I had an interesting talk at Likemind last Friday with some “Above” agency folk. They’re very interested in Digital. Mainly ’cause they heard that, because of the recession, more and more companies are shifting their communication budgets to “online”. So they either have to acquire digital know-how, or see their income shrink. From what I gather they’re mostly going for the first option.
But.
You’d think they’d see the big picture, that there’s a whole new world out there and whatnot. But when you get down to talking nuts and bolts you get an idea of what “digital know-how” means to them: It means someone who can translate their tv/print/outdoor idea to a website.
And why would you want to do that?
That’s a question people like me would ask.
But it’s dead obvious to them: because if you didn’t repeat your advertising message online, you’re never going to get an INTEGRATED AWARD.
Let me give you some info on The Integrated award.
It’s the Holy Grail category of all advertising awards, it’s the Oscar for the best movie, the yellow jersey, marrying Scarlett Johanssen and winning the race to the moon.
And the criteria for winning one is: Being the best at repeating your advertising message in different media, and adapted to those media.
And some agencies are pretty damn good at it. For instance this one that won “integrated” at the local advertising award:
You can watch the case video here.
I think they deservedly won.
Because they where best at “repeating their advertising message in different media, and adapted to those media”.
Only…
when that campaign ran I saw two outdoors executions, I thought they where smart. I saw a third, I thought: Okay, I get it. Fourth: Enough already. I saw the pub they transformed, admittedly: smart. All that came after that: Okay, can we move on now! Than they did the takeover of the newspaper site: Zzzzzz.
Now I don’t know what came first, the egg or the chicken. Do agencies do this knock-you-over-the-head thing because it gets you an integrated award? Or are integrated awards awarded to these campaigns ’cause someone somewhere once decided this is the be-all end-all of advertising.
Is it?
Is it just me or is this kind of practice outdated?
Should advertising types take a step back and look at this practice from a 2009 perspective?
Should I be burned at the stake for questioning the Holy Grail?
It seems pretty formulaic to me:
1. take a brief
2. condense it to a 5 word tag line that’s concise, yet applicable to almost everything
3. apply to almost everything
Consider how in this case they used online: They did a very intrusive takeover of a popular newspaper to once again pound in the same 5 words. Did that serve the client’s cause? Or the Integrated cause?
And I know it’s easy to comment from the sidelines, so here’s what I would do differently:
Sack the formulaic approach.
Tags: Eurostar, formulas, Integrated, time to move on
Great riff. I have to admit I’ve done this as well. Yet, I’m eager to know what campaigns are – according to you – truly integrated and don’t repeat their above message as superficially as you highlight here.
BTW: you probably know it better than I do but taking a concept and translating it into different media messages is something else than taking one media message and forcefully copying it into other media.
Becoming a slave of the metrics (i.c. wanting to achieving a huge reach) apparently can backfire…
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true!
Presenting various online ideas on a brief, but then they go for a banner or a page takeover: “good ideas, but they don’t fit the campaign. Maybe later, keep ‘m…”
A campaign is: the same 3 pictures repeated on tv, print, pos, outdoor, and banners for the full 360 integrated thingy. Oh wait, maybe we can do e-cards where you can stick your head on the campaign pictures!
Time to move on ppl!
@Hannes, I think the one mentioned is truly integrated, I mean it must be, it won the award. Point is: “integrated campaigns” the way they see it don’t have the relevance they used to have. With the amount of media buying involved in that campaign you could do far more interesting things than hammering in a tagline.
@boskabout I’m all for huge reach. But I’m against treating people like idiots.
@derekb Hierzie den Derek! There too? You’re scaring me.
@ hannes : simple, take a look at last year’s cannes lions in the integrated & titanium category. cases listed in those categories defy the concept of traditional/360° integration by having (1) a rich story to tell and (2) having a profound knowledge about the potential of each used media.
but… on the other hand, one can’t deny that the eurostar case wasn’t effective in planting their message in people’s heads. therefore the aforementioned discussion could be summarized by the choice between forceful vs enjoyable integrated campaigns. btw, i already wrote about this debate by the time the eurostar campaign was launched – http://bword.wordpress.com/2007/11/27/eurostar-zegt-360°-uber-alles/
maybe the early adopters are expecting too much of the ones standing outside, looking in. Tv has been around for a while. Radio for even longer, and print… well…. that’s been around for a while too i guess… but the web, and all that comes with it, is fairly new ( some 14 years ago no one even knew what the internet was. And with good reason ; It was’nt anything more but a crummy collection of bbs ’s ( no, not the pimpmyride rims brand, but bulletinboard system) and now, all of a sudden, you have people practically living on the net, making money, building reps, starting a business…. It’s just easy to try and apply the ‘traditional’ rules upon the web.And I can’t say I blame those ’stuck in their ways – eager to grab a piece of the pie – where’s the easy money ‘ type of people. If I try really hard, I can see where they are coming from, BUT ; maybe ( juuust maybe) the ones that are positioned within the agencies that are ‘determined’ to really pull some 360 stuff out of there digital hat, maybe they just have to try harder. The budgets are there ( even in crisis times – makes me laugh everytime i type crisis. haha), so are the ideas, so….. what’s the friggin hold up.
I’ve seen ‘em try. Try,…. and die…. ( the big agencies I mean). But once the generation that grew up with and on the net, hit the workfloor… that’s when it ‘ll get interesting…. hopefully….
patience is a virtue, but suck big time bollocks.
remember orwell. thank you for consuming.
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