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We’re living in the digital golden age. So, what are you doing about it?

We’re living in the digital golden age. So, what are you doing about it? by Fred Roed (@fred_roed) I have an unshakable belief that we’re living, right now, in one of the most crazy awesome times in human history. I believe that in 100 years from now, people will look back at the turn of the 21^st century and say “Dayam, I wish I lived then!” – sorta like we do now thinking back to the 60’s, or the Enlightenment, or the industrial revolution, or the 80’s. Na, just kidding – the 80’s sucked.

[pullquote]Scalable areas like media placement are becoming competitive and crowded, and more and more agencies are entering the arena. Often these new agencies are more energetic and better looking than us. Damn those little punks to hell.[/pullquote]

Think about it. We’re living in a time where digital communication is changing everything. You know that right? Of course you do. The question really is, what are you doing about it?

So, running an agency, as I do, the question becomes even more critical. I’m at the forefront of all this stuff. We get updates daily, hourly, every .minute, on new shit that’s getting done. Innovations, inventions, disruptions: these are the things that mark this amazing pocket of time called the digital age.

And what am I doing about it?

Part of the reality of running an agency is that the disruption has affected our business too. At the heart of most of what we do is selling time, and the Good Lawd knows, selling time is hard, thin-margin work at times.

Scalable areas like media placement are becoming competitive and crowded, and more and more agencies are entering the arena. Often these new agencies are more energetic and better looking than us. Damn those little punks to hell.

As I see it, there are three options for us agencies.

1. Become better at being an agency.

This means do great work, tighten up operations, watch spend, pull the levers of expenses and income, win new business and market the hell out of yourself. Ok ja fine, but is it enough? It means living in15%-20% margin territory and a handful of marquee clients where one or two phone calls can wipe out your returns. That’s cool if you’re doing a tidy revenue, but it has to be asked, in a ‘golden age’, is merely being a better agency satisfactory?

2. Go into business with your clients.

Yep, I’m sure this has run through many an agency owner’s mind. I remember a Heavy Chef Session 2 years ago where the inimitable Alistair King reflected upon the great work King James had done in putting Allan Gray on the financial services map. If they’d negotiated a 1% profit share from AG’s growth from their work, the revenue return would run into over a billion rand. However, this is not easy. It’s difficult to measure, and even harder to sustain. If you fail, the relationship will strain. If you succeed, the validity of the partnership is questioned. Certain things happen,like cash flow or capacity issues that dictate that you pursue quick wins; or culture conflicts and differences of strategic vision arise. These things can kill a marriage very quickly. It’s very seldom that agency / client profit-share partnerships are all fun and roses. We’ve tried it with an e-commerce website and it was an unmitigated disaster. Still… with the right project, in the right industry, with the right people, at the right time, I believe a good strategic partnership can be an attractive route for an agency.

3. Create products

Entrepreneurs know that selling time is easy, but thin on profit; whereas selling products is hard and risky, but rich on reward. In the back of every agency owner’s mind is to convert some part of his output into a sweet, beautiful, scalable product (if you deny this, you’re lying). The issue is that you have to find the time or investment to do this right. I’ve personally found the biggest challenge to creating products in my own agency is the lack of suitable product champions. In other words, entrepreneurs within the organization that will take on the product as his / her own business and make it fly. It’s very, very seldom that agencies get this right – and, to be honest, we still haven’t managed it, despite a few aborted attempts.

My agency turns 10 this year. We’re having a lot of fun and I believe that, for us, taking advantage of this historical golden age lies in a combination of the three factors above.

The first bit is a given. We’re already on our way. Part 2 and 3 are the harder bits, but we’re giving it a shot.

It will take time, it will be risky and we’ll undoubtedly stumble a few times.

It will also be worth it. In the year 2100 – when our cryogenically frozen selves look back to now – we will say: “Thank God we did something remarkable in that crazy time!”

– Fred Roed first started teaching people how to build their brands in the digital economy way back in 1998. Fred is currently the Creative Director and CEO of digital marketing agency World Wide Creative. Fred is also the co-founder of the Heavy Chef project, dedicated to demystifying digital marketing. Fred is obsessed with brand strategy and digital media – with side habits of pizza and Hawaiian shirts. Fred is also Head of Agencies at the Digital Media And Marketing Association. Follow on Twitter: @Fred_Roed

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Ad of the Week with Oresti Patricios – the foodie revolution

MarkLives Ad of the Week with Oresti Patricios – the foodie revolution.

There was a time when food in South Africa was fairly simple and straight-forward. We were the land of tripe and polony. Gourmet wasn’t a commonplace word, and fancy food was all about special Sunday roasts or hotel buffets, or if you were of another class, the stuff people ate in restaurants like those in the Carlton Hotel or The Mount Nelson. Masterful chefs were the preserve of a small elite – not the every man and woman.

Fortunately times have changed and gourmet foods, products and processes have become much more democratised thanks to television and the interwebs. As the media discovered that human beings love to watch other humans cooking, all things gourmet have seeped into our popular culture.

Another aspect that’s driving local and international gourmet markets is generational. Baby Boomers may have launched the cooking craze and nurtured it, but the Millennial generation (aged 17-34 ) are stirring the pot and taking over the kitchen. Global market research company Mintel says younger generations love cooking more than their senior counterparts, and make up for in enthusiasm what they lack in experience.

56% of Mintel respondents in the US survey who cook occasionally say cooking allows them to experiment and try new things and 27% say it helps them to explore foods eaten in other cultures. Meanwhile, 48% say cooking is a way to express affection to friends and family, and 41% enjoy teaching their children how to cook. And perhaps the simplest of reasons, 43% enjoy the process of cooking as much as eating and 40% find that preparing food helps them to relax.

“Younger cooks appear to be more interested in experimentation, with those in their 20s and 30s more likely to agree that cooking gourmet meals makes them feel sophisticated and smart, suggesting that learning to cook and cooking for friends is viewed as a way to establish credibility among their peers,” says Fiona O’Donnell of Mintel.

Locally this trend is being fuelled by the likes of online premium kitchenware store which has enjoyed massive popularity and growth since its launch, together with commercial television where consumers can enjoy a veritable visual smorgasbord of the likes of Jamie Oliver, Heston Blumenthal, Nigella Lawson and the irascible Gordon Ramsay.

As a result of the rise of the epicurean phenomenon, people who wouldn’t normally go gourmet now ‘own’ it, as non-chefs learn that preparing cordon-bleu meals in their own kitchens is a whole load of fun. Even the laziest cooks have been inspired to try different ingredients in their meals.

The popular reality show MasterChef has epitomised this trend and features self-taught or inexperienced ‘home chefs’ competing for national honours in what is a nail-biting and highly entertaining televised affair.

So it’s hats off to Woolworths who made a great strategic decision by sponsoring the South African version of the much talked-about show. By doing so the brand sets itself up as the luxury food merchandiser of choice, and the go-to venue for ‘cuisine-quality’ ingredients, creating associations in the public mind of quality, variety and freshness.

In the run-up to the programme’s launch, Woolworths featured a beautifully-produced ad that showed deliciously shot slicing, dicing, splashing and drizzling, blending and cooking of gourmet food. It is a delight to watch, and smartly established the brand’s association with the project, which was much anticipated by South African foodies, ever since the success of the UK and Australian versions. In fact, it was the Australian version that really turned South Africans on to the series; it had better production values and was designed to be much more exciting than its precursor.

South Africa’s first series suffered from a few hitches, blamed by many on a poorly chosen ‘cast’. People felt that the Deena Naidoo was not up to the task, as his prize – a restaurant at the Tsogo Sun – was beset with problems and received negative reviews. Be that as it may, the show has continued, and to their credit, Woolworths has stuck with the sponsorship. Both MasterChef and Woolworths have strong enough brands to weather these sorts of issues, and I’m looking forward to an improved second season.

The latest spot was shot—as was the previous one—by Ian Chuter of Platypus Productions. This Cape Town-based production company is no stranger to filming food and beverages, having also produced spots for Robertson’s, Carling and Schweppes.

The photography and filming of food and drink is a specialised skill – anyone who has spent any time in a kitchen knows that preparing food can be a messy business, but a skilled food stylist and cinematographer can use lighting and composition to make the ingredients and process appear seamless, yet appealing and appetising.

In the launch spot, a white backdrop was used to fit in with the Woolworths branding. White also works well with food, signifying cleanliness and lightness. But in this ad, the backdrop was switched to a slate-black, which fits in with the programme’s design elements. It’s a more modern, edgy look and the dark background creates a chiaroscuro effect, making the colours ‘pop’.

As before, the food shots are mainly about perfect lighting and creative use of slow-motion. But the producers have gone a subtle step further with this ad, using a combination of slow-motion and jump-cut style animation techniques to create visual puns and micro-stories, supported by a rhythmical soundtrack that provides motivation for exciting edit points.

At first glance, what appears to be giant slabs of rock tumbling to a heavy drumbeat, are revealed to be chocolate, offset by a swirl of molten chocolate sauce;
Cream jumps into life as the blender kicks in;
Strawberries burst onto the screen as if they cannot contain their flavour;
Chillies fall and vegetable kebabs tumble to the beat;
The story starts ‘heating up’ as the lid is removed from a Japanese steamer to reveal crisp, green pak choi;
Followed by beetroot plummeting through boiling water, trailing deep red dye;
Then cool, crisp apple slices are doused with balsamic in a quick jump-cut sequence;
Various fish, seafood and meats are juxtaposed in different stages of preparation;
A row of leeks is splashed with water, which is match-motion cut to a flame briefly singeing the leaves;
Finally, condiments and bubbling sauce complete the montage.

The simple take-out slogan is: “Recipes in-store and online” – a call to action that will inspire any foodie (or aspirant foodie) to get creative in the kitchen, with ingredients that can probably only be found at ‘Woolies’.

These spots were mainly aired during the MasterChef South Africa Programme, maximising their reach to the intended target audience: ‘foodies’ who would be inspired to try out a new recipe and be prepared to pay the premium for exotic, high quality ingredients.

Beautifully filmed, brilliantly edited, yet simple and uncluttered to watch – these ads are delicious! Plus the brand maximises its reach with targeted placement, which means all the perfect elements combine for an effective and masterful campaign – one where Woolies takes ownership of gourmet cuisine.

Ad of the Week is published on MarkLives every Wednesday. See past selections here.
Oresti Patricios is the CEO of brand and reputation analysis company Ornico.

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After 20 years, SA ad industry sees demise of last print trade magazine

by Louise Marsland’s (@Louise_Marsland) It was with sadness that I learnt today that Media24 has closed down leading business-to-business magazine, AdVantage.

The 20-year-old print brand, started by legendary adman and editor, John Farquhar, pushed the boundaries in both content and advertising over the years, winning multiple awards.

The last issue (dated July 2013), went to print today and the June cover, which we display here, has been entered by Ogilvy into the Loeries.

When I was the editor, we redesigned and won awards for writing, design, covers and supplements two years in a row, including the Media24 internal awards for best B2B publication.

Outgoing editor, Danette Breitenbach, said she was “devastated” about the closure of the magazine.

“It is a fabulous product in a wonderful industry and it is very sad for all of us and such a pity it is closing after a legacy of 20 years.”

Media24 will also be closing and restructuring some of the medical titles in its B2B division and a number of staffers have been retrenched.

I have learnt reliably that Media24 has “sold off” the division, which included some custom titles, to New Media publishing, which felt that AdVantage was not a “fit” or in the “strategic interest” of their content business.

As an industry we should be deeply saddened when yet another print publication is closed. When it is a B2B publication with the brand legacy of AdVantage, it is even sadder, but times have changed and many B2B trade publications are moving online to cut out high print, paper and postal costs, to maximise their content resources.

Who can forget the heydays of Loeries at Sun City and the sought after AdVantage Loeries goody bag? Those were the days when the publication racked up R1 million in ad sales and sponsorships alone for that Loeries edition and add-ons.

With the traditional media industry in crisis, advertising spend has been cut radically since the global financial crisis began in 2008 and we all know that the levels of spend have not returned. AdVantage relied on advertising from media owners to survive. The ad agencies, much as they all lined up to be on the cover, hardly ever advertised. And the fact is that when Media24, which dominates the media market, bought AdVantage from Primedia, they no longer advertised in the magazine either and neither would some of their competitor media houses, so AdVantage lost a huge chunk of its potential advertising almost overnight.

It was a no win situation for the dedicated team, which nevertheless, managed to produce a content rich and designer publication that continued to receive accolades and meet its budgets most months by targeting new below-the-line advertisers and producing useful industry guides like the Radio Guide and the Transit Media Guide.

The publication was actually not losing money, but it wasn’t “making enough”, is how one source put it.

This is where I get angry. AdVantage was not just another magazine owned by a big media company. It was a 20-year-old magazine built by dedicated publishers, editors, journalists, designers and salespeople over decades, in partnership with the industry.

It is a legacy that belongs to the media, marketing and advertising communications industry. It helped build many careers, showcasing award winning work, profiling people, producing awards which it gave out to the very media industry which failed it. It made an enormous contribution to this industry, let us not forget that.

And that is what business-to-business media do: they facilitate trade, that is why they were called trade magazines before we got fancy with B2B terminology. They are a professional resource for industry.

AdVantage covers – which were never sold – were the most sought after in the industry. Many of those covers still hang on agency and media owner brag walls.

When the news of its closure broke today, the overwhelming reaction from the industry on social media networks was disbelief and sadness, with a couple of clients actually suggesting a petition and tweet campaign to get Media24 to change their decision.

I’m angry because the faceless accountants and publishers who sit in their towering head office at the big media conglomerates have never understood how special brands like AdVantage are to industries such as ours. Or the value to be obtained from the loyalty engendered by top B2B publications in the same industries that they try to sell advertising in for their glossier and wealthier media brands.That the legacy of the embedded knowledge in the talented teams of such B2B publications is just discarded.

B2B teams who dedicate their craft and specialise in covering their industries in depth love their publications and their industries. Their skills are extraordinary and far superior to many other lofty consumer titles, as B2B staff engage at CEO and director level with clients every day, help sell advertising, come up with innovative brand extensions, take their own pictures, get involved in publication layouts, proof copy, update their own websites, sign their mags off at the printers, and so on.

It is a testimony to the dedication and passion of the AdVantage team that we all offered to try raise the funds to buy the publication when closure was first mooted in 2011 when I was editor, and again last week, when the current team learnt of the latest move to close it.

I was told at the time that Media24 doesn’t buy publications to sell them, they would rather close them down.

And we still question why the media industry is in the state that it is today?

– Louise Marsland was editor-in-chief of AdVantage magazine from January 2009 – February 2012. She produced a model for business-to-business media sustainability in her M Com dissertation (2008) through the University of KwaZulu Natal Leadership School, entitled : ‘Analysing the Role of Business-to-Business Media in South Africa in the Emergence of Communities of Practice’. She has worked as an editor and journalist in the B2B publishing industry for 18 years of her 25 year media career.

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Design Annotator: Joburg’s creative undercurrent

Design Annotator with Uno de Waal is a new column featuring the top design work from South Africa’s biggest online creative showcase, Between 10 and 5, curated by Publisher Uno de Waal @Unodewaal.

Cannes Lions have come and gone with South Africa bringing a healthy few awards home. We’ve found and collected all the best South African creative pieces for you to view in one easy place. Have a look through our list and decide for yourself if you thought it deserved a win. The Here 2013 conference hosted by website It’s Nice That also happened recently and we have a great little write-up on it. Back in illustration land, Ben Johnson wows us with his incredible graphic and photography work. If you’ve ever been to a gig at EVOL you’ve probably seen his great work. Local photographer Chris Saunders teams up with Dazed and Confused former editor Rod Stanley to produce a short video on the exciting under current of the Johannesburg youth culture movement. Have a good read.

Winning SA Work at Cannes Lions 2013

We’ve collected all the creative work from South African winners at Cannes 2013 for your viewing pleasure. View the case study videos, radio ads or print work from all the best South African creative work.

View the winning South African Creative Work at Cannes 2013

Here 2013 Conference from It’s Nice That

Here is a one-day creative symposium of inspirational talks, experiments and live elements excellently curated by It’s Nice That. This year’s event took place last Friday in London and Larissa Elliott was there to soak up inspiration, make us really jealous that we weren’t there too and report back. Larissa works as an art director at M&C Saatchi Abel and runs the fantastic music video blog.Read the wrap-up and best of from the Here 2013 Conference.

Featured: Adriaan Louw Travel Photography

Adriaan Louw is a Cape Town-based photographer with an enviably well-stamped passport. While his fresh and beautiful decor and lifestyle photography could serve as an ample source for the most avid Pinterest-er, we’ve chosen to focus on his travel photography. Adriaan has captured the textures, patterns, people and must-see places of cities the world over. He must be able to actually fall asleep on a plane.View all of Adriaan’s travel photography.

Featured: Ben Johnson

Cape Town based graphic designer/director/photographer (etc.), Ben Johnson, has redesigned and launched his portfolio site. The new website showcases Ben’s original approach and inventive layout style in work for brands like Adriaan Kuiters, a store and Unknown Union as well as colourful and collaged fashion editorials and installations. A brilliant line of sublimation print T-shirts also makes an appearance. We’re enjoying Ben’s multi-layers and novel nod to MS Paint effects and Photoshop’s lesser-used tools in his refreshing event posters.Have a look at more of Ben Johnson’s creative work.

My Day Job: Geraldine Fenn

Geraldine Fenn is a jeweller, and works out of the popular Parkhurst store, Tinsel. She specialises in one-of-a-kind pieces, but also creates beautiful ranges that reflect her fancies and aesthetic. We chatted to her to find out a little more about what being a jeweller is all about.Read about Geraldine Fenn’s day job as a jeweller.

Young South Africa: JOBURG PARTY

JOBURG PARTY is a snapshot of South Africa’s new youth underground shot by South African photographer Chris Saunders and British journalist and former editor of Dazed & Confused, Rod Stanley, as duo Windeck Productions.

– Uno de Waal is the publisher of creative showcase 10and5.com.– Industry profiles you’ll make time for. Sign up for our free newsletter!

Inside view: Judging Cannes Lions Film

by Alistair King, Chief Creative Officer, King James Group (@alsparkles) The last time I judged Cannes Lions Film I swore never to do it again. I found the process political and argumentative, and many of the jury members devious and full of agendas. I found letters in my room from production houses telling me what work to look out for and hardcover books, elegantly printed by holding companies, showcasing their finest work. Party invites inevitably came with a 5 minute sales pitch on which ads they had entered. All in all I found the whole thing sickening and desperate and so I decided to approach this Cannes with a sense of calm and humour. As it turned out my pre-judging-self-pep-talk proved to be unnecessary. Apart from an early effort to establish alpha dog supremacy in the room, (which Sir John Hegarty won convincingly) the entire process was smooth, friendly and massively constructive.

After 4 days of hearing people motivating for work they admire, you do start to see patterns that mostly fall on nationalistic lines, but generally speaking this year’s panel was wonderfully neutral, with few signs of the block voting and favour trading that typified my previous experience. This time I left having made a few good friends and feeling that the best work won.

By its very nature, the award process is flawed. There are 3500 commercials and films to view over the first 3 days and one can fully expect the opinion of 22 jury members to differ vastly from that of a different set of 22. With so many films to view, many of which are between 30 and 90 minutes in length, judges are initially split into 3 groups to filter out what will eventually become the long shortlist. I have a feeling judges are put into filter panels that minimize the chances of them judging their own country or agency group’s work as I saw very little South African work in my slots, and very little again when I eventually got to view the long shortlist. Much of what I considered to be the best South African work was eliminated at those early stages. It is brutal to say the least. Just like that, your 640Euro entry is gone at the press of an iPad screen. After 3 full days of judging, the jury was put together for the first time to view, in one 14 hour sitting, all 385 films that had made it through. Of these a further 100 would be culled leaving you with what is commonly known as ‘The Shortlist’.

There are two broad categories at Cannes Lions Films. The A category (TV and Cinema Commercials) and the B Category (Online, Viral, Interactive, Branded content and Short and Long format films). Many of the entries in the latter category are cunningly broken up into episodes to disguise how long they really are. Anyone who suggests that the traditional TV ad is on the decline is kidding themselves. What was very apparent this year is that much of the great production values still lie in the traditional space. There were literally hundreds of films in the online category that were cheap and nasty and this kind of work was not granted any kind of grace. Idea remains king, but if it wasn’t well produced, it was swiftly binned. One judge verbalized it very well: If you’re going to make a film, your film must live up to the standards set by the great film awards like Sundance. The fact that you are operating in the online space is no excuse for shoddy film values and predictable product expressions. This new thing called Content has to be every bit as beautiful and every bit as entertaining as anything else made on film.

By Friday 5pm, we had selected 100 winners from the 3500 entries. Sir John Hegarty had set the tone upfront by insisting that we look for work that is fresh, as opposed to original. In describing the difference, he said we are all copyists in a sense – everything has been done before. He asked that we look instead for work that makes you feel something different or offers a unique perspective on the brand and the category in which it operates.

[pullquote]By its very nature, the award process is flawed. There are 3500 commercials and films to view over the first 3 days and one can fully expect the opinion of 22 jury members to differ vastly from that of a different set of 22. With so many films to view, many of which are between 30 and 90 minutes in length, judges are initially split into 3 groups to filter out what will eventually become the long shortlist.[/pullquote]

What becomes abundantly clear when judging Cannes is that it takes something very special to stand out. If you’re going to make a funny ad, it better be very funny. If you are going to try and tap into a humans’ deepest emotions, you’d better make an utterly unique observation of what we are all about. Anyone who thinks they can win a prize at Cannes with beautiful footage expressing a stale, well-trodden idea, is dreaming. Hegarty summed it up perfectly over lunch by saying “Good ads are 80% idea, and 80% production”. You have to have both. There is no grey area. The jury is brutal and most know 10 seconds into the ad whether it is intriguing or not.

This was definitely the year of the split screen. There were hundreds of them. Some made it onto the shortlist, but few converted into metal. Media houses and marketers should also take note of the length of most of the winners. There are a few gems that are short and punchy, but anything with any real emotion is 50 sec and longer. At a time when everyone is talking about storytelling, it’s important to accept that stories take time to tell and certainly this year’s winners prove that. If anything we are seeing the re-emergence of the long ad, thanks largely to the longer format films being made online. Another trend this year was the ‘filmed stunt’, spurred on by the success of Carlsberg’s ‘Bikers’ and TNT’s ‘Push to add drama’ last year. In many respects, even this is becoming an overly familiar genre and nothing works against you more at Cannes than familiarity.

[pullquote]There are a few gems that are short and punchy, but anything with any real emotion is 50 sec and longer. At a time when everyone is talking about storytelling, it’s important to accept that stories take time to tell and certainly this year’s winners prove that.[/pullquote]

Certain categories, which have historically done very well at Cannes, crashed and burned this year. It’s bound to send a very strong signal that they and their category are getting complacent, if not totally falling asleep on itself. Fast food for example was abysmal. As was the Financial Services category.You can almost see where the pressures are globally. If one client doesn’t step up with amazing advertising, the category as a whole tends to slip easily into a state of comfortable boredom.

Cannes awards two things; freshness on the part of the agency, and courage on the part of the client. When you watch 250 ads and films back to back in the same category, those agencies and clients who have stuck with the expected, the default language of the category, get nowhere. Those that have bravely sought out new observations of how consumers interact with their products stood out, just as they do in the real world. On more than one occasion you would hear a judge talk passionately about a particular piece of work. They would often say “I work in this category – it’s really hard to make decent work in this category – it deserves an award just because it pushes the category forward”. That pretty much sums Cannes up. At the end of the day, the ideas that won celebrate the human spirit. They break the norms of the category. And they offer something fresh and intriguing in a world of advertising sameness.

By Friday lunchtime it came down to 4 pieces of work across both categories: Dumb Ways to Day – a catchy, naively animated music video that arrived at Cannes backed by a wave of unprecedented hype. Dove Sketches – a beautiful observation of how many women see themselves. Southern Comfort – ironically, a beautiful observation of how comfortable a southern comfort man is in his own body. And ‘The Beauty Inside’ – an extraordinary film in 6 parts created for Intel and Toshiba.

I had watched ‘The Beauty Inside’ during the preliminary judging done in the weeks leading up to Cannes and had decided already that it would most likely be my Grand Prix choice. It is a game changer in my opinion– the most beautiful and profound link to a brand that I have ever seen. Whilst most advertisers in this category are slipping their products into their films in really indiscreet ways, Intel and Toshiba managed to create the most beautiful expression of its products wrapped up in a sublimely human story. As a film, from the acting to the production values, it is flawless. And it took less than 20 minutes of debate for the jury to pick it as the Online category Grand Prix over its nearest contender ‘Dumb ways to die’. At the back of everyone’s mind though I suspect ‘Dumb ways to die’ was always going to be a likely winner in the Advertising category.

As a piece of film it’s hard to say exactly why ‘Dumb ways to die’ is so good. It’s contagiously catchy and its power as an effective piece of communication is undeniable. Yet there is nothing brilliant about the animation, nor is the soundtrack a leap forward musically. It just can’t be ignored. For a while the jury was split between this and Dove Sketches, but many of the judges were very critical of Dove’s viral hit. Some felt it was contrived in places, and others had a fundamental problem with the message and the feeling the film left you with. The debate raged for close to 40 minutes, till the panel arrived at the rather inevitable conclusion that ‘Dumb ways to die’ deserved to win a film Grand Prix. All things considered, Film was the ‘ground zero’ of this campaign, and so an entirely deserving place for it to win.

From a South African perspective, it was another bleak year in this category, with only one Bronze to our credit. Category for category, Film is now where we perform the worst and has been for quite some time. This should not be the case however. We have great directors, great production resources, and all the creative talent we need to make interesting, provocative films. We appear to be constipated though, resorting to category cliché’s and predictable story telling formats. It’s time we change that, and the sooner the better. We need to push ourselves, and we need to push our clients. There’s always next year, but I guess that’s what Cannes is all about.

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Africa Style: Target markets — what do you see?

by Masingita Mazibuko ‘It’s not what you see, it’s what you look for’ is the statement. Coupled with a visual of ferocious, greedy hyenas descending upon unsuspecting playful lion cubs in a barren, Karoo-like desert, they are exceptionally emotive stirring feelings of anxiety and pending doom.

A closer look, however, reveals the adult lions camouflaged amongst the tufts of dry grass keeping a protective eye on the pride’s youngsters. So now the same words appear sage and thought-provoking.

That’s my take out from this ad from FNB targeted at its private clients. These words combined with these visuals assure me that the bank promises to look deeper, act wisely to unlock the magic of investment.

But, do I experience the ad in the same way in which you do, your neighbour does, FNB’s private clients do? Are we a largely homogenous target market? And if we are, will we remain so for the foreseeable future?

The widely-reported 2011 census results revealed the diversity that exists in South Africa. Robero Suro¹ puts forward the view that ‘a census is a national storybook’; it therefore gives facts and figures, such as age, race, household types and the like. But perhaps it is all together a too simplistic story.

Targeting forms the foundation of marketing and, as South Africa evolves, the ‘rainbow nation’ as we have characterised ourselves will morph considerably. As Suro¹ states, people form bonds on kinships and commonalities. Yes, they may see themselves belonging to particular race or place, but mutual exclusivity will increasingly become nebulous. This will have major implications for targeting. He writes: ‘A group identity may be a point of departure, a point of reference or a source of content. But it rarely defines an individual entirely.’¹

Added–Value² highlights some considerations for an increasingly multicultural US market. These learnings are relevant on our shores as we are similarly not only a rainbow in our demographic profile but in the ‘look, feel, flavours and sounds’ of our varying heritage and experiences.

How do we target increasingly diverse groups of people?

Firstly, keep communication efforts focused on what you have to offer. Kalil Vicioso³ mentions the multiculturalism that exists today, and that we have gone beyond the need honourable mentions and cheer-leading of specific groups. Marketers need to respect people’s pride in their individual identity, and reflect how they see themselves as part of the broader South African context. Klipdrift’s ‘Met Eish’ campaign comes to mind as it champions South Africanness, yet is focused on the product’s intrinsics.

Second, focus on values that authentically reflect people’s genuine experiences and aspirations to facilitate a more textured engagement. In today’s information age, consumers are savvier in their consumption of marketing messages. This requires marketers to step away from their desks and truly engage with all aspects of their targets lives. How many conversations do you truly have with your target consumer and how often? The Dove ‘Real Beauty Sketches’ campaign’s recent You Tube post with its approximately 55-million hits reflects a brand evoking a dialogue with its target audience.

Third, reflect diverse experiences, your target’s own as well as those of others. As consumers get broader exposure, one needs to start reflecting this change in their world. Johnnie Walker’s recent glocalisation of its ‘Keep Walking’ campaign interspersed great South African moments with shots of its iconic strider accompanying the voice-over ‘How often we forget our greatness idealizing the external, yet we forget how we made the world stand up and take notice …’ to inspire us.

Lastly, Vicioso states that intercultural dynamics can be a wellspring of dialogue, learning and humour. He rightfully states ‘living with diversity involves negotiating differences and seeking common ground consciously and subconsciously’. In this lies richness, which creates a platform for brands to prosper. Fast foods restaurants Wimpy, Spur, KFC and Nando’s capture our hearts every day, not impeded by our diversity but using it to create fond memories by reflecting our shared experiences regardless of our most apparent visual identities.

So, as the FNB says ‘It’s not what you see, it’s what you look for’. Let’s not let our desks be our handcuffs.

Sources:

http://www.added-value.com/source/2011/01/roberto-suros-commentary-on-cultural-openness/#sthash.YkHm6l8K.dpuf
http://www.slideshare.net/theaddedvaluegroup/the-influence-of-ethnic-identity-on-consumer-behaviour
http://www.added-value.com/source/2011/04/the-changing-face-of-america-four-tips-for-multicultural-marketing/

Masingita Mazibuko, marketing director at Unilever, contributes the monthly “Africa Style” column to MarkLives.com. The views expressed within this column are entirely her own.

Mad Men to Math Men

by Herman Manson (@marklives) Mad Men to Math Men is where advertising has been heading for a while now, and the pace of transformation is only picking up, Steven Plimsoll (@splimsoll), Chief Technology Officer at the WPP Data Alliance and at Mindshare Worldwide, told delegates at the recently held Acceleration Digital Ignition Symposium.

In case you don’t know, the WPP Data Alliance is a partnership between WPP companies “to connect diverse data to provide powerful, analytics-driven solutions for our clients.” This is where direct marketing meets media, says Plimsoll, who argues that the traditional adoption model used by many marketers is broken as consumers adopt communication technology at an unprecedented pace.

WPP, with its keen eye on shifts in marketing spend, and backed up by the findings of a 2012 Gartner report that says by 2017 the CMO (Chief Marketing Officer) will spend more on IT than the CIO, is investing in building data partnerships, like the one recently announced with Twitter, and going into client data strategy.

For the WPP Data Alliance every interaction, across the various channels we make use of, becomes an opportunity to collect data on consumers. “Insight opportunities” extend from store openings to tweets, call center activity, online ratings and reviews, media preferences and more. Data sources include traditional market research, owned activity monitoring (own website, call centre activity etc), social monitoring and media intelligence. Now plug all that data into a single pipe and see what you come up with.

According to Plimsoll collecting data is a never-ending task – 2% of customer records are made irrelevant each month. Of course you now have to figure out which 2%!

Plimsoll talks of a value exchange between engaged consumers and marketers as the future of brand communication. As a delegate I thought the word ‘engaged consumers’ should have been in caps, because I really can see value in only seeing advertising on topics I’m engaged with, on the proviso that the rest gets junked. It seems unlikely that media owners, or frankly marketers, would honour such a deal, where they get to collect my data in return for only relevant marketing communication. I’m betting my data will be collected, sold, resold, and I’ll still receive a ton of messaging

Charles Duhigg, the NY Times writer and author of The Power of Habit, explains how data are already mined to predict consumer behaviour. Plimsoll uses Duhigg’s video as an example of power of data already held by many corporations (watch video below).

Plimsoll gave a telling example of what customer data integration is already in play (for those companies who can afford it). An anonymous consumer is served a display ad. The same consumer later drops in on the brand site and their activity is recorded against the initial cookie. This second visit indicates consumer interest, the cookie is targeted on ad networks, after the brand site visit triggered a rule to ensure the highest bid against said cookie.

The consumer might well land back at the brand website, where they register via Facebook Connect and sign up for the opt-in newsletter. The Facebook ID and email address are recorded and Facebook Graph provides social network insight. With a name and email address in hand 3rd party data brokers will be approached for lifestyle data and address details (by now your full real name will be available to the marketer as well as your location).

The cookie might be identified as a regular visitor to a site catering to new moms, a text to a competition line with the email address included matches email and mobile numbers. Finally a call center operator calls with baby product offers, capture, and match personal details. That is anonymous browser to a personalised call with a relevant product offer in eight not terribly hard steps.

Plimsoll isn’t worried about legislation targeting cookies, saying WebObjects in HTML5 remains active even when cookies are cleared, and offers more data. “No one is missing cookies,” says Plimsoll.

This did make me wonder about the trust conversation marketers and brands are having with consumers. Trust us, we will tell you when we make use of cookies, and we don’t capture a lot of your data anyway, the conversation goes. But it’s not quite true, is it. As consumer realise the value of their data, and as data scandals receive more publicity, the big data conversation with consumers are going to have to change, or brands, and their agencies, will face risk to their reputations, and ultimately sales.

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Authenticity is the non-digital revolution sweeping our industry #canneslions

by Charl Thom, Group MD, FoxP2 The seminars and speakers over the Cannes Lions week are some of the most inspiring and informative an advertising or marketing person could hope for. Here are a few of the many notes I made during the week, and a few interesting quotes (some more colourful than others) that stayed with me:

It always has been and always will be about the idea. The canvas may change, but the big idea remains at the core of everything. As the canvas, or rather channels, become more and more fragmented, and some of them become channels within channels, our industry sometimes loses sight of the most important thing – the idea. A great idea effortlessly spreads itself across a variety of channels, without compromise or dilution, to deliver a single-minded message that people are interested in and want to engage with or participate in. “Entire industries are built to create things that help people avoid what we create.” David Droga

Technology is not an idea. It’s an enabler of the idea. As George Lois so eloquently stated in his legendary session with Lee Clow “We aren’t in the technology business, we’re in the f*cking creativity business”. If you don’t have an intimate understanding of technology and digital communication platforms, and how to execute in them, your agency is in deep trouble. It would be similar to not understanding what broadcast television could do for your brand when it reached South African shores as new technology in 1975. But our job is to deliver the idea that makes the technology come alive.

Execution separates the great from the good. The idea is nothing without execution, and vice versa. Many great ideas are greatly compromised through poor production. If you can’t afford to execute an idea to its full potential, go back to the drawing board and come back with an idea that you can create on the budget. Don’t compromise. As Sir John Hegarty likes to say “good advertising is 80% idea, and 80% execution”. Working with an agency that truly values craft is an invaluable asset to a brand.

Great work is a culture. This is true in an agency, and it’s true for clients. Jonathan Mildenhall and Ivan Pollard from Coca Cola took us on the tour de force that is Coca Cola’s advertising history. This is a company that believes in the power of creativity and the value of partnering with agencies that believe in fighting for great work every step of the way. George Lois, once again in his inimitable style, remarked “Choose clients that let you do great work. If they don’t let you do great work, then f*ck ‘em!”.

“If you’re not going to be great, you need to go home, get the f*ck out of the room.” P. Diddy. Building anything great is a marathon, not a sprint. And you have to be relentless in the pursuit of this greatness. This holds true whether you are building an agency, or building a campaign. And it’s a critically important qualifier for George’s statement above. I’ve seen too many agencies fight for mediocrity and then respond with arrogance and indignation when the client rightly tells them where to go. By all means, choose clients that let you do great work, but then put great work in front of those clients. Otherwise, get out the room.

Authenticity is the non-digital revolution sweeping our industry. Watch television for an hour or two, and you may find this hard to believe, but the days of fooling people through insincere advertising are gone. Conan O’Brien lamented the fact that some advertisers on his show still try to insist on fake product interactions. They don’t understand why he would resist snacking on their particular brand of chocolate bar, and then turn to camera to tell everyone just how tasty it is. He says “people are more aware than ever of ‘phony-ness’, and they are suspicious of it”. It seems obvious, but weaker marketers still want it, and poor agencies fall back on it.

Digital is the new traditional. Marcello Serpa uttered these words at Cannes two years ago “the only line that matters is the line between good and bad ideas”. I’m excited by the continuing convergence between old and new media (and these terms are rapidly becoming outdated). Last weekend, I sat in Amsterdam, watching television as the British and Irish Lions played against Australia in Brisbane. I watched the game with my buddies in South Africa and the UK as we commented back and forth via Twitter. We looked up player stats and retweeted plays the following day. This ongoing convergence gives old media platforms new relevance and constantly unlocks new opportunities.

Stay true to who you are. It’s the only way to be great and build something worthy of a legacy. Too many agencies start out great, and as they grow and get more clients, they lose themselves. Some of them become clumsy, fat and lazy. The guys from IDEO candidly shared how a decision to do the right thing cost them people, offices, clients and profit, but gained them allies, believers, reach and a legacy. P Diddy backed this up by saying “Never back away from your authenticity for the sake of profitability, you will eventually lose”.

Hear more from Charl. Get onto our weekly mailer.

MagLove: Jay-Z rocks Billboard

MarkLives.com runs a regular slot featuring the best local and international magazine covers every week. We recognise well thought out, powerful and interesting (and hopefully all three in one) magazine covers and celebrate the mix of pragmatism, creativity and personal taste that created each of them. By media blogger MediaSlut.

INTERNATIONAL

Billboard, 29 June 2013

Jay-Z is all over the place, and definitely breaking the mould when it comes to music, and the way people listen to it and access it. He recently launched an amazing deal with Samsung, but now there’s a debate going around as to why his record numbers (note: not sales) will not be recognized. Read more on the debate here. Most of the required information and stats are all creatively displayed on this cover, sigifying the blueprint that Jay-Z is creating in terms of music…

ShortList, 27 June 2013

The late James Gandolfini (or better known as Tony Soprano) is on the cover of ShortList, and looking timeless. One of their articles about James is named “The man who redefined men” about how he changed a whole generation of men, and it makes for very interesting reading.

Variety, June 2013

The new movie The Loan Ranger is launching on 12 July in South African theatres, and I thought that this is really a unique and creative concept and cover execution to promote the launch of (and story behind) The Loan Ranger (in the US). Reminds me a bit of ‘paint by numbers’.

Alberta Venture, June 2013

Puzzled? Just a little bit. I’m still trying to figure out if they actually had everything printed on the puzzles and actually shot it like this, or if it was all done digitally. Either way, I’m very impressed with the level of detail, even to the smallest bit of information, that comes across on the different puzzle pieces.

Volkskrant Magazine, 22 June 2013

This is one of those covers that really plays with your mind. Almost like the Intermediair cover of 12 October 2012 that covered migraines, and actually gave me a migraine just looking at it. On the cover is actor Porgy Franssen saying “I really put everything on its head”. The cover was actually inspired by the ad campaign that Jung von Matt did for Mercedes (see below) which was also very striking.

– The (for now anonymous) blogger behind MediaSlut knows way too much for his own good about media in South Africa. Magazines in particular. His mission is to show when South African magazines might fail, but most importantly, succeed. If you’re looking for a library about South African magazines and news, your one-stop pitstop is MediaSlut. #MagazinesForTheWin

– Find a cover we should know about? Tweet us @marklives and @mediaslut
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Tech Law: NSA spying negates attorney-client privilege

by Paul Jacobson (@pauljacobson) To say recent revelations about the US National Security Agency’s global surveillance campaign are unsettling is an understatement. While we are still getting to terms with the extent of the surveillance we have all been subject to, a few things are pretty clear:

The NSA has been collecting both the metadata relating to our digital communications as well as their content (the US government has maintained that it does not collect the content of US citizens’ communications but that has been challenged).
Internet services we rely on are not immune to the NSA’s campaign. On the contrary, their data is being accessed, either directly or indirectly, and stored for future reference in case they do something illegal or problematic in the future.

You may think that if you don’t rely on the larger Web service providers (apparently with the exception of Twitter which, as I understand it, refuses to co-operate with the NSA) you are immune from scrutiny but that is a fallacy. The NSA has basically tied itself into the Internet’s backbone and monitors all traffic passing through the routers and infrastucture it can see. What this means is that if the data you send or receive passes through any of the Web services that have been co-opted by the NSA under the USA’s secrecy laws or the very Internet infrastructure the NSA is monitoring, your data is exposed to the NSA’s scrutiny.

What we don’t know is just how the NSA analyses the data and to what extent. Certainly as non-US citizens, we are being targeted and all our communications are potentially being captured and stored for analysis. The Guardian has also reported that this isn’t limited to the NSA. The British GCHQ (the equivalent of the NSA) is also monitoring data passing through the UK. We already know that the South African government has the mechanisms in place to monitor our communications through legislation like the Regulation of Interception of Communications and Provision of Communication-related Information Act which essentially mandates storage of users’ identities and their mobile device data. It is conceivable that our government’s programs are more extensive. The NSA’s and GCHQ’s programs certainly seem to grant other nations implicit permission to run similar programs.

Aside from the dramatic erosion of privacy, one significant concern is how these programs impact legal professional privilege (which incorporates attorney-client privilege). The Electronic Freedom Foundation recently published a detailed review of what has come to light about the NSA’s surveillance programs and dealt specifically with attorney-client privilege:

Attorney-Client Privilege Means Nothing

The attorney client privilege is a long-standing feature of American law, one of the oldest and most cherished privileges through out the ages. As one court explained, it is the cornerstone of the privilege is “that one who seeks advice or aid from a lawyer should be completely free of any fear that his secrets will be uncovered.”

The NSA document shows they cut through this privilege like a hot knife through butter. The NSA only has to stop looking at the communication if the person is known to be under criminal indictment in the United States and communicating with her attorney for that particular matter.

This remarkably myopic view of the privilege means communications between attorneys and clients in many cases will be unduly spied on. This is exactly what the ACLU was worried about when they challenged the constitutionality of the FISA Amendments Act. They alleged that attorneys working with clients overseas had an ethical obligation not to electronically communicate with them because the NSA was likely able to read their emails. While the Supreme Court dismissed their suit for lack of standing, these documents at least in part, confirm their fears.

This could also mean any attorney-client communications with someone like Julian Assange of WikiLeaks, who has never been publicly acknowledged as indicted in the U.S., would be fair game.

Even where the privilege applies, the NSA does not destroy the information. The privileged nature is noted in the log, to “protect it” from use in criminal prosecutions, but the NSA is free to retain and use the information for other purposes. No limits on other uses, so long as the NSA General Counsel approves. This is a complete perversion of the attorney-client privilege. The privilege is designed to allow free communication of attorneys and those who they represent, so the client can get good counsel without hiding the truth from his attorney. It is not simply about preventing that communication from being used as evidence in a criminal case.

Legal professional privilege, at least in our law, is actually the client’s privilege that binds the client’s lawyers and protects communications between the client and his or her lawyers from disclosure. The Constitutional Court dealt with the legal professional privilege at common law (the Court wasn’t asked to consider privilege as a Constitutional right) in the 2008 Thint (Pty) Ltd v National Director of Public Prosecutions and Others, Zuma and Another v National Director of Public Prosecutions and Others case:

The right to legal professional privilege is a general rule of our common law which states that communications between a legal advisor and his or her client are protected from disclosure, provided that certain requirements are met. The rationale of this right has changed over time. It is now generally accepted that these communications should be protected in order to facilitate the proper functioning of an adversarial system of justice, because it encourages full and frank disclosure between advisors and clients. This, in turn, promotes fairness in litigation. In the context of criminal proceedings, moreover, the right to have privileged communications with a lawyer protected is necessary to uphold the right to a fair trial in terms of section 35 of the Constitution, and for that reason it is to be taken very seriously indeed.

Accordingly, privileged materials may not be admitted as evidence without consent. Nor may they be seized under a search warrant. They need not be disclosed during the discovery process. The person in whom the right vests may not be obliged to testify about the content of the privileged material. It should, however, be emphasised that the common-law right to legal professional privilege must be claimed by the right-holder or by the right-holder’s legal representative. The right is not absolute; it may, depending upon the facts of a specific case, be outweighed by countervailing considerations.

The general principle that lawyers not disclose (or permit to be disclosed) confidential information is practically universally accepted as an essential component of legal professional privilege (or its equivalents in various jurisdictions). The Law Society of South Africa’s Information Security Guidelines quotes what appears to be an early version of the International Bar Association’s International Code of Ethics governing lawyers’ conduct as an example of the expectations of lawyers. Rule 4, in particular, states the following:

Rule 4. All communications between attorney and client relating to the subject matter of the lawyer’s representation are privileged and may not be disclosed without the client’s express or implicit permission, except to the extent they relate to future conduct that may be criminal or fraudulent. In-house attorneys are included within the scope of this Rule.

Rule 6 goes on to state the following:

Rule 6. Lawyers should never disclose, unless lawfully ordered to do so by a proper Court with jurisdiction or as required by Statute or in a lawsuit with the client, what has been communicated to them in their capacity as lawyers even after they have ceased to be the client’s counsel. This duty extends to their partners, to junior lawyers assisting them and to their employees.

Complying with information security requirements generally involves exercising due diligence in assessing a service’s security features and taking reasonable steps to secure client data. Storing client data on a centrally located server within a firm’s offices may be relatively secure from the perspective that the server may not be susceptible to scrutiny from external parties but the days of an offline server a an effective resource are likely over as lawyers are increasingly expected to work flexibly and remotely. It also isn’t always feasible to manage servers and their security requirements in-house, particularly for smaller firms so lawyers look to cloud services for flexible, hosted and secure solutions.

In a time where foreign agencies weren’t conducting indiscriminate and pervasive surveillance campaigns (you have to wonder when there was such a time, in retrospect), it was probably sufficient to ensure that the cloud service was adequate encryption (both for data being transmitted as well as being stored) and sufficient physical access control policies to protect the data from foreseeable attacks. That doesn’t seem to be enough anymore and lawyers are going to have to beef up their security protocols to meet their ethical and legal confidentiality requirements.

What this likely means is that lawyers are going to need to seriously consider implementing encryption technologies for email and their cloud services. The NSA whistleblower, Edward Snowden, seems to think that making use of encryption is adequate protection, provided it is properly implemented:

Encryption works. Properly implemented strong crypto systems are one of the few things that you can rely on. Unfortunately, endpoint security is so terrifically weak that NSA can frequently find ways around it.

What this means is that lawyers have to consider their email communications (and data transmission and storage, generally) holistically. Encrypting email requires that recipients also make use of encryption tools to be able to decrypt the email and will also need to make more consistent use of these tools to communicate securely with their lawyers.

Another implication for the NSA/GCHQ revelations is that services which are subject to government surveillance and access are probably not satisfactory options for lawyers anymore, at least not without modification. It seems that lawyers are going to have to integrate data security practices into their day to day workflows and take steps to educate their clients about the need to do likewise. Both parties should begin encrypting (or, at least, digitally signing) their communications to prevent (or, in the case of digitally signed communications, detecting) interceptions and unauthorised data access. Ars Technica has a pretty good guide to popular email encryption options for Mac, Windows and Linux users. This is not a quick fix. It requires a pretty extensive review of how you approach email but we, the legal profession, just don’t seem to have much choice.

The irony is that encrypting your data makes you a bigger target for the NSA. As the EFF points out –

More appallingly, the NSA is allowed to hold onto communications solely because you use encryption. Whether the communication is domestic or foreign, the NSA will hang on to the encrypted message forever, or at least until it is decrypted. And then at least five more years.

The benefit of encrypting your data is that good encryption (presumably) takes considerably more resources to crack and affords clients far better protection of their data. It also means lawyers are more capable of complying with their obligations to protect their clients’ privilege.

Our digital world has been shaken to its core and as legal professionals, we have little choice but to adapt and take data security more seriously. That means rethinking how we communicate with our clients and which services we use to do that. It also means we have to begin sooner rather than later. Each email or file uploaded to a cloud services is more data exposed to scrutiny by agencies that seem to have little regard for legal professional privilege or privacy.

Update (2013-06-24): It’s also worth reading this CNet article titled “How Web mail providers leave door open for NSA surveillance” for perspective on what some of the major Web mail providers are doing (or not) to secure your emails. It turns out that Google is doing more than most.

Paul Jacobson is founder and director of Web•Tech•Law. Web•Tech•Law / CC BY-SA 2.5

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