Independent industry news for marketing, advertising & media execs
Bouffant, a TV commercials production company, is giving out customized Moleskins as end of year gifts. The illustrations are designed by Nicholas from Team Uncool. Mark thinks it’s all pretty cool. Bouffant consists of six commercials directors namely Erik Van Wyk, Ariane Besson, Dean Blumberg, Marc Sidelsky and Andre Liebenberg.
Twitter, the popular micro-blogging service, isn’t being utilised properly by South African newspaper publishers. Internationally Twitter is being used by media organisations as diverse as CNN and the NYTimes to push breaking news to subscribers. Big name local brands such as The Star, Beeld, Die Burger, the Cape Times, the Sowetan and others are still missing in action. So which South African newspapers make use of Twitter?
Date or survey – December 4&5, 2008 (Ranked by popularity) [TABLE=2]
IOL came in at first place which is a little bit surprising. I expected it to be The Times which is must more innovative online. However its’ lengthy URL makes it difficult to find, the same can be said for that of the Mail & Guardian (I had to ask Mark’s followers on Twitter where I could find it – thanks Simone). Tech savvy local paper Grocotts Mail managed to attract more attention than the M&G on Twitter.
Just as a comparison here is a look at some of the international subscriber figures:
Name & URL and No Followers
The New York Times 13985
Financial Times 685
Detroit Free Press 701
Just to provide some context to these numbers, the NY Times uses multiple Twitter accounts so readers 
only need to subscribe to the channels they prefer, be it sport, finance or world news. FT’s numbers are low because they have to use an awful URL (FTfinancenews). Why they didn’t just use their website URL is beyond me.
Publishers need to wake up and register their brand names on this service before they lose out as @rapport and others already have.
Follow MarkLives on Twitter @marklives
If you find other news organisations online let me know so I can add them to the list. Check back in January for an updated list.
Today we have a guest blog by Olivier Schildt, Creative Director at REX, on Muji, an aspirational brand that went for less, and won.
As the economic downturn leads to budget cuts, particularly in the area of marketing and design, smart companies are asking how they can get the most out of their branding buck. It’s not just a matter of trying to cut costs; they realise that during difficult times it’s more important than ever to ensure that their brand stands out from its competitors. But in an environment that’s flooded with brands jostling for the same piece of the consumer attention pie, achieving this is not easy.
In a snap survey in which creatives were asked how they would differentiate a brand against a background of sameness, many of them fell back on words and phrases like ‘innovate’, ‘think out the box’, ‘go left field’ and ‘create something entirely new’ – but what exactly do these things mean and how can they inform a brand strategy that truly sets a product or company apart?
I’d like to propose that an answer by way of an example. When Japanase store, Muji, launched its philosophy of ‘no brand quality goods’ it wasn’t necessarily breaking new ground. (After all, the same concept has been done here in South Africa with Pick ‘n Pay No Name Brands). But somehow the simple, anonymous understated look caught people’s attention. The question is why. When did plain wood and brown paper become vogue? Is it simply because Muji, an aspirational brand did it, or because what they were doing was so different from what was out there at the time that people couldn’t help but notice it?
I’d argue for the latter. It’s not so much what Muji did from a design point of view as what they didn’t do. In other words, their brand concept worked because it considered what was out there (clutter) and, given this, what would stand out (minimalism). The point relates back to two things we already know. Firstly, brands don’t exist in a vacuum. They are more or less eye-catching, innovative, conspicuous relative to other brands. Secondly, its a simple business truth that if you want to set yourself apart from your competitors you’d better make sure you know what those competitors are doing.
In other words, smart branding and design takes into consideration what’s already out there – and then does something different. Because it’s relative, it’s also constantly evolving. To get back to the Muji example, it won’t necessarily always be the case of ‘less is more’. Muji’s plain wood and brown paper would have receded into obscurity if the market was flooded with minimalism. Under those circumstances, heavily worked and intricate design would have stood out.
So design is not about following trends or being different for the sake of it – it’s rather about recognising what’s out there and developing an understanding of the experience that this ‘whole’ creates for the consumer. And then doing something strategically other. When brands accomplish this, they breathe a breath of fresh air into the market that makes everyone turn in the direction of the breeze.
Of course, this is not a new concept. But perhaps its one of which we need to remind ourselves as consumer fatigue grows, customer attention span decreases and businesses demand a greater return on their branding investment.
The number of South Africans now online have risen to 4.5 million. This is the key finding of the Internet Access in South Africa 2008 study, released today by World Wide Worx.
“The increase comes on the eve of the biggest shakeup in South African Internet access we’ve seen since the dawn of the commercial Internet in 1994,” says Arthur Goldstuck, MD of World Wide Worx. “It is only the beginning of a dramatic turnaround, and is occurring despite numerous obstacles in the way of growth.”
The Internet Access in SA 2008 report shows that growth has come largely on the back of dramatic take-up of broadband offerings by small businesses, which alone accounted for half of the growth in the market, mainly through connecting office staff to their ADSL links. At the same time, the market as a whole has seen a continued dramatic shift from dial-up connections to broadband, with growth in both ADSL and 3G at more than 50%.
“We are seeing a broadband culture emerging in South Africa, held back only by the restrictions still placed on data capacity,” says Goldstuck. “These should start becoming a non-issue from the middle of 2009, as the first of the major new undersea cables enters operation. At that point, dial-up will effectively be dead as a connectivity option – it is more expensive, and utterly inappropriate to the changing nature of the Internet.
“Once everyone who is connected is on broadband or high-speed networks, the Internet will come into its own as an environment for business collaboration and personal interaction.”
Television commercials production company Velocity has launched a new website as part of the new Velocity Corporate identity designed by REX. Instead of going vertical the design went horizontal effectively showcasing Velocity’s work in a unique manner.
All the images (each one linking to the appropriate commercial clip) were treated in a homogenous monochromatic snapshot. This is in line with the look that was created for the new brand mark. It also lets all the images flag the work they represent in an even manner. In turn, this encourages a visitor to the site to browse the work, rather than select something specific and then move along, potentially glossing over other, equally engaging commercials.
According to Olivier Schildt of REX design who designed the website, “We created a site that is all about a balanced and refined restraint, creating an elegant backdrop for the all the great commercials this company has become world renowned for.”
This great ad was created for Mini by Black River FC for World AIDS Day. The message – stick with one partner!
Creative Director: Ahmed Tilly
Art Director: Sifiso Tshabalala
Copywriter: Sindiwe Mbiko
Client Service: Maxine Merckel
TV Producer: Alison Pope
Designer Bradley Kirshenbaum of Love Jozi T-shirt fame has come up with a unique viral campaign over the course of the last two years that has been running under the nose of marketers and consumers alike without anybody realising it. In short – he faked his own brand.
Bradley created a fake, much cheaper brand called ‘Luv Jozi’ on nasty t-shirts to make people think someone was copying his exclusive and sought after Love Jozi range with cheap Chinese imports. There was a fake, misspelled, logo and a fake website (with photography that seemed to be shot in China but really shot in Cyrildene) and Facebook page. The t-shirts were selling at robots, flea markets and city vendors as well as Chinese owned clothing shops downtown. A couple of blogs picked up on the story not realising the real brand was behind the fake one all along.
“We didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when we spotted these “Fongkongs” or rip-offs of local design label Love Jozi being sold blatantly in the streets of Johannesburg at a third of the price of the original,” wrote Represent, a local lifestyle blog.
“One of our very well known local suppliers Love Jozi has found itself in the grip of these criminal elements of late and have had their very slick urban wear ripped by a group called Luv Jozi who go around selling garments that are obviously stolen from our beloved Love Jozi,” wrote local fashion blog eSquared. “The fact
that these guys even have a website with Made in China all over it really pisses me off, did they think they could get away with this so easily?”
“We did it to draw attention to the original brand, Love Jozi, and to emphasise the quality of production and design of the real brand,” says Bradley. “Also to comment on the Department of Trade & Industry’s regulations at the time on retailers bringing in imported goods vs. goods made in SA.”
It was also part of a larger, long term, marketing campaign for a new range of cheaper and more accessible Love Jozi products. The graphics on these will remain Love Jozi classics such as the Jozi skyline, barbed wire writing and barcode, and is made with the same quality fabric as the original T-shirts, but the cut is a lot more basic and not as fashion forward as the mother brand.
Finally SA’s big financial institutions are waking up to the fact that South Africans are also being impacted upon by the global financial crisis. This ad from Sanlam reads: “It’s hard not to panic.
Every inch of your body is in hyperdrive. Your heart pounds. Your chest hurts. You look for danger in every direction. You run. When excitement hits the markets, it’s exactly the same. But we keep our cool.”
The ad was created by The Jupiter Drawing Room.
Livio Tronchin – Creative Director
Kim McDonald – Art Director
Nick Gordon – Copy Writer
These lunch bag designs are fast becoming something of a web sensation. Each day this dad creates a new lunch bag design for his kids. He also posts his designs on his blog which was recently featured in USA Today as well as on a number of design blogs. Sometimes its the simple things that speak to people…
The Detroit Free Press is reporting that GM is considering shedding up to four brands as it prepares a plan for the US Congress on how it will apply money from a potential government bail-out to stave off bankruptcy.
“In his last visit to Capitol Hill, GM Chairman Rick Wagoner’s explanation of how the company would use the government loan took one page of an 11-page presentation, with seven bullet points offering no specific numbers,” reports the Free Press. “GM’s new presentation on how it will use up to $12 billion of the $25-billion pool could run close to 100 pages for lawmakers, with a shorter summary for public viewing.”
GM is reportedly considering shedding its Pontiac, Saab, Hummer & Saturn brands. The shuttering in 2001 of the Oldsmobile brand reportedly cost GM $2 billion.