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Agile, collaborative agency backed by Quirk Group

by Herman Manson (@marklives) Clients are becoming more frustrated with agencies, especially as agencies grow to become corporates with all the inflexibility and structural issues that entails. As client problems require quicker turn-around, greater flexibility and innovation, their agencies are becoming less likely to fulfil these requirements.

Designed to counter these issues are Kathryn Sharfman’s new agency, Fast and Remarkable. Quirk Group backs the agency in which Sharfman is a shareholder.

Fast and Remarkable officially launched October 1st. The agency brings together teams of experienced freelancers under the project management skills of Sharfman. Sharfman’s husband, Las Madurasinghe, with a background in investment banking, is also involved in the business.

The agency is focussing on digital projects and offerings include strategy, production and media. Focus will be on quick turn-around times, essential in the digital environment, as well as top quality (i.e. remarkable) work and pulling together a network of well vetted and deeply skilled individuals.

Digital has a fairly low barrier to entry, Sharfman notes, and Fast & Remarkable is set up so clients can easily access high-level digital skills and experience. It’s that experience which offers agile solutions to client problems, says Sharfman.

Sharfman says the new agency taps into the collaborative work model with its strong focus on people and maximising their individual contributions for the benefit of clients.

Media Future: You can’t bank on it

Absa and Investec both finally launched banking apps in the last two weeks – and both have taken a narrow view of the market, writes Arthur Goldstuck (@art2gee).

Two major banks have finally come out of labour and given birth to mobile apps to complete the South African family of financial apps. Both Absa and Investec showed off their long-awaited apps to the world in the last twe weeks, joining FNB, Standard Bank and Nedbank in the nursery of 21st century banking technology.

The proudest parents this week were the members of the Absa team who had climbed into bed with their, err, parent company, Barclays, to produce an app with clear African credentials.

Hermaneutics: In digital, associations are losing relevance

In the early to mid-1990’s the commercial internet was just grabbing a toehold in South Africa. In ’96/’97 I was still one of only a handful of journalists covering ‘new media’ in this country. I was classed a ‘tech journalist’ even though I didn’t know anything about gadgets. You see people who worked on/with/through the internet were easy to silo (at that point as ‘tech’).

Then digital went all Big Baboon House on every industry you can imagine. No more silos. If you work in media, part of your job is working on/with/through the internet. Ditto for advertising, marketing and a host of other industries.

This brings us to an interesting point. If you are an association created for people functioning in the digital silo, in a time when (dear senior big agency management please place your hands before your eyes – just for a moment) the digital silo is bust, just how relevant are you?

It seems to be one of the questions facing the Digital Media & Marketing Association (DMMA) – an association focussed ‘on growing and sustaining a vibrant and profitable digital industry within South Africa.’ Its members consist of a bunch of publishers and agencies that value their digital capacity and skills, and often have a digital legacy, but are no longer necessarily digital pure plays.

The Hidden Danger Of Precision Targeting

by Bob Hoffman (@adcontrarian), San Francisco BayThere is very little difference between your customer and your competitor’s customer.

And get ready for a shock. To them there is very little difference between you and your competitor.

Most consumers are oblivious to the positioning subtleties among major brands. The average consumer has no idea why Coke is different from Pepsi, or Crest is different from Colgate. They see no difference between Jif and Skippy. They are unimpressed and uninformed about the arcane positioning distinctions between Bounty and Brawny paper towels.

Most of their purchasing habits are just that — habits. Interpreting their behavior as some sort of ideological commitment to your brand is a delusion.

DMMA board denies governance crisis

by Herman Manson. The DMMA earlier this year announced a new management structure that saw an elected exco replaced by an appointed steering committee. However, it had neglected to update its constitution, which requires a 75% vote in support by members, before doing so.

Media Future: Here comes the tablet killer

by Arthur Goldstuck (@art2gee) A new entrant in the ultra-low-cost tablet market is also a global brand name at the high end. That could make all the difference.

While the world watches the battle for the high-end tablet market being waged between Apple and Samsung, a surprise attack is being mounted on the low end of the market.

Acer is best known for quality notebook computers, but late last year announced a series of tablets and Ultrabooks that positioned it alongside the equivalent high-end devices from Apple and Samsung. However, its pricing was so out of kilter with the competition at that level, it in effect wiped out the rest of its differentiating factors.

It seems that Acer won’t make the same mistake again. This week, it announced the imminent arrival of a tablet targeting the entry-level. That’s the arena dominated by no-name generic 7” tablets running the free Android operating system, imported from the East and given local branding. Prices range from R1000 to R3000 but, at the low end of that range, devices are barely functional for high-speed or interactive use.

Most quality name-brand tablets competing at this level, such as the Huawei Ideos, came in at around R3500. Its successor, the Mediapad, ran to R4300. However Apple shook up that market segment with the 7.9” iPad mini, starting here at R3400 – cheaper than buying the device in Europe.

That left Asus as the last international brand standing at the entry level, with the 7” MeMO Pad. It carries a reported R2000 price tag on a tablet running the Android Jelly bean operating system, weighing 358g, sporting a single-core 1GHz processor, 1GB of memory, 8GB or 16GB storage, and the option to expand storage via a microSD slot. A microUSB port also offers easy escape for files.

Tech Law: Processing, personal information and direct marketing under POPI

by Paul Jacobson (@pauljacobson) There is a lot more to the anticipated Protection of Personal Information Act and, in this post, I’d like to give you an overview of two further important terms used in the Protection of Personal Information Bill, namely “personal information” and “processing”.

Janet Warren Likes Walmart (but does she?)

by Bob Hoffman (@adcontrarian), San Francisco Bay Janet Warren was one one of those impossibly wonderful girls. Not just pretty, not just smart, but nice and pleasant and friendly. Often her father would have letters to the editor published in The New York Times. She was a cheerleader with actual cheer.

Naturally, she had no idea I existed. But she lived in the next building, and her sister was friendly with my sister.

I was in Los Angeles once, years after high school, and I saw her in a popular restaurant. She was with a group of obviously high-performance individuals, and she was the star of the crowd. I studied her from across the room. She was in her early 30’s and had an ethereal almost-hippie, almost-executive look and manner. I found out, years later, that she had been the producer of some pretty important movies.

Years passed and as circumstances sometimes unfold, I had occasion to have lunch with her. I explained to her who I was, and of course, she didn’t remember me. She was still lovely in that way that women over 50 can be lovely if they dress simply and tastefully and don’t have surgery and don’t try to be 20.

She had adopted a child. She was active in many organizations that worked for social justice. She was no longer an active producer, but still had great poise and presence.

We exchanged a few emails following our lunch. I wanted to become friends, but after a while she gracefully stopped emailing, saying she was too busy. I knew what that meant. Several months later I was surprised when she friended me on Facebook.

Lately, on my Facebook page, I find ads that tell me that “Janet Warren Likes Walmart.”

The 2nd internet revolution

by Louise Marsland (@trendlives) This year, the number of mobile devices in circulation will reach 7 billion – more than the total number of humans on this planet. It is our “mobile moment” as a generation.

Mobile has also become as big a disruptor to the way we communicate, as the dawning of the internet age. With mobile devices as powerful as desktop computers, itis being called the dawn of the second internet revolution.

And for many on this planet, the mobile device has become their ‘first screen’.

EXCLUSIVE: Sekunjalo Group company buys digital agency World Wide Creative

Saratoga Software, a subsidiary of JSE listed Sekunjalo Investments Limited, has acquired a majority shareholding in Cape Town digital agency World Wide Creative.

Sekunjalo is lead by Dr Iqbal Survé, who recently made headlines thanks to the successful bid (still subject to approval from shareholders and authorities) by the Sekunjalo Independent Media Consortium to acquire the South African division of Irish owned Independent Newspapers in a R2 billion deal.

Independent titles include The Star, Cape Times, The Mercury and Isolezwe amongst others as well as the online news portal IOL.

(A recent SENS statement by the company points out that Sekunjalo Investment Holdings (Pty) Ltd is a party to the Sekunjalo Independent Media Consortium and not the JSE Listed company, Sekunjalo Investments Limited. Sekunjalo Investment Holdings (Pty) Ltd (part of the consortium) “will work closely with the technology business of Sekunjalo Investments Limited (which owns Saratoga Software) to ensure that thereis synergistic benefits for Sekunjalo Investments Limited.”

Survé recently told media journalist Gill Moodie that innovation and digital transformation was key to make Independent newspapers competitive and to take on arch newspaper rival Media24. He had hinted in that interview that the imminent acquisition of digital assets to help achieve these goals were on the cards.

World Wide Creative is known for its expertise in the production and development of digital assets. Current clients include Hyundai, The Foschini Group and Virgin Mobile. World Wide Creative was launched in 2003 by business partners Fred Roed and Mike Perk.