The mistake occurred as part of a stunt launched in May by which facebook members handed over control of their statuses to Dr Pepper for the chance to win a thousand pounds. The statuses would then be made as embarrassing as possible, capitalising on the company’s strap line, “What’s the worst that could happen?” The kerfuffle arose as a result of an unsuitable update being posted on a 14 year old girl’s page.  While this may well have caused irreparable damage to the brand’s image now, but without the benefit of hindsight the risk may have seemed worth taking.

What Dr Pepper and their agency, Lean Mean Fighting Machine, inadvertently stumbled upon was either a spectacular piece of bad luck or really a catastrophe waiting to happen, depending on which way you look at it. The failure to check the database of potential statuses for the kind of post that looks entirely innocent at first glance – but after a little research turns out to be incredibly explicit – is the ultimate cause of the episode, but perhaps the kind of joke necessary to properly catch the attention of your common or garden facebooker needs to be a little risqué, doesn’t it?

The problem for brands and marketers is that though social media is by far the most effective way of getting the attention of young people, there is a dangerously narrow line between humour and obscenity that has to be respectfully toed. In order to win over interest and grow your brand’s profile, visibility on sites like facebook is a good idea, but not one without its drawbacks. After all, online social networking is a relatively new phenomenon, and marketing on the platform an even newer one. Dr Pepper’s method of approaching the challenge was a clever and innovative one, but hopefully the irony of the tragic consequences that befell a drinks manufacturer whose ad campaigns highlighted the often dire results of risk-taking has not been lost on businesses and agencies looking to social media as a means of expression.

Carol O’Mara
Business Leader
GyroHSR London

We spent a good deal of time and interactive conversation on ad disclosure, especially the new “AdChoices” icon  that has been implemented on all Yahoo ads. AdChoices offers a menu of additional information, enabling users served a particular ad to learn more about the ad. The additional information contains details such as who placed the ad, where to learn more about ad selection and what choices are available for Internet-based advertising.

We cited a study from the Ponemon Institute in January 2010 titled “Behavioral Notices Study, Future of Privacy Forum” that indicated that applying transparency and choice increased the percentage of those who were comfortable with behavioral advertising from 24% to 40%, a 37% change. The same study also found that approximately 30% are neutral about behavioral ads with or without transparency and choice. Related to campaign effectiveness, we cited another Ponemon Institute study from May 2010 called “Economic Impact of Privacy on Online Behavioral Advertising,” indicating that 98% of companies surveyed have restricted online behavioral advertising because of privacy concerns; however, 63% of companies surveyed rated online behavioral advertising as their most effective form of marketing, an untapped opportunity.

We concluded with a series of Q&A around online behavioral advertising as well as transparency in measurement, and we agreed that these topics are very much in their infancy stages. Thus, we are braced for the roller coaster that we will inevitably ride.

Frannie Jaye Danzinger
Senior Vice President  – Media

Steve Jobs claims that this experience will have the interactivity of banner advertising and the entertainment value of TV advertising. Is he right?

Well on the surface he’s on to something. The adverts look pretty discrete to begin with but when interacting with them they really come to life. He admits his example is just a mock-up but his Toy Story 3 advert on an entertainment news advert really hits the spot. It has video clips, audio clips, iPhone wallpaper, even a game which he proudly says runs in HTML 5, a cheeky dig at the Adobe Flash mob.

And the best part is that you dont have to leave your app or lose your place when you exit. You close the ad and return to exactly the point you left.

The catch? Apple host and sell the space and will take a hefty 40% of the revenues. Apple claim that this will encourage developers to use this platform rather than some of the maverick advertising currently seen in apps and give developers a revenue stream. But is this really going to make a difference for the solo developers out there? I think theyll continue to point users at a browser where they may well prove to be better experiences outside of Apples platform. And since the new OS promises that more than one app can be run at the same time this should mean there isnt the issue of losing your original app.

It certainly is going to be attractive to the bigger apps/companies out there, I guess well have to wait and see how users behave.

Its another example of how Apple are streets ahead in the app world. Every time I fight the BlackBerry App World on my old Pearl I seriously consider the upgrade, but my pockets literally arent big enough! :-) I’m going to wait for the iTouch upgrade instead and keep the BB for work.

By
Barnaby Ellis
Head of Digital
GyroHSR London

So what does all this mean for the B-to-B world? It is no different than the traction we already see. The real question is scale. 5 days after launch, 450,000 units were sold and there were 3,500 iPad specific applications available; Apple announced on May 3 that over 1M iPads were sold and users had downloaded over 12 million apps. When will the audience usership of the iPad reach the level that B-to-B advertising can be effective in reaching a target audience, above and beyond the novelty? The Wall Street Journal, the business industry’s bible, has come out of the gate with an iPad application that demonstrates an accelerated level of core competency with the platform, while strategically aligning useful and timely information for its users. The functionality for advertisers also reaches new heights with the endless potential for engagement and interactivity. This is the future. It offers content that is exclusive to the iPad such as “Now,” a real-time edition covering the latest breaking news and top stories, allowing the user to save entire selections for later reading. It also offers a seven-day-edition archive that can be downloaded for reading any time, even offline.

For advertisers, a variety of units of space are currently developed across iPad applications. For example, the WSJ’s app features a small sponsor “button” on the bottom left of a page, and, when touched, this area expands to a unit covering about one-third of the bottom of the screen. Further, this banner can be redirected to an advertiser’s full arsenal of materials, inclusive of audio and video. As in the WSJ example, advertisers can also own an entire screen that is embedded in between content. In addition, there are no apparent limitations to the depth of information contained on the iPad once a user is interacting with the advertisement, and, of course, if connected to a Wi-Fi network during use, the advertisement has full functionality to link with its website. The clear potential benefits for B-to-B advertisers, once the scale is there, is the design of the iPad with its color and unprecedented resolution, mimicking the size of a single magazine page, making it an ideal environment for reading digital magazines. Publishers are embracing this format by investing in the technology and specifications required for the iPad.

Tracking is not at the level that we are accustomed to for digital media at large, but is quickly making inroads.. A handful of the b-to-b iPad applications do offer advertisers (such as the New York Times) the ability to install tracking pixels that operate similarly to the mobile platform, yet others are more primitive, basing results on number of units sold times SOV of advertisers.

Pricing models for advertisers are all over the board as this new platform comes to life. Some advertisers are paying north of $1 million for their “trial period,” and others have been given the space as added value coinciding with their already placed integrated campaigns. The only catch for the advertiser is having the technology to develop iPad-functional ads.

The iPad is all about interactivity. Many critics believe the iPad will provide a resurrection of the print and video industries by providing new economic-on-demand frameworks that reset content and marketing values to reflect the expectations of digital users—and beyond. So while the iPad certainly has its fun factor, I believe it is here to stay as a tool in enhancing our opportunities to communicate with B-to-B audiences in unprecedented ways.

Frannie J. Danzinger
Senior Vice President – Media, North America

*This post has been revised to include updated, more accurate information

In addition to a stellar media content strategy are the extensions of this strategy that naturally occur via socialization of the media tactics. For example, for one of our clients, Pitney Bowes, we designed a media program in 2009 (and currently planning for 2010) that included a strategy through media placements, aligned content and messaging with the appropriately targeted digital property. Our plan also engaged a key Web site editor or publisher to blog about our provided content and message, putting their spin on the message, and releasing to their media extensions (social avenues). The approach was measured by the results generated by the more traditional digital media placements (high impact and sustaining), but incremental to the foundation were all the social extensions rooted in the content provided through the crux of the media program.

Content should be fully integrated into the strategic media planning process.

Frannie Danzinger
Senior Vice President – Media, North America

Ferruccio’s secret? Realising that a simple element he was selling as functional, effective and reliable, could expand outwards into something that was beautiful, awe-inspiring and world-famous. Now, of course, Feruccio could have stuck to turning out his tractor clutch for tractors. But he didn’t. He realised he was only selling a percentage of what his product was actually worth, and went after the remaining potential.

It’s a lesson direct marketers would do well to learn. No, it’s a lesson direct marketers must learn, or risk finding themselves staring into the abyss. For too long, we have marched into pitches talking about data, targeting, response, measurement – all that solid, commercial stuff that we know budget-conscious clients want to hear. “Don’t spend your cash on those beautiful, but intangible brand awareness ads”, we urged. “Go for DM. It works, and here are some cold, hard (if boring) stats to prove it.”

And, for the most part, that approach has worked. Who wouldn’t want to engage with consumers in an intimate way and be able to track where every penny is spent? But the landscape has changed. The consumer has changed. And if direct marketers don’t learn to sell everything else they can deliver, then they can kiss a share of tomorrow’s marketing spend, goodbye.

So why now? What’s changed?

Well, the direct marketing industry has been focusing on the clutch – the fundamental cornerstone of its heritage. We’ve been selling our targeting and measurement. Which is great. Only now, everyone else is starting to walk the walk – or they are at least talking the talk. We all know that with a long history of understanding customer data, direct marketers are those best placed to navigate the new digital landscape for clients, but it’s unquestionable that other disciplines are staking a claim on cross-channel targeting and measurement.

Add to that the lightning speed at which consumer channels have fragmented and multiplied and the ensuing land-grab this has created. Where direct was once a one-to-one channel, it has fast become a one-to-many channel, and this has fundamentally changed the way we must operate.  We predict that we won’t see disciplines drop off, but we will see them continue to multiply.

Taking this new landscape into account forces us to reassess the way we view disciplines and channels within it. Contrary to what some may think, direct marketing is not just a tactical tool, it is a strategic approach. It can build brands and it can create an intimacy that no other approach can. Believe it, because if you don’t, you can’t sell it. And if you can’t sell it, you might be left to turn the lights out as everyone else embraces a new era somewhere in the future. This is an approach we had to adopt when launching a US campaign for agricultural and construction equipment giants John Deere. (If only these essays were themed ‘DM…and tractors’…).The challenge was clear: John Deere wanted to enter a new digger category. The audience was contractors, landscapers, farmers and dealers. So a simple offline DM piece, targeted and tracked, might have done the job.

It might have done. But then, it might have gone down as another classic example of the real potential of direct marketing going well and truly unexploited. Instead, we created a campaign that incorporated the stalwarts of direct marketing and used them to create something much, much bigger.

“Smackdown” involved staging a series of head-to-head battles featuring the top machines in a ‘robot wars’- style duel. The events—the hill climb, visibility test, power lift and serviceability—were based on real-world situations that drivers experience and were staged in front of a live audience.

Initially, the audience was engaged via offline mailers, but that was only the beginning. At the heart of the programme was the ‘SkidSteerSmackdown.com’ microsite, featuring videos of digger battles. The site was fully interactive, enabling visitors to engage in a number of ways. For example, fans could create e-postcards which could be customized and distributed to friends and co-workers. This simple tool converted dealers and operators into the campaign’s strongest advocates. A series of eDMs were distributed to alert both dealer and prospects when new content was available on the site, and finally – traditional elements such as print ads were also incorporated.

And through this activity, John Deere gained a cult following. Since the site launch in April 2008, the microsite has had more than 150,000 visitors with 125,000 unique views and more than 350,000 page views.  Smackdown videos have garnered more than 100,000 views on YouTube. Offline, the Smackdown-themed lead generators yielded a 4 percent response rate, outpacing many other similar mailers during the year. Drive-to-site banner advertising had click-through-rates of approximately 3 percent, and eBlasts promoting the site had response rates of more than 7 percent.

This was a campaign that had direct marketing at the heart – there was an identifiable audience, a clear proposition and a measurable response. But to encapsulate it in this way does no justice to the true reach of the activity. We could have sent out the mailers and waited to track the sales. But we didn’t. We took the brand to a new marketplace and created a following populated by genuine advocates. We drove awareness, created buzz and instigated WOM. And if I’m starting to sound like a traditional adman, then I make no apologies.

And neither should DM as a discipline. It is perfectly poised to tell complete brand stories through this brave new media landscape. But if DM professionals hide behind data and measurement without talking about the inspiring creative, groundbreaking online innovation and power to build genuine brand experiences, then they will be selling themselves short. They will be moaning about their Ferrari clutch, whilst never looking beyond to the potential of their own product. Go forth and sell it all, sell it now. The alternative doesn’t bear thinking about

By Christoph Becker
Chief Creative Officer
GyroHSR

Links: http://www.campaignlive.co.uk/news/944635/PROMOTIONAL-FEATURE—Direct-marketing-round-table/?DCMP=ILC-SEARCH/

Ferrand, a former Media Strategist at Naked Communications and Maxus Global, where he was group head, oversaw the media planning for clients including UNIQLO, Timberland, FT and Fujitsu-Siemens. He is responsible for driving GyroHSR’s growing media planning division, with a particular emphasis on London Business School, NXP, Nuffield Health and Tate & Lyle.

Swann meanwhile, who spent five years at JWT and several years in brand consultancy before moving to creative ad-boutique Mother London, has been behind the brand and communications strategy for clients including HSBC, PG Tips and Boots Opticians. He is tasked with driving the development of stronger planning and strategy across the GyroHSR network and elevating its creative product, and will work across the T-Mobile and Shell accounts.  Adam was instrumental in winning the recent Nuffield Health account and building closer ties with existing clients.

The additions are part of a raft of recent senior appointments at GyroHSR, which has been investing heavily in its creative output following former DraftFCB creative head Christoph Becker joining the agency as Chief Creative Officer in June.

Richard Perry, Chief Operating Officer, GyroHSR says: “Agencies need to think harder and operate faster than ever before, and GyroHSR is committed to investing in the best talent to meet this changing landscape.  With the addition of Adam and Luc to an already strong team, we are confident we have the experience, insight and creative skills to drive the best results for our clients. Attracting talent of such a high calibre is testament to the growth of our business and ongoing commitment to our creative output.”

In April, Gyro announced its merger with US agency HSR to meet the scale and reach of client requirements. GyroHSR now has 17 offices in 15 cities spanning Europe, North America and the Middle East.

Links:
http://search.twitter.com/search?q=gyrohsr

http://www.brandrepublic.com/Discipline/Advertising/News/939779/GyroHSR-expands-its-planning-function-hires-Mother-Naked/

http://www.marketingdirectmag.co.uk/news/939779/GyroHSR-expands-its-planning-function-hires-Mother-Naked/

GyroHSR has been tasked with the next stage in the development of the Nuffield Health brand following its acquisition and integration of Cannons Health Clubs last year. Our work will support the ongoing implementation of Nuffield’s  innovative, integrated healthcare strategy.

Activity will focus on positioning the organisation as the leading destination for healthcare, fitness and wellbeing across its wide network of hospitals, health clinics and centres. The first phase of the campaign, which is set to launch in this September, will use online, direct marketing, guerrilla and above-the-line advertising to promote Nuffield Health’s unique offering and to attract people to one of the organisation’s 50 fitness and wellbeing centres.

Richard Perry, of  GyroHSR, said “We are delighted to have been appointed by Nuffield Health and excited by the opportunities this brief presents. We know that we have the integrated services and creative talent that will truly help deliver results and bring a different way of thinking to the healthcare sector.”

Mat Hart, Group Marketing Director, Nuffield Health, said “GyroHSR’s interpretation of our brief demonstrated its excellent understanding of our objectives and its superior creative thinking set it apart from the competition.”

So how would you feel if you had to start paying for access to online newspapers? You probably wouldn’t care; I certainly wouldn’t, but it seems as if, in these ever increasing hard economic times, it is certainly the route that most newspaper companies are heading, as a way to recoup their falling revenues from advertisers who are abandoning them in their droves, along with the purchasers of their newspapers.

I can understand why people would pay for financial information etc., but why would we bother to pay for general news stories, which form the bulk of the copy, when we’ve got used to having instant access to information via mobiles as well as our computers? With the onslaught of Twitter and other social networking sites, the world can know about events from people who are there, long before the news networks get their people on location. For example, news of Michael Jackson’s death appeared on both, hours before the story was covered by official news sources.

In my opinion, the newspapers need to think ‘outside the box’ in the same way that glossy magazines did a few years ago. The relatively ‘cheap treat’ for a woman of buying a magazine that she can pick up and read wherever she wants (which now also come in different sizes, so you can even choose one that even fits in your handbag!) will always exist; but when a monthly magazine has long lead times, the website offers the perfect channel for covering all sorts of stories that would otherwise be ignored as old news by the time the next issue was going to the printers.

The successful launch of the UK Vogue site some years ago allowed different editorial content to be created, so that fashionistas could have a daily fix of fashion news which complemented their monthly magazine read. It ensured that the catwalk shows could be covered instantly, with image and video coverage of not just the clothes, but interviews with the designers and coverage of who was attending which shows and with whom – all compulsive information for people in and lovers of the fashion industry!

But the secret to their success was providing something new and different that readers couldn’t easily get from other sources. With a dedicated team with their fingers on the pulse, they could provide all the inside track on their site, but free of charge. Although online newspapers can potentially do the same thing, why on earth would we ever be persuaded to pay for news that we can get from lots of other sources? Beats me…

Jill Thater
Client Services Director
Bluhalo Ltd