How often do you come across a banner ad worth talking about? And worth giggling over? And worth clicking and clicking and clicking? Not often enough, my industry friends, not often enough. An innovative banner ad from Pringles, which recently won a gold Cyber Lion at Cannes last week, keeps one's attention by telling a tiny story within its ad. Well, perhaps it's best described as less of a conventional story and more like a one-sided conversation from which you can't turn away. I clicked to the very end -- I couldn't help it. Check it out for yourselves, and tell me if I'm wrong.
Archive for June, 2009
Is There Nothing Left To Talk About In Online?
Posted by Jay Friedman on June 30th, 2009 at 12:00 am
Last week I dutifully logged onto TweetDeck on the day of the OPA conference, set up a search column for #opa, and waited for the tweets to flow. I couldn't make the live conference but I knew I could count on my colleagues to share the highlights. The attendees tweeted about two main topics - the value of display for branding purposes and 'the demise of the click' - and were quick to note how 'old news' these topics are. In fact, the last tweet of the day said, "what a let down, let's get to the networking." I'm not picking on OPA, because the truth is that I've heard this (or seen it tweeted) from numerous conferences lately. We're talking about things that are old, rehashed, and not beneficial for those in attendance. So, is there nothing left to talk about in our industry that is worthy of a conference? Absolutely not. Here are just a few topics that I personally believe would generate real interest:
Is Data the New Bubble? We all saw the network bubble form and now it's starting to decompress. Data companies (BlueKai, Exelate, etc.) are now popping up faster than can be tested. Is this the new... Read more
Interactive trumps all at Cannes
Posted by Rich Cherecwich on June 29th, 2009 at 12:00 am
Judges at last week's Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival awarded the Film Grand Prix, traditionally given to the world's best commercial, not to a television commercial, but to an online video from Phillips and Tribal DDB.
The winning ad, "Carousel," is a stunning piece of video which, somewhat ironically, promotes Phillips' Cinema 21:9 television. Viewers are taken through an action scene frozen in time, complete with explosions, cops, and clown-masked robbers, that starts and ends at the very same point (hence the name Carousel).
But not only is the world's best commercial found online, it's actually much more than just a breathtaking video. Viewers can click on interactive elements within the video stream to pause the action and watch as the director of photography, visual effects supervisor, and director step into the frame to explain the thought process behind the shots and the benefits of the TV set.
According to Ad Age, the festival judges considered giving two Grand Prix awards this year: one for traditional TV, one for interactive, but ultimately decided to award only one and went with the best piece of work. "[T]hose lines are blurring so much we wanted to make a statement," said judge Ted Royer of Droga5.
