, cos we all know numbers add credibility to any release.
A snippet here from the Tech Cruch article: " Compared to Internet Explorer users, Firefox users are: * 21% less likely to be a sales representative or agent at their current place of business. * 45% more likely to have gone on vacation in San Francisco within the last 2 years. * 33% less likely to live with others suffering from high cholesterol. * 6% less likely to have eaten any meal at Chick-fil-A within the last 7 days. * 24% less likely to live with others suffering from heart disease. * 66% more likely to have viewed or listened to audio or video about politics or public affairs news within the last 30 day. * 89% more likely to have purchased database software for work in the last year. * 38% less likely to live with others suffering from breast cancer. "
And then they probably sat back, patted themselves on the back and waited to see numbers jump and gleefully giggled for page hits.
And hit it did. Hard.
The first wave of Netizens started attacking, incensed and chastising them on their denigration of morals, their insensitivities to real-health issues like heart disease and cancer. One even pulled out Mozilla's mission statement as a case to highlight his disappointment with the developer.
Paul Kim, Mozilla’s VP of marketing probably pulled the plug when he entered the office, around 10 am the same morning the campaign rolled out, and started on damage control - Mozilla promptly took down the sites, and Kim personally replied to comments.
Reply 1: “ This is Paul Kim, VP of marketing for Mozilla. I want to apologize to anyone who was upset or offended by some of the stats on the not yet final website for this campaign. The list Techcrunch referenced was posted without a final review by Mozilla and wasn’t intended to be published as is. We’re working right now to correct this on the site, which goes live in a final formlater today.”
Nice… Blame the Press.
Reply 2: "Zachary: There is no way we would have gone live with a site that mocks cancer victims if there had been a review of these stats beforehand. Something went seriously wrong with our content development process, and I’m working to clean this up now. The site is up now for testing purposes, but should have been kept behind password authentication until we were ready to open it up. Regardless of these issues on our end, the main thing is to say that I take responsibility for the situation, and again, apologize to anyone who was upset by this."
And then he blogged:
Later today didn’t come and the site is still down.
Me wonders what will come out of this,
1. Blame a junior insider for the leak? 2. Blame the Press for jumping the gun? 3. Fire the marketing team that thought of the campaign? 4. Steer clear from Statistics? 5. Steer clear from Viral campaigns? 6. IE folks popping champagne and sending a cake again to Mozilla for a campaign well-done.
As publishers are learning to leverage their print brands in the digital world, monetising their online properties are top of mind for most.
At this week’s FIPP Worldwide Magazine Marketplace (WMM) conference, Meredith’s (a leading media and marketing giant in the US) chief development officer, general counsel and secretary John Zieser said there has to be separate sales teams for online and for print properties.
John Zieser
“Someone needs to wake up every morning and focus on the internet,” he said, adding that this person has to always consider how to increase the value of the net.
However, to prevent net sales person and print sales persons from tripping over one another, there has to be one person overseeing everything in the brand, stewarding the brand across difference channels.
For the brand’s biggest clients, though, there has to be 360 degree teams managing them across the media options, especially since most agencies today ask for print and multimedia “bundles”.
According to Donald Kummerfeld, president & CEO, FIPP (International Federation of the Periodical Press),75% of Vogue’s record 700+ ad pages in a single edition were sold bundled with something else.
Donald Kummerfeld
Kummerfeld also said with online properties, publishers should focus on profit, not revenue, because margins are “way higher” online than in print.
Zieser put things into perspective when he responded to a question from the floor on how much revenue Meredith today makes from online: “Our total revenue is two billion and, 100 million of that is purely from online.”
It is one of those moments when you don’t know whether to laugh, to cry, to roll your eyes or to just have a faint aching in your heart echoing your pity after watching something absolutely ludicrous (to some), but certainly new, unheard of and shall I say, different.
Yup, it’s the MDA Senior Management Rap!
Reports say that the rap video was meant to show a lighter side of the management and the ability to ‘walk the talk’ when it comes to spearheading creativity. Well, the first part has certainly been achieved…we hear it has definitely generated much laughter. As for walking the talk, that’s where it gets a little grey around the edges. Some don’t appreciate the organization’s efforts and wouldn’t consider that ‘creative’.
But somehow these guys from the MDA decided that to really showcase their ability to think out of the box and passion for developing Singapore as a creative hub, they had to really get down with the flo' yo'!
Question is: Is having top line executives and managers bop to the beat and mouth lyrics like “Experimentation is my cup of tea” going to help them with their many goals of ushering Singapore media onto the world stage?
Despite all the flack, one must admit that seeing a different side of the govt regulatory body has its merits. It demonstrates their willingness to be open, to change with the times and to not alienate itself from current trends. It makes you realise these guys have a sense of humour as well, not bad for a country once dubbed ‘uptight’. And that’s encouraging for the future of our media growth, even if we don’t dig their dance moves. After all, these guys have big plans for the Singapore media industry, as rapped about in the video.
But then before embarking on a corporate rap video, maybe they should’ve given it more consideration. Because having a mass rap party with senior managers while delivering their corporate vision, goals and daily operations takes quite a lot to pull off successfully.
Let’s analyze this from all angles, shall we?
Why this video is kinda cringe-worthy:
1. Rap uses concise, catchy and succinct sentences. The long sentences in the rap sounded like a normal speech these guys would give except they rhyme and it was spoken in a "rappish" manner. And the depth behind those words...I mean, RAP never had DEPTH! Most raps are either about sex, ice, rock (aka jewellery), being all glamorous or being so damn hot, sex, violence, did I mention sex?
2. It wasn't really rap rap, y'know waddamean? They had the CEO stand there and read some lines in a weird tone of voice and passed it off as rap...just cos' it rhymed and followed to the beat!
3. You can tell the lyrics are propaganda and PR-approved.
4. Sometimes it takes more than putting words like 'y'all' and 'rock-on' together with your message to make your message seem cool. Rap is all about the culture, the 'cool' factor right?
But don't you think "yo yo singapore rock on! We strive for the best yeah yeah you bet, and we’ll put singapore on world stage, go girl!" sounds kinda off? Yeah, I thought so.
Much less the lines in this rap. Check this out: "They call me the HDTV guy, my tasks include internal systems integration; HRFIS, PMP to iTrax, please stay tuned, next up channel X!" Er....ok.
5. Has any other government in the world done this?!
6. If it ain't comfortable, it ain't meant to be done. Some of them just look stiff. If you don't feel good or comfortable doing it, don't. If you really have to make a rap video, get people who are really enthusiastic about it.
7. They had a guy wearing a 'superman' looking costume, complete with red underwear worn outside, standing on top of some building. 'Nuff said.
Why this video is cool....in a way:
1. The way these senior guys danced...let’s face it, it’s kinda cute. There's something endearing about seeing seemingly ‘older therefore not so cool’ and ‘professional’ people try to dance and be hip. (I meant older than most people who rap properly)
2. They were actually gung-ho enough to do this, when they probably know they might (or rather, will) get embarrassed. Or wait, maybe the thought never occurred to them.
3. Some of them actually look like they were enjoying themselves…complete with happy dance moves and genuine smiles.
4. The way it's so "awwww"-inducing when you see 'em old guys trying to do something they think will really help 'em showcase their creativity (dancing so cutely and all) when you know it's not really working. But they did get a lot of attention; I suppose that's good enough.
5. Has any other govt in the world done this? :) We’re original, man!
In conclusion, though many can criticize their attempt (c'mon lah, not all of us can dance like Justin Timberlake either…) at least it goes to show these guys are open enough to do a rap video...seriously, which crazy government body has the guts to do that?
Singapore does.
And in a weird way, though people all over the world may laugh, I'm kinda proud of them simply cos' of that. (Plus, these guys demonstrated their ability to entertain!)
Okay, thank goodness I can stop using rappy words like 'y'all'...
For a brand that vigorously fights to protect its trademark goods from the mass interest of counterfeiters worldwide, Louis Vuitton must have been surprised to see Britney Spears ripping off the brand for her video ‘Do Something’.
It’s been a while now since the video aired on MTV and on sites such as YouTube but on Monday LV won a lawsuit that alleged the video violated counterfeiting laws by showing a pink dashboard with designs similar to the brand’s Cherry Blossoms design. A Paris court has not punished Britney but instead ordered Sony BMG and MTV online to stop marketing the video.
I guess the sight of Britney tapping her fingers on the dashboard from inside her pink Hummer, was a little too much for LV to not do anything – especially since the brand already is a prime target for counterfeiters.
Or perhaps they watched the entire video and felt compelled to respond to her numerous requests for someone to ‘Do Something’.
The video is still on YouTube and the offending bit is about 30 seconds into the video...
The appearance of an untitled trailer fuelled media speculation over the film’s plot that generated global hype and in the case of my colleague – led her to put the film on a pedestal just as so many did with the Blair Witch Project where an amazing amount of people within your inner circle of friends passed on the message that you’re about to watch the most scariest show ever… I was pretty disappointed at the end of that show.
This time however, I didn’t buy into the hype and watched Cloverfield without knowing anything about the film except that it was going to be told from the point of view of the protagonist’s video camera and that the statue of liberty’s head gets ripped off – cool I thought to myself.
