FurCoatsNoKnickers

A lot of online trends talk is all ‘Fur Coat No Knickers‘ – as your Irish Mammy used to say. This blog is my ongoing attempt to delve a little deeper and get to the heart of the why people are doing what they’re doing, saying what they’re saying… buying,...

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Fashion without a Filter: LFW Rebels against #Instastyle

New blog post on #LFW

It always amazes me how – apart from the tired references to lipstick economies and hemline indexes – trends in fashion are rarely considered in the frame of consumer psychology and economics.

Fashion trends – small and large – indicate a shift in consumer mindset that actually has very little to do with clothes but rather, indicative of the political, social and economic landscape their wearers…

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Too Big to Burst? The Startup-Tech-Bubble-Unicorn-Supernova

As I said before in a previous article ‘Is it Time to Breakup with the Startup Guy?‘, open any financial, business or economic magazine or newspaper section and you will be bombarded with interviews, news and speculations about the heady world of the tech startup. All of it, in the pursuit of finding the next tech startup ‘unicorn’. In the previous post – Carrie Bradshaw style – ‘I started to…

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10 Online Stores doing things Differently Conor Pope has written this week in the Irish Times on the potential 'ashopalyse' looming thanks to online competitors.

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Ireland Ranks 3rd in Searching for 'Game of Thrones' as Viewing Records are Smashed Worldwide

Ireland Ranks 3rd in Searching for ‘Game of Thrones’ as Viewing Records are Smashed Worldwide

A record breaking 23 million people in the UK and US tuned in to watch the first new episode of Game of Thrones. That’s a 50% uplift in some places on last year. Historically, however, estimates of illegal views of the series versus legal was at a ratio of 7:9… so, the real figure is probably at least 41 million. With Ireland ranking 3rd for search interest in the series after Kazakhstan and…

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Four Things you Really Need to Know about GDPR if in Marketing..

1. What is GDPR?

GDPR stands for General Data Protection Regulation. It will apply, from the 25th May 2018 to anyone handling data of an EU person or any EU based company (so literally any data we deal with in Irish marketing land).

2. Why should I care?

You could be fined up to 4% of your company’s total turnover if you don’t comply. That’s not an empty threat either, it’s very real with a…

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Behavioural Economics - the Missing Piece of the Marketing Strategy

Behavioural Economics – the Missing Piece of the Marketing Strategy

  The following is an extract from my interview with ‘The Wiki Man’ Rory Sutherland.

You may know him from that one Ted Talk we’ve definitely all seen and shown to our mammies – Lessons from an Ad Man (although she still doesn’t quite know what you do).

 Generally, Rory is seen as a very engaging and entertaining figure in adland – with the added bonus of being one of the few people who seems to…

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The Problem with Awards...

The Problem with Awards…

It can be hard to know these days what awards to aim for in marketing…

We debate things like sponsorship bias and over awarding in the Irish marketplace – creating a loss of value in those wins. But I think there is another issue at hand when it comes to awards – the framework.

I cannot for the life of me understand why we are categorising and grading creative ideas by the platform on which they…

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The Internet of (Stolen) Things: 1.3 Million Irish are Illegally Downloading

The Internet of (Stolen) Things: 1.3 Million Irish are Illegally Downloading

While the industry has been primarily concerning itself with the rise of adblocking a much more concerning trend has been going on right under our noses. Odds are, as a digitally savvy heavy media consumer, you’re probably one of these trendsetters yourself.

Now finally, we have the numbers.

The Commercial Court was informed yesterday that approximately 1.3 Million (yes, million) of us are…

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Super Bowl Ads get Political... but Haven't We Been Here Before?

Super Bowl Ads get Political… but Haven’t We Been Here Before?

Probably the most common headline regarding the Super Bowl ads this year is how some brands chose to ‘get political’. Particularly noteworthy were Airbnb and Coca-Cola. This is leading to a debate about the role of brands in politics and social movements. Are they supposed to steer clear, or dive in?

A lot of people would argue that brands should steer clear of politics.

After all, it’s not their…

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Why Brands Need to Be more Airbnb

Lots of brands have great branding. Lots of brands have a compelling identity and a positioning founded on a core vision and deep understanding of their audience. Lots of them also have a memorable design that somehow magically captures all this.

But how many brands can say they actually live it?

Airbnb have become a world reknowned case study in ‘how to dobrand’. The full process and story of…

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Are We Finally Breaking Up with 'The Start Up Guy'? 

Are We Finally Breaking Up with ‘The Start Up Guy’? 

Open any financial, business or economic magazine or newspaper section and you will be bombarded with interviews, news and speculations about the heady world of the tech startup. The hoody hero has long replaced the ‘serious suit’ as the business pin-up of our time.

After all, he’s different.

He ‘gets’ people and what they reallywant. He is a true visionary, who can see a glorious future for us…

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Robot Makes the Panel at Dublin Tech Summit...

Robot Makes the Panel at Dublin Tech Summit…

The full details for Dublin Tech Summithave just been released with an impressive line-up of speakers. Amongst them, a robot. RobotThesbian will be talking on the 16th of Feb about, well, the rise of the robots. FYI he can be yours for the knock-down bargain price of fifty grand. While many global panelists at events may be famed for their automated responses and robotic performances, this…

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Pineapples and Unicorns - some of the weirdest Trends of Post-Truth 2016

Pineapples and Unicorns – some of the weirdest Trends of Post-Truth 2016

Forget the ‘year of the mobile’ (ugh) and ‘tech trends’ of 2017, 2016 turned out to be the year of the Unicorn.

And thinking we can probably learn a lot more from looking back on the last 12 months then pointless crystal ball staring and obsessing over platforms rather than ideas for 2017, I thought I’d use it to pull together some of the things that took centre stage this year for us to muse…

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Irish Tourism Rises 11% in 2016

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In the percieved epic global mess that was perceived to be 2016, it’s nice to here some good news. Tourism to Ireland is up 11% on last year. 

Visits from Mainland Europe grew by 8.8% to 3,096,300 visits. 

North America a whopping increase of 18.3% to 1,699,100.

GB up by 11.1%  to 3,620,500 visits.

Rest of the world (mostly long-haul and developing markets) increased 1.9% to 503,700. 

Domestic…

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Trending: The Home Truth in the White Noise of #HomeSweetHome

Trending: The Home Truth in the White Noise of #HomeSweetHome

There has been a lot of pointless chit chat, online ‘noise’ and debate about Home Sweet Home. And it is all entirely missing the point.

Because it goes beyond the debate about the usual (I’m going to call) ‘bono-bashing’ – where Irish people give out about successful Irish people for getting #notions and out to get the attention of the parish.

It goes beyond the debate about modern cynicism…

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Trending: Superfoods get Spiced Up for 2017

Trending: Superfoods get Spiced Up for 2017

  There’s a new kid on the ever-expanding block of Superfoods that you may not expect. Firstly, because it is relatively cheap (not a typically desirable a tribute we tend to admire from our superfoods) and will continue to be. Secondly because it’s accessible (no need for the trip to the health store). In fact, it’s actually more of an ‘old kid’ and probably sitting at the back of your cupboard…

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Why you need to Stop Reading this Stupid Blog Post... 

Why you need to Stop Reading this Stupid Blog Post… 

In about 5 mins I will auto post this quick piece to Facebook, where it will receive about 95% of it’s traffic… and therein lies the problem. Basically, you need to stop reading this blog post. 

​Traditional media is undoubtably not without their flaws but internet has zero rules for upholding the truth in news. 

We are reaching the point were social liberties are being undermined by social…

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