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The braincells blog

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Printing as part of an integrated marketing strategy

Since the introduction of the Internet advertisers have been looking towards digital marketing as a new way to spend their advertising budget. The popularity of digital marketing can be linked to its effectiveness, potential for exposure and convenience. While it is expected that advertisers will continue to use digital marketing, there still exists a key role for print as part of an integrated marketing campaign. The best way for advertisers to be marketing their business is to use as many channels as possible to reach every area of their target market.

There are many reasons why print is an effective tool for delivering your message to your audiences, and will continue to be so:

Printed Collateral

Printed collateral can form an integral part of a marketing strategy. It can capture the attention of potential customer particularly for small and emerging businesses on a tight budget. A brochure or booklet can focus entirely on a business and its offering, thereby getting undivided attention. Effective marketing campaigns are all about customer interactions, brochures are simply just another way to interact with customers and generate leads for the sales teams to follow up.

Direct Marketing

Direct Marketing enables us to contact prospective customers in a way that may be more effective than digital marketing. It is a particularly good way to target a small demographic of people. It allows you to mail advertising directly to those customers who are most likely to want what you are selling, and those who do not want to search extensively for what they want online. Many prospective clients still enjoy the ritual of reading through “junk mail” and dedicate time to looking at this.

Variable Printing

One way to engage personally with customers is by using variable printing. It isn’t a new process, but has become more popular since advancements in print technology have lowered costs. Variable printing allows each piece of media to be customised by changing certain elements from piece to piece. Personalised print media has a more powerful presence than a personalised email, as audiences can recognize that it takes more effort to customise.

Point of Sale

Point of Sale (POS) materials  are used for executing advertising campaigns, exhibitions and presentations. When well thought out and properly presented, they are an effective marketing tool. Due to their appealing and informative nature, POS materials are capable of attracting consumers attention and stimulating purchases directly at the point of sale. POS materials can include wobblers, shelf-talkers, counter cards, price tags, promotional stands, roll-stands, banners and hard posters. POS can also be integrated with QR technology to integrate an online and print marketing strategy.

QR Codes

QR codes are a great way of integrating print and digital media. When scanned with a smartphone, a QR code will take you to a homepage or a special offer page that lives on the web. Slightly different to a QR code, is NFC (near-field communication) tag. This new technology requires the touching or tapping of a NFC enabled device towards a tag, which triggers a connection with an online document. Many businesses are adopting these as a means of marketing. These technologies can be used more creatively then just connecting your audience to a website. They can be used to share files, play videos, or encourage your audience to share with others.

Signage

Signs can be an essential component of a business's overall marketing strategy. While a sign that contains a business's logo can help reinforce its brand it can also attract new business. Customers are more likely to purchase from a business they have already heard of, so a sign can help plant the seed for future sales. Exterior signs draw attention to your place of business and help differentiate it from others on the street. Strategically placed billboards can convey a concise message to passing motorists. You can also place vehicle graphics on the side of your vehicle to serve as a form of mobile advertising. Because an exterior sign is visible 24 hours a day, its effect is continuous.

Conclusion

No matter how important digital marketing becomes, there will always be a large audience can be reached through print marketing. The best way to market your business is to utilise as many channels as possible to reach every corner of your target market; this should not exclude print. Finding the right balance between various media will ensure a steady revenue flow, an increase in sales and new customers.

Sarah Parsons - Production Manager

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“L’Oreal’s Digital Makeover”

Makeup Giant, L’Oreal, has recently released their new app, which quite frankly, is genius!

This tech savvy marketing app uses facial mapping technology to transform smartphones into your own personal makeup mirror, allowing consumers worldwide to try on various products from the comfort of their own home!

 In Australia, within the first three weeks, the app had been downloaded over 500 000 times! The real time makeup technology tracks your facial movements and expressions in all kinds of lighting, giving you a unique and personalized experience.

L’Oreal Makeup Genius Link So how is this app apart of L’Oreal’s overall vision to doubling their customer base to two billion by 2020?

This app was created purely to create awareness for L’Oreal and their products. With the launch itself using high profiled celebrities including Eva Longoria, Julianne Moore and Australian Supermodel Megan Gale the high profiled media attention for this app keeps on growing.

 In Australia alone, L’Oreal has increased their digital spending from 10% to 30% in the last two years. This is new territory for a brand that has always been product centric and product marketing focused, relying mainly on TV and print advertisement. Investing a large proportion of their budget into the development and marketing of the app instead of a new product launch is courageous move and represents a shift in the marketing culture.

With 40-50% of all web traffic already coming from mobile devices, L’Oreal has identified an opportunity to not only create a fun and innovative way for consumers to view products, but also invested in the future for online shopping and product research.

  “The first and main thing is very much through word of mouth through earned media. What we want to do given that it’s an innovative digital technology is very much focus our efforts in that area, with a large face-to-face launch with key media tonight, the app is very much front and centre,” Cameron Woods, Marketing Director.

 “It’s very much to get people telling people, sharing it with people. Ideally the love for the app and the noise around it will spread quite organically.”

 “Second to that we will underpin it with an online media spend and trying as much as possible to integrate the app into everything we do,” he added.

 “Lots of media moving forward, making sure it’s got an in-store presence so when people are standing in our retailers at the point-of-purchase if they need that last moment of experiencing a product prior to putting it on or buying it then they are able to do that as well.”

 Success of this app at this point is based on the number of downloads rather than an increase in sales. L’Oreal aimed to reach half a million downloads by the end of the year and have reached this target in a matter of months. Once L’Oreal has introduced the ecommerce functionality future success can be measured by the impact on product sales.

  Emily Noble - Junior Account Manager

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Handy Apps for Agencies

Apart from the obvious apps everyone knows and uses like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn etc, I thought I’d have a look and see what else is out there for agency to use. Hopefully to help not hinder in all that day-to-day stuff. So here’s few iPhone Apps I’ve found that might come in handy, with just a brief description to go with it. These are all on the iTunes App Store if you’d like to find out more.

Adobe Apps

PDFs are every ones favourite form of sending files – a must have. Although, do be aware for Adobe products you will need an Adobe Cloud subscription. Just PDF Reader is included as a feature in a lot of apps now. Adobe also has iPhone apps for Photoshop, Illustrator, Lightroom, Colour CC, Connect Mobile, Connect Viewer and more.

Documents Free

It’s Free! It’s a mobile office suite – files can be opened using Microsoft Word and Excel, Open Office, Numbers, and all major office suites.

Scanner Pro by Readdle

Scanner Pro transforms your iPhone and iPad into portable scanners. It allows you to scan receipts, whiteboards, paper notes, or any multipage document and save as a PDF file you can email or print.

File Pro Ultimate File Manager & PDF Reader

This one costs a few dollars, but includes a lot of stuff, from managing files/ folders, emails, dropbox, PDF reader, PDF scanner, audio recorder, import photos/video and editing TXT files. – nice to have it all in one app.

Dragon Dictation

Another freebie. This one is an easy-to-use voice recognition app that lets you dictate your message, translate it to text (apparently five times faster than you could type it), then send it via sms or email, or copy and paste.

CamCard

CamCard reads business cards and save instantly to your phone contacts. It syncs all your cards across smartphones, tablets, computers and the web app. No more need for keeping all the paper business cards. Eliminate your business card clutter. 


 There are also a lot of apps around for managing day-to-day business. They let you record receipts (some you can photograph within the app), track travel, manage expenses blah blah blah. All that stuff the accounts department hassle you about at the end of the month. Here’s just a few…

Shoeboxed Australia

Media Pro

Xero

Invoice2go

XpenseTracker

 MyPantone

And finally - this one is one of my favourites, it cost $12.99. Everyone in the advertising industry knows and understands Pantone colours. The app has all the libraries we’re used to using – including metallic and pastels. It lets you capture and extract colours from a photo; save colour palettes you’ve created or will automatically generate harmonious colour combos.

That’s it for my app search for now, but in my searching I did notice a little bit of a phenomenon.

There appears to be an increase in Ad Agencies creating their own apps. These feature galleries of their work (both print and video), plus services and contact details, pretty much everything you’d find on a website condensed into an app. Agencies such as Anx Agency, DDB Warsaw (#Doodad), Gravity Global World. What will be next!!

Deirdre Walker – Finished Artist

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The Internet of Me

The Internet of Me has generated a lot of buzz recently, but what does it mean? And what can marketers learn from it?If it seems like Facebook is reading your mind, it isn’t – but it does have a very good understanding of how your mind works. The smallest aspects of your online habits, from how long you linger on a photo of your ex to whose events you RSVP to, are all compiled to create a complete picture of your ideal Facebook experience.

When searching for information, Google displays results according to their ‘relevancy algorithm’ (this means Google will list results in such a way that the records most likely to be of interest to you will be displayed first). So what you end up reading is, usually, what you want to be reading.

Netflix have just invested in a ‘recommendation system’, so that when you visit the Netflix app, the first thing you see is what you came to the site for – or at the vey least, relevant enough to keep you there.

As we become more dependent on technology, the ability for our online experiences to influence our real world experiences becomes less of theory and more a reality. Anywhere that we can express an interest, we’re paid back in personalised, optimised content - every time we check into our apps; we make our preferences known and then have them fed back to us. New technology is getting personal; connecting and analysing our movements, our health, our brains and our devices. This is the so-called ‘Internet of Me’.

57,000 devices are added to the Internet every second!! But this is only valuable if those devices are learning about our lives and working together to create experiences that are simpler, more valuable and more informed.

A great example is the Phoenician Resort, an SPG Hotel. When you enter the hotel, the reservation system connects with your device, checking you in and confirming your stay. You then go to your room, using your device to unlock the door. Before you step in, the room has already adjusted the lighting, music and content on the TV based on the integrated network of data your ‘Internet of Me’ is sharing with the environment.

Consumers want complete, integrated and personalised experiences that are connected to them.

What does this mean for marketers?

This means not only will there be higher demand to capture and analyse and connect data for our consumers, but the kinds of data we must adapt to will change to include more sources than we could have ever imagined.

Consumers expect brands to know, respect and interact with them just as consistently in the offline world as the digital world. They want continuous experiences created specifically for them and at the exact moment they want them, whether browsing apps at home or strolling aisles in the store. This will enable brands to go much deeper, to be where the customer is experiencing the brand, capturing and connecting up the right data, and using it to create personalised experiences across the entire customer journey.

Using data more effectively means we can tailor marketing messages that are relevant and based on real-time preferences. With the mobile device acting as a remote control for our lives, marketers should use data to serve up relevant content to customers via their mobile phone whether about their location, tailored offers, or content that is locally relevant. In a world where consumers expect to get what they want, when they want it, marketers need to make sure interactions and communications are timely, simple, and personally relevant to their customer.

Andrea Bennett - Project Manager

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Changing behaviour starts with empathy - the first step of innovating through Design Thinking.

How many times have you left a formal meeting and doubted that it would result in any change to the status quo? So many times we get together to solve a problem and nothing is accomplished - it’s frustrating. Sadly, many approaches to solving business challenges are misaligned because innovative, business changing ideas are fleeting and difficult to identify. This is what design thinking addresses. It is a 5-step method of thinking that enables businesses to develop innovative ways to solve problems. Developed by internationally renowned global design firm IDEO, design thinking is now helping many successful organisations to innovate and grow.

Allowing the proper time to think is something that many businesses overlook; more frequently they repeat old behaviours and so are unable to change to meet new market demands. How do organisations break entrenched behaviour? In an increasingly changing world, it’s reassuring to understand that innovation stems from empathising with and paying very close to your customer.

Centre on the customer; shake well

On their own, organisations tend to generate ideas that serve their needs more than the customer’s. Their decisions are founded on good intentions, but can sometimes fail horribly for the customer when made in isolation. Customer-centricity is the main word here. It’s one way to help elevate the empathy factor—a key in isolating and defining the problem.

WHAT is empathising?

Empathy is the foundation of a human-centered design process. To empathise, you:

Observe. View customers and potential customers (users) and their behaviour in the context of their lives.

Engage. Interact with and interview users through both scheduled and short ‘intercept’ encounters.

Immerse. Experience what your user experiences.

WHY empathise?

The customer is the centre of any creative person’s world; it is essential to understand the people for whom you are designing or influencing. The problems you are trying to solve are rarely your own—they are those of particular users; in order to create anything for your users, you must build empathy for who they are and what is important to them.

Watching what people do and how they interact with their environment gives you clues about what they think and feel. It helps you to learn about what they need. By watching people you can capture physical manifestations of their experiences, what they do and say. This will allow you to interpret intangible meaning of those experiences in order to uncover insights. These insights will lead you to the innovative solutions. The best solutions come out of the best insights into human behaviour.

But learning to recognise those insights is harder than you might think. Why? Because our minds automatically filter out a lot of information in ways we aren’t even aware of. We need to learn to see things “with a fresh set of eyes” – tools for empathy, along with a human-cantered mindset, is what gives us those new eyes.

Engaging with people directly reveals a tremendous amount about the way they think and the values they hold. Sometimes these thoughts and values are not obvious to the people who hold them. A deep engagement can surprise both the designer and the designee by the unanticipated insights that are revealed. The stories that people tell and the things that people say they do—even if they are different from what they actually do—are strong indicators of their deeply held beliefs about the way the world is. Good designs are built on a solid understanding of these kinds of beliefs and values.

As well as speaking with and observing your users, having personal experience in the design space yourself is useful. Find (or create if necessary) experiences in which to immerse yourself to better understand the situation that your users are in, and for which you are designing.

And most importantly, assume a beginner’s mindset.

Why assume a beginner’s mindset?

We all carry our experiences, understanding, and expertise with us. These aspects of you are incredibly valuable assets to bring to the design challenge – but at the right time, and with intentionality. Your assumptions may be misconceptions and stereotypes, and can restrict the amount of real empathy you can build. Assume a beginner’s mindset in order to put aside these biases, so that you can approach a design challenge with fresh eyes.

How to assume a beginner’s mindset?

Don’t judge.

Just observe and engage users without the influence of value judgments upon their actions,circumstances, decisions, or “issues.” Question everything.

Question even (and especially) the things you think you already understand. Ask questions to learn about how the user perceives the world. Think about how a 4-year-old asks “Why?” about everything. Follow up an answer to one “why” with a second “why.”

Be truly curious.

Strive to assume a posture of wonder and curiosity, especially in circumstances that seem either familiar or uncomfortable.

Find patterns.

Look for interesting threads and themes that emerge across interactions with users.

Listen. Really. Lose your agenda and let the scene soak into your psyche. Absorb what users say to you, and how they say it, without thinking about the next thing you’re going to say.

Empathising is much more than identifying target markets and doing a bit of background reading on the topic at hand, it’s the first rigorous step of design thinking that enables businesses to successfully convert need into demand.

Jeff Champtaloup - Managing Partner & Creative Director

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Be Brave, Be Vulnerable.

“Vulnerability is the birth place of creativity, innovationand change”,Brene Brown.

 Brene Brown’s, “The Power of Vulnerability”, was presentedin 2010 as a TEDx talk.

 Her talk was so powerful that it grew in numbers, so much so that today it has clocked over 19 million views and is listed as one of the 11 must see TED talks. Her book “Daring Greatly”, published two years later delves into this subject deeper and is a must read.

The core message being; to live fully we need to be vulnerable to ourselves, to people, situations and events in all aspects of our life.  

 Even work.

 This means feeling insecure, suggesting off-beat ideas; asking difficult questions, finding alternative routes or solutions, creating or presenting something that the client isn’t expecting, learning something new, or admitting if you haven’t cracked it or know the solution…just yet.

 All of these options can and do bring out the cold sweats. But these sweats also are the genesis of new techniques, superior strategies, great lines, new ideas, innovative products, beautiful design and engaging communications.

 Sometimes too, these ideas or options ask the client to be vulnerable. Maybe speak to a different market or speak to the market in a different way, modify the product, or take a non- traditional route to market.

 So, if vulnerability is the birthplace to creativity, innovation and a more connected life why is it really hard to be vulnerable?

 Brown suggests that the biggest hinder to vulnerability is shame. The shame of: failure, of imperfection, or, just not being “enough”.

 And sure while guilt is pretty powerful its influence can be positive because it can illicit action, but shame is just destructive, it  “erodes our courage and fuels disengagement”.

 Jung, describes shame as a ”soul eating emotion”.

 And so this brings me to another Ted talk that was only published on the weekend. Monica Lewinsky’s, “The Price of Shame”, is just over 20 minutes of compelling viewing.  

 Her notoriety is understood given her story but what she clearly communicates is the danger of the Internet, social media and its outright sport of shame.

 Her public shaming occurred just at the birth of the Internet. Sure there was no social media, but overnight her story and images went global. She became a one-dimensional character that we feasted on. She was 22.

 She speaks of other examples, the most disturbing being a young college student who was filmed without consent.  He was no one famous, just a regular person like you and me. This film was then sent via social media. His distress became unpalatable.

The Internet, specifically social media provides the perfect incubator to shame. It knows no boundaries. Shame sells – it is then repackaged and sold again and again.  

 As a society we seem to become more and more desensitised to shame. If this is the currency of social media what will be the cost?  

 Lewinksy will not doubt receive some criticism for entering the public domain. However I am incredibly impressed. It is a gut wrenching display of vulnerability. And, through that brave daring act, will hopefully elicit discussion and change.

 “That’s what life is about, about daring greatly, being in the arena”, Brene Brown

 Links and Images for Blog: http://www.ted.com/talks/brene_brown_on_vulnerability?language=en

 https://www.ted.com/talks/monica_lewinsky_the_price_of_shame

Amanda Cinanni - Project Director

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This blog is compulsive reading.

Over summer, our office developed a compulsion with the record-breaking podcast Serial. (For those few who aren’t aware of it - it’s a journalists’ investigation into the 1999 murder of a teenage girl in Maryland, in which the convicted ex-boyfriend still protests his innocence: serialpodcast.org)

Intrigued by the fervour, I decided to give it a listen and was instantly hooked. I ripped through all 12 episodes in 2 days. Powerful stuff.

As someone who’s job it is to get people to listen to a message, I realised that this was communications gold: its had over 5 million downloads; dedicated discussion forums have sprouted across the web; countless bloggers are dissecting its success. And people are hungry for more.

So it got me thinking - is there something I can take from Serial to inject into our advertising concepts? A formula that could transform a simple marketing message into compulsive listening?

It gets interesting when you start looking at definitions of “compulsive”: – repetitious behaviour that doesn’t lead to an actual reward or pleasure – an attempt to make obsessions go away.

So is that what it was? Did I feel compelled to keep listening to Serial just to make it go away? Now that I think about it, that could be right. Every episode I really just wanted to know - were they going to find that conclusive piece of evidence that exonerated or condemned the accused? What did the finished puzzle look like?

Discussing the science of “rubber-necking”, Michael Stevens (internet philosopher and creator of the Vsauce YouTube channel) says “We often find uncertainty more unpleasant than unpleasant certainty.” In other words - we need to know who dunnit. The human mind is uncomfortable when it’s left to wander through unlimited potential scenarios of abhorrence (our obsession with MH370 is another example of this). At least when we know the full story we can start the process of trying to understand the human behaviour involved, as it relates to ourselves.

Another aspect of Serial that compelled me was the narrative style of Sarah Koenig (host and creator of the show). It was conversational, honest, winding and uncertain. It echoed my own thinking, making me feel involved in the investigation – as though I was discovering the truth alongside her.

This was helped by the fact that new information was being discovered right up until the final episode was produced. I found it tantalizing that there was no foregone conclusion. No opportunity to turn to the end of the book to see how it ended. This was happening now - and I was a part of it. (Currency can not be under-rated. I know it’s not just me that has the occasional obsession with the BOM radar website...)

The openly inconclusive presentation of information inspired debate (both in my own mind, and around the water cooler), adding to my personal investment in the series.

And finally - I was compelled to hear this story because it was true. There is so much more gravity in a series of events that have actually taken place (I care a lot more about who killed Hae Min Lee than who killed Laura Palmer). It requires serious introspection – could a teenager, just like me in so many ways, commit cold-blooded murder? It became a test of something that we all hold very dear - our judgement of character.

So, what’s the formula, then? From my own experience of Serial, it’s compulsive pull came from: • posing an unsolved puzzle • focussing on unsettling aspects of human nature • involving the listener • inviting debate • unfolding in the present • being real.

Whether or not these aspects of storytelling can be applied to advertising is questionable. Clearly it’s not as simple as tacking a washing powder on to the end of a murder mystery. The product needs to be either believably incidental, or integral to the story.

By considering these factors, we may not be able to create truly compulsive advertising, but we should be able to make a campaign that’s at least a little compelling.

Liz Hammond – Art Director

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An Expose into the Craft of Finished Art

A long long time ago (back in the 80s and before), graphic designersand art directors hand-did their design concepts sitting at a drafting tablewith black art-liners, coloured markers and a set-square. They then briefed specialists, who used rub down lettering, scalpels, wax, spray glue, complex colour overlays and bromide cameras (in darkrooms with all their foul smelling chemicals) to convert the creatives’ sketches, type and graphics to “print ready” artwork - neatness and attention to detail were a must. These were the ‘finished artists’ or ‘paste-up artists’.

Fast forward to the 1990s, with the onset of computers….

Then they became called ‘mac operators’ (because Apple Macs were the original choice of artist all over the world, and still the best in my opinion) or maybe even ‘graphic artists’.

Apple MacIntosh SE – How cute was that!

Around this time everybody wanted to be a designer! Newsflash: For most finished artists you either had been or were smart enough to realise early on that finished art was your craft, which just meant you probably thought in a totally different way to a creative - ie logically, practically, and slightly anally – so being a finished artist was a great career option, especially as production departments in ad agencies generally had more finished artists on staff than creatives.

As a finished artist you were expected to have all the technical skills with computers that the creatives lacked. Originally with applications such as PageMaker and Freehand, and later with QuarkXpress and Illustrator. And, of course, the forever loved and long lasting Photoshop. Plus a better than average understanding of the printing industry. There was so much to learn!

Fast forward to the present day, still with computers, and now with the internet….

 The latest incarnation of our title is the ‘artworker’ or ‘electronic artist’. Staying up to date has become very important. Although the role still requires bang on technical knowledge of applications and also printing industry requirements, the finished artist now also needs to have knowledge of the internet – what works, what doesn’t, working with pixels instead of millimeters, and even with moving or rolling images.

Although most creatives now design their work on computers, finished artists are still required. They are the final check point before a job goes to press or print, and can save a client a lot of money if a job is set up correctly. So, 30 years on, attention to detail is still the most important skill of a finished artist, and probably still with be 10 years from now.

What’s next for the finished artist? Who knows! But I’m hoping it involves 3D – think I’d like to learn that next :)

  De Walker - Finished Artist

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The Impending Peril of Ignoring Font Licensing

When I first started writing this blog about font licensing acolleague expressed their concern that I was rehashing information that people inthe industry already knew. It made me think - do people in our industry really know how fonts are allowed to be used, or are they simply turning a blind eye to how fonts are used? Maybe it is a bit of both.

 If you work in the creative side of the industry you certainly should have a fairly good understanding of font licensing. Despite this, it’s not uncommon for designers to load their favourite fonts onto a USB to take with them into a new workplace. Agencies are regularly asked to share fonts with clients, printers and freelancers, despite this being against most font licensing regulations.

 Legally fonts can’t be shared with anyone outside of the company that purchases it. Even when a font is purchased for a clients project the font would need to be purchased again by them for use in their own office. When a font is purchased a company only has the right to use that font on their computers. Files can be shared, but fonts can’t be supplied as well. The only way to share a file and retain its fonts, is to provide a PDF with fonts embedded or to outline fonts in InDesign or Illustrator. This however means that no alterations can be made to the artwork.

 A fonts licensing conditions can be difficult to keep track of. Many fonts have different restrictions on how they can be used. A fonts licensing normally only allows you to use that font on a particular number of computers, and if you have it on more you are in violation of the fonts usage. Some fonts can’t be used in logos or on websites. Some can’t be used in large print runs. Some fonts allow you to send a copy of the font to a printer for the use of reproducing the work you created some strictly prohibit this. Many ‘free’ fonts are only free for personal use and for commercial use you do need to pay.

 In previous years it has been fairly unlikely that companies would be caught out for using unlicensed fonts. In Australia there have been very few (if any) cases of font licensing lawsuits, so this could be a big reason that font licensing is ignored. In America in recent years however there has been many font related lawsuits that stretch into the millions of dollars. This alone is a good reason for companies in Australia to be more aware of how their fonts are used. How long will it be until it does begin to affect companies here as well?

 With millions of fonts in use on the internet and many files being uploaded online, it is becoming easier to police font violations. Font management companies understand the possible minefield in the future, and have created centralised font programs to help companies track their font usage. With the introduction of Creative Cloud - and the ability to store working files in the cloud - it’s highly likely that Adobe will be working with font developers to create new ways of tracking font licenses in the future.

 It wasn’t that long ago that many software packages could be used on computers without being legally licensed. Since the advent of the internet, tracking IP addresses, and now the introduction of the Creative Cloud this is a thing of the past. It might not be long before fonts will be treated in the same way.

Sarah Parsons  - Production Manager

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Lessons from a mummy blogger: 1.1 million subscribers and growing.

Never heard of Ann Reardon? Given the rate at which her YouTube channel is growing, chances are you soon will. This Sydney housewife is the mother of all mummy bloggers, with her How To Cook That YouTube channel averaging over 3.7 million hits a month. In a few short years, she’s gone from posting recipes for friends on her website to having the No.1 baking channel in Australia and No. 3 in the world. The only thing more impressive than her cakes is the speed and skill with which she has built her online presence. So what can we learn from Reardon? 1.    People follow content.  My sweet-toothed daughter introduced me to her Icing Taste Test video. From there, I checked out her Instagram Cake video, then I just had to check out her Instagram page, which made me want to know even more about her so I checked out her facebook page and website, which is where I discovered I could buy her cake templates – which of course by now, I just had to have. Every touch point touches other points. Build people’s interest and they will ultimately end up at your website. 2.    Content is king. There are endless baking channels out there. Reardon’s is rising as rapidly as her cakes because it is better and different to all the rest. Great content also trumps film quality. Her initial videos were shot on her iPhone and she edits them herself on her home computer. 3.    Trend jacking. Reardon makes her decisions on what to bake based on what is trending, e.g. Elsa from Frozen and iPad cakes. Curating and repurposing trending topics helps build your own following. 4.    Collaborate. Reardon regularly appears in other people’s YouTube videos. Sometimes the link maybe tenuous – Ann taste testing Korean treats with some ex-pat bloggers in Seoul – but she’s suddenly exposed to a whole new group of followers and both parties attract new subscribers. Estee Lauder recently followed the same strategy when they appointed Kendall Jenner a face of the brand. Sure she’s a pretty girl, but her millions of young Instagram followers are what make her really attractive to the cosmetics giant. 5.    Post regularly. Early on in the piece Ann was given the advice that “blogs are like plants; if you don’t water them they die.” She set a target to post every week and stuck to it. As her videos became popular, she started uploading a video with every post. 6.    Be flexible. The online environment is continually changing. Stay abreast of new platforms and adapt. Inspired by a gaming app, Reardon released the "Surprise Cakes" app – the world's first augmented reality app for cakes. It uses computer gaming technology, to bring an average dessert to life with realistic 3D fireworks bursting from the top. 7.    Tailor your message to the channel. If you’ve heard braincells’ on hold message a little too often (our apologies) – you’ll know every platform has its own personality.Reardon doesn’t cram every message into every channel – the videos show you how to make the cake, the website gives you the exact ingredients and measurements, facebook lets you know what she’s up to. To see the cakes that started it all, click here.

Trend jacking: Reardon often bases her content on what is popular.

Collaborate: Reardon increases How To Cook That’s exposure by appearing in other people’s videos.

Rebecca Wong - Copywriter

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British Sausage Company

Background: The British Sausage Co. is a WA born and bred brand. Despite being in the market for nearly 20 years, many consumers mistakenly think it is a foreign company, or its sausages are imported. There was a need to explain the connection between the brand’s name and the provenance of the WA ingredients.   Objectives: To communicate that the British Sausage Co. is a WA-owned family business that makes outstanding sausages with 100% Australian ingredients Inform that the sausages are made to a traditional family recipe Reassure consumers that they will appeal to people from all backgrounds.   Approach: At every consumer touch point, it was important to tell the story behind The British Sausage Co. On the packs, this meant a subtle redesign of the logo to incorporate both the British and Australian flags, and a new positioning line: British made, the Australian way.   Our post-campaign research for the Great Greengrocer campaign confirmed television is still the most effective media, with the highest recall, to communicate with grocer buyers. We therefore decided to create a television commercial that explains how these Australian made sausages came to have a British name.   Using animated stills brought to life with music and a ballad, we tell the story of The British Sausage Co. founder, Mick Ferrero, a third generation British butcher who migrated to Australia. The distinctive looks of the television commercial flows through to a website that directs consumers to their nearest British Sausage Co. stockist.   The television is supported by outdoor that appears on the semi-trailers that deliver British Sausage Co. sausages around Perth.

http://britishsausage.com.au/index.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idVEi1wb7JY

[braincellsblog]

SKULLS 2014

The annual Perth Advertising and Design Club (PADC) Skulls Awards are an opportunity for the design industry to recognise the exceptional commercial communications work produced in Western Australia over the previous year. For over 20 years the PADC has recognised the outstanding work of its members. For the first time, this year the Awards were open to all entrants who aim to achieve creative excellence and not only PADC members. As such, the categories were vastly expanded to accommodate the variety of digital and experiential work produced. “This will bring The Skulls in line with the national and global trends and sync much more tightly with AWARD on a national level and D&AD internationally” stated PADC President, Mark Braddock.

The Skulls are the highest accolade for creative communications in Western Australia and the braincells team was fortunate enough to have a number of entries considered for this year’s Awards. 2014 brought the highest number of entries on record, up by 30% over the previous year. Thus competition was fierce. braincells’ entries included the Great Green Grocer for integrated campaign, retail and brand individual television and cinema advertisement, Flow Stone Wine label and the White Rabbit Growler for Individual and Range of Packaging.  

The Skulls 2014 jury was chaired by Brendon Guthrie, ECD of Ogilvy Melbourne and comprised Creative Directors Julie Faktor and Simon Bagnasco. Mr Guthrie was front and centre to announce the winners responsible for creating Western Australia’s most inspiring commercial communications in a variety of categories spanning the mediums of cinema and television to radio, digital and PR. 

The braincells group are very pleased to have won the bronze skull award to our very talented Design Director Steve Boros for the Little Creatures’ White Rabbit Growler Packaging.

This award serves as recognition of the innovative and remarkable work the braincells team is producing at a top industry level. braincells look forward to continuing this trend by competing in the 2015 awards.

Nicole Monchouguy

Financial Controller & Office Manager

[braincellsblog]

Learning From Social Media Mistakes

Over the past few years, social media has become an increasingly important marketing tool being widely used in announcing new products, informing market research, inspiring product innovation, communicating deals and establishing category leadership . Social media has the estimated ability to connect with 1.97 billion people worldwide, this is more than one in four people globally.

A few years ago, when social media marketing was still a relatively new concept, braincells launched the “Pizza Base” campaign for Anchor Foods. The campaign encompassed blogs, forums and YouTube videos where passionate cooks were able to exchange ideas and thoughts to create the perfect pizza base. This yielded impressive outcomes for Anchor Foods. In that year their sales increased by 10-15%, the website landed a permanent place for pizza enthusiasts – with a growing subscription list, and the specialty flour category grew by 10%.

Social media marketing has well documented benefits. But what can actually happen when a social media is used incorrectly? Below are a few of the worst social media campaigns that landed popular companies in hot water, creating catastrophic damage to their reputation.

In 2012 fast food giant McDonalds invited twitter users to use the #mcdstories to share their thoughts about the chain. They hoped customers would share fond memories and experiences with the world, but instead social media users slammed the company sharing their worst experiences! To this day the #mcdstories is still being used!

About a year after this disaster, the largest bank in the US, JPMorgan Chase & Co., decided they would start an online forum via twitter where people could ask the CEO direct questions. The #AskJPM went viral immediately, but the responses were not what they hoped for.

  Closer to home, Qantas and supermarket giants; Woolworth and Coles have also faced a similar fate when using the same concept as McDonalds and JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Another mistake made that well known brands have been guilty off is tweeting content at very inappropriate times. American Ripleman posted this tweet just after the Aurora cinema shooting.

Celeb Boutique also made a terrible post in regards to the Aurora Shooting.

And Epicurious posted this tweet, attempting to cash in on the Boston Marathon attack.

So what can be learnt from past mistakes?

  Make sure you publish content from the right account.

Revise auto timed posted in regards to the current climate.

Revise the content and the different means that can be drawn from it BEFORE posting.

Create hashtags with caution, they cannot be deleted and anyone can contribute, especially angry customers.

Accepting full responsibility for everything posted from your account – even If it had been hacked.

Finally, probably the most important of all, never try to cash in on a trending topic. This will backfire and cause more damage then good.

  “Content is fire, and social media is Gasoline” Jay Baer

There is plenty of evidence to support the value of engaging with social media platforms in marketing strategy.  However, understanding some of the pitfalls of social media engagement can help marketers mitigate the risk of posting inappropriate content and/or inviting damaging feedback.

References

emarketer. June 2013. Social Media Reaches Nearly 1 In 4 Around The World. November 2014.http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Social-Networking-Reaches-Nearly-One-Four-Around-World/1009976).

Calderon, Arielle. 2013. 19 Companies that made huge social media fails. Buzz Feed. November 2014.http://www.buzzfeed.com/ariellecalderon/19-companies-that-made-huge-social-media-fails

McArthy, Francis. 2012. Biggest Codial Media Disaters in Australia. Tenth House. November 2014.http://www.tenthhouse.com.au/blog/the-biggest-social-media-disasters-in-australia-so-far/

Feloni, Richard. 2013. 10 Biggest Social Media Marketing Fails for 2013. Business Insider. November 2014.http://www.businessinsider.com.au/10-worst-social-media-marketing-fails-of-2013-2013-11#youve-seen-the-years-worst-now-see-some-of-the-years-best-11

Emily Noble

Junior Project Manager

[braincellsblog]

Marketing agencies have completely missed the potential of digital

Check out this article by Tom Goodwin

Agencies are failing to exploit the true potential of digital. Photograph: Kacper Pempel/Reuters

"We sit here in 2014 and we think we’ve “got” digital. We’ve been talking about it forever and we’ve introduced new processes, expressions, agencies. We’ve acquired, hired and rebuilt. What more evidence is needed? How could it be in an age where Unilever has a YouTube Channel Oreo can put tweets on cookies and where we make TV ads out of recycled vines, that we’re not on top of it?

I believe we’ve accomplished nothing with new technology in marketing. We’ve missed the entire point of it all; we’ve taken the revolutionary power of digital and found a way to adapt it to what we had.

It’s always been this way because paradigm shifts are hard, be it the onset of the steam age, or the beginning of electricity. We tend to view the future through the mirror of the past, unable to start afresh with what the new technology means. We become fixated on embellishing what we had, instead of attempting to transform the status quo with what’s now possible.

Media owners still sell identical units from the past, merely digital equivalents of what we already knew, sold in the same way, to the same people in media agencies who use the same techniques to plan and execute. Clients operate as they always have, but with “digital people” with their own budget and present at meetings. Creative agencies are identical, the production line for ads is the same, the processes, templates and briefs identical. They’ve taken the supply specs for digital and bolted them on to the end. Even the technology we have embraced, like programmatic buying or retargeting, is based on an obsession with technology and a dearth of creativity. We’re getting better at narrow cast ads based on a misunderstanding of our own proficiency and a total lack of empathy about consumer behaviour.

Industry wide we’ve taken the most powerful, transformative force the business world has ever seen, a power so strong it’s reduced retail brands to ashes, bankrupted media channels, and redefined personal transportation, and have forced it to fit into what we could best deal with. If we are honest, digital has always been a problem. It threatened us, it undermined what we knew, it gave us measurement and removed artistry. We digested it as a problem, and as a result we’ve never once tasked ourselves with maximising it.

The first step is to blow up the agency environment and start again.

We are built on an anachronistic structure from the days when we were funded by commission and aligned to media channels that no longer exist. We live in a world where we listen to the radio on our phones, read magazines on tablets, watch TV on laptops. The very least important aspect of how we consume media is how the stuff gets to us, the most important aspect is the context. Yet we order our entire workflow and budgets around the irrelevant pipe.

We should bring media owners, media agencies, technology companies and creative agencies together. Adding technology, strategy, creativity and media knowledge together will allow us to do more interesting things than replicate what we know. With this structure we would take advantage of new technology like addressable TV, we’d use targeting and creative optimisation to find ways to make ads more personal. We’d find ways to do native at scale.

We’d invent new advertising units, entirely new ways to connect with people, or create ads with more interesting calls to action. Clicks to add products to shopping baskets, clicks to bookmark pages. We’d leverage new media platforms that don’t yet exist, mobile marketing in the notification layer, maps as a portal for search advertising. We’d see flow advertising across devices, to close the loop on shopping and send mobile coupons to people.

I’d hope that we’d also rise above the world of communications and think more broadly about what technology means for marketing. We could think more imaginatively and empathetically about how brands can connect more meaningfully. We’d invent new business models for the internet of things, establish what APIs or app links can do. We’d explore digital screens in retail, exploit omni-channel retail, find ways for brands to redesign call-centre processes and CRM strategy, employing over-the-top (OTT) messaging to be more personal.

We could move upstream to the big meaty problems in business and to improve products. Unleashed to transform the core business, we could help brands and business reinvent themselves for the digital age. Now more than ever companies face bigger threats than before. We should have been the people to get Kodak to become Instagram. What if we’d suggested an idea like Uber to General Motors? What can we do about the dying high street, or how can banks manage virtual currencies? What do companies threatened by the innovator’s dilemma do to keep fresh and nimble? This should be a role for marketeers in the digital age.

Let’s put down the drone, forget “follow Friday”. Let’s step up a gear, be bold and change the future of business.

Tom Goodwin is the CEO and founder of the Tomorrow Group. You can follow him on Twitter @tomfgoodwin"

Goodwin, Tom. 2014. Marketing Agencies have completely missed the potential of digital. The Guardian. Published 20/10/14. http://www.theguardian.com/media-network/media-network-blog/2014/oct/20/marketing-technology-potential-digital-possibilities

[braincellsblog]

Banksy’s Social Media Experiment

Not many people would make a logical connection between graffiti and the Internet, especially not when it comes to the intriguing and pseudonymous graffiti artist, Banksy. However, Banksy has not only showed the world what that looks like, but he has made people care about it too through his ‘Better Out Than In’ show in New York.

Although his artwork was painted or staged on physical objects in New York, the true showcase took place online. The curiosity and mystique was visible across all forms of digital media, with thousands of people following Banksy’s one-picture-a-day Instagram account #BanksyNY. Legions of Banksy fans rush to find the pieces to have their photos taken with them before the works are ultimately destroyed by fellow street artists, stolen, buffed, covered up or hijacked. They then share them on Tumblr, Facebook, Instagram and Twitter.

  The point of Better Out Than In has less to do with the actual art and more to do with people’s reactions to these public displays of thought-provoking content. These reactions are instantly uploaded to Facebook, Youtube, Twitter and Instagram, thus further fuelling Banksy’s mystique and ultimately invigorating the Banksy brand. Finding Banksy’s work around New York, particularly when many of them disappear in less than 24-hours, provides fans with ‘unique discoveries’ that become validated through shares, likes, and comments online, thus giving them online ‘social status’.

  Shock, surprise, anger, amazement…Strong emotional responses drive people to share content.  As Jonah Berger in ‘Contagious: Why things catch on’ writes - “naturally contagious content usually evokes some sort of emotion.” Banksy is a master of creating provocative viral content, hence why fans have reacted to and shared his message on social media, further building the Banksy brand. Although Banksy would never admit to his Better Out Than In experiment in the context of social media marketing, it is clear that Banksy has given fans unique and exciting content and tools to sell his brand within the social space.

As marketers, we can learn from this case history that every brand is built around a core value or a set of core values. For Banksy, it’s Mystery. The thing that separates Banksy from all the other talented street artists out there is mystery. As professional marketers, we need to follow his lead. It can be tough to say no to a great idea or to a new direction, but if it doesn’t stick to the core values of the brand, it sacrifices the integrity of the entire communication. Furthermore, we can learn that for people to interact with and share content, it must be engaging and interesting. Banksy perfectly demonstrates this with his visual story telling and playfully elusive content that evokes interaction, intrigue and a reason to share online. In today’s online world, people are thinking visually and want to share something that's unique. Therefore marketers should be developing visual content that: a) demonstrates the organisation’s unique value proposition, b) is worth consuming and sharing and C) resonates with prospects and current clients.

References

Banksy. 2014. Instragram. Accessed 2/10/14. http://instagram.com/banksyny

Multiple Authors. 2014. Social Media Explorer. Social Media Marketing. Accessed 2/10/14. http://www.socialmediaexplorer.com/social-media-marketing

Cardiner, Brock. 2014. Banksy Better Out Than In in Los Angeles. High Snobility. Accessed 2/10/14. http://www.highsnobiety.com/2013/09/23/banksy-better-out-than-in-in-los-angeles/

Andrea Bennett

Project Manager

[braincellsblog]

Luxury Branding & Heritage

When Vasse Felix approached us to review their brand identity we knew we were dealing with one of Western Australia’s truly luxury, iconic wine brands. Luxury branding is not about price or exclusivity, it is about craftsmen and connoissers coming together. Vasse Felix is Margaret River's founding wine estate and the pioneers of the Margaret River wine region. Our brief was to simply ensure that all the hard work, investment and rich heritage was reflected in their visual identity and to do justice to the finest wine quality and timelessness inherent in the brand.

Far too often brands are subject to "change for change sake" rather than appreciating the significant time it takes to establish brand equity. Desirable, differentiated and defendable brand positioning is braincells mantra and its critical that brands hang on to their heritage and authenticity as a point of differentiation and reflection of quality. While evolution of brand identity is necessary over time, it is equally important to understand what design elements must be retained in the evolution process.  

In reviewing Vasse Felix's identity, the heritage and premium nature of the brand mark has been enhanced by incorporating the 'est 1967’ border. A refined font has been selected that reflects the distinctiveness and craftsmanship of the brand.  The best possible printing techniques and materials have been combined with design refinements to create a subtle yet sophisticated result.   The end product is in many ways not unlike the very first bottle of 1972 Cabernet Sauvignon produced in Margaret River that Vasse Felix displays at its cellar door.  The new identity proudly echoes the original 50 year old label with nuanced design refinements that firmly place it at the forefront of quality and craftsmanship in 2014.

Steve Boros

Design Director

[braincellsblog]

Why brands need to serve the real needs of their customers.

In their important new book Absolute Value, Emanuel Rosen (author of The Anatomy of Buzz) and Itamar Simonson (consumer decision-making researcher and Professor of Marketing at Stanford Business School) identify some powerful issues that are changing the role of brands.

When Jonney Shih told his colleagues that he wanted his contract-manufacturing firm to develop and sell laptops under its own brand name, Asus, most of them thought he was nuts. Asustek had been founded in 1989 in Taiwan, and Shih was now its chairman; it was a successful manufacturer of other companies’ computers and video game consoles. But it had virtually no name recognition among consumers, so how could it compete with players such as Dell and HP? Shih ignored the doubters, and in 2007 an Asus-branded product, the Eee PC, got stellar reviews and became a hit. By 2012 Asus was the world’s fifth-best-selling brand of PC, and by early 2013 its tablets were the third-best-selling brand. Shih’s instinct had been correct: With the growing availability of opinions from experts and users, the importance of a brand name had diminished.

In the age of (nearly) perfect information, your consumers already know everything they need to about your new product – and that’s far more important than your brand. Online consumer reviews are changing way many brands have to engage with their customers. Here are three key issues authors identify:

Online reviews make brands transparent:  It’s no longer possible to dissociate the brand from the product. Particularly for high-interest categories like electronics, travel and automobiles, consumers are acutely aware of both consumer and expert reviews. If a particular product does not meet the expectations of the consumer, loyalty will not hold consumers in a franchise.

Consumers trust other consumers and experts, more than brands:  Some marketers still talk about advertising ‘persuading.’ But in categories where reviews are common, only reviews can be persuasive in terms of product attributes and quality. The ‘absolute value’ that Simonson and Rosen refer to is the value of the specific product to the specific consumer, which that consumer can determine independently by reading the reviews of like-minded consumers and expert reviewers.

Positioning must start with the product itself: If brand positioning is merely ‘framing’ that attempts to recast a flawed product in a more positive context, it will fail in a world of ubiquitous and easily accessed consumer reviews. So brand marketing in the Rosen and Simonson’s world has to involve a dialectic between the brand and consumers:  marketers define, consumers evaluate, marketers retool and consumers judge.  If product design isn’t an integral part of the marketing feedback process, there’s no possibility of building a brand, because consumer won’t fall for unfulfilled promises.

In markets where customers depend mainly on ‘other’ (O) information sources, such as user reviews, friend and expert opinions, price comparison tools, and emerging technologies or sources, branding takes on less importance, and newcomers find relatively low barriers to entry as a result—as Jonney Shih’s story shows.

Companies in O-dependent markets can also diversify more easily than others, because new peer-to-peer information can overcome long-held conceptions about what a company is (and isn’t) good at. LG and Samsung have taken full advantage of this capacity, moving beyond their original core products (electronics) into a broad array of tech goods and home appliances.

Jeff Champtaloup

Managing Partner & Creative Director