Hasta La Creative!

Advertising Agency: Spenat, Karlstad, Sweden
Art Director: Erik Nilsson
Copywriter: Marcus Sjögren
Production Manager: Marjo Fjällsby
Project Manager: Per N Lekemark
Final Art: Per N Lekemark, Mats Åstrand, Marjo Fjällsby, Marcus Sjögren, Maria Grahn, Fabian Fredholm, Erik Nilsson

Lebron and Stephen A. Smith feud over “Greatest-of-All-Time”. Stephen A. takes issue with a tweet from LeBron reading “Chicken McNuggets #GreatestAllTime,” asking, “Ever heard of the Quarter Pounder with Cheese LeBron? Whatever happened to the Big Mac?” The debate created a ripple effect of responses from viewers across the country, all chiming in to give their two cents on the greatest McDonald’s item.

Advertising Agency: Arnold Worldwide, USA
Chief Creative Officer: Pete Favat
Creative Directors: Craig Miller, Pete Shamon
Art Director: Marcus Chin-Quee
Copywriter: Jeff Vitkun
Business Affairs: Jen Wrentmore
Sr. Broadcast Producer: Sean Vernaglia
Producer: Whitney Bogosian
Sr. Group Marketing Director: Catherine Ellefson
Sr. Marketing Producer: Dan Gross
Production Company: Hungry Man
Director: Dave Laden

Ogilvy & Mather London, Mother London and 4Creative all won Gold Lions this evening, as UK companies took home 22 Lions, ten more than last year.

Well it was pretty clear this was going to happen and it did. “Dumb Ways to Die,” created by McCann for Melbourne Metro Trains Melbourne has won the Canes Lion Integrated Grand Prix, its fifth Grand Prix this week. The work is said to have been the most shared PSA in history and is attributed to reducing train accidents and deaths by 21%.

The integrated campaign included the famed video, radio, print, outdoor and a top ten song on iTunes. Hell, my daughter’s friends are singing it. Now that’s a serious cultural achievement let along an advertising achievement.

In other news out of Cannes tonight, Dove’s Real Beauty Sketches from Ogilvy Sao Paulo won a Titanium Grand Prix, Nike’s Find Your Greatness from W+K Portland and AKQA London won a Titanium, Samsung Life Insurance’s Bridge of Life from Che Worldwide Seoul won a Titanium, Christians + Muslims for Government of Republic of Macedonia from Y&R won a Titanium, Prudential’s Challenge Lab from Droga5 New York won a Titanium, P&G’s Proud Sponsors of Moms from W+K Portland won Integrated Gold, Intel and Toshiba’s The Beauty Inside from Pereira & O’Dell won Branded Content Grand Prix.

AdWeek has a full list of Titanium and Integrated, Film, Film Craft and Branded Content winners here.

At the end of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, McCann Melbourne’s “Dumb Ways to Die” picked up a total of five Grand Prix awards, including the integrated category, and Ogilvy Brasil’s Dove “Sketches” won the titanium Grand Prix, considered the festival’s highest honor. For Ogilvy it was a triumph to pick up the award after netting several Gold Lions in other categories but no Grand Prix awards.

The Jury: “I don’t really like judging,” said Dan Wieden, chairman of Wieden & Kennedy and president of the titanium and integrated jury, noting that this will be his last time as a judge at Cannes. The two categories are judged together, with separate winners. More than half the 10 judges were from the U.S.

“‘Dumb Ways to Die” is an Australian train-safety themed music video that went viral and inspired karaoke-style parodies; was sold on iTunes; and featured various digital components (including a mobile game), to get people to interact with the campaign. The song climbed the music charts in more than 20 countries and, more importantly, client Metro Trains reported a 21% drop in accidents and deaths on public transit compared to the same period last year.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

San Francisco agency Pereira & O’Dell has picked up two more Grands Prix on the last day of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity, winning the top prize in both branded content and the film categories. Earlier this week it also took the big Lion in the cyber category. It’s the surprise hit of this year’s festival, while McCann Melbourne’s superhit “Dumb Ways to Die,” was its favorite. The film added to its collection of Grand Prix when it picked up the other top film honor. The last time the film jury awarded double Grands Prix was in 2008, when Cadbury’s “Gorilla,” from Fallon London and Xbox 360/Halo 3’s “Enemy Weapon,” from the “Believe” campaign via T.A.G. San Francisco/McCann, shared the honor.

What it is

“Dumb Ways to Die” is the popular animated film by McCann Melbourne for Metro Trains that showed cute characters shuffling off this mortal coil in spectacularly stupid ways. It featured animation from John Frost and a catchy track written by agency executive creative director John Mescall, performed by the fictitious band “Tangerine Kitty” that hit the top 10 rankings on iTunes in various countries. The effort was a global viral sensation and a festival darling, picking up a total of five Grands Prix this year. The others were in PR, direct, radio and integrated.

Continue reading at AdAge.com

(TrendHunter.com) These miniature food jewelry pieces by Tadam Jewelry are extremely decadent accessories. Miniature doughnuts are not hard to come by on Etsy, but this shop brings an extra dose of decadence to these…

Let’s face it. Many companies and organizations sell the same products or services to the point they are considered commodities. The best way they can differentiate themselves is through creating a powerful brand or image. This causes potential customers to think of the company or organization with the strongest image first when a particular product or service is mentioned.

While it does not have the glamour of a Super Bowl ad or a slick print ad, t-shirt marketing can be very effective in creating the kind of image that attracts customers and makes them think of you first. It is fallacious to dismiss such marketing as bush league or a desperate move from a startup.

T-Shirts for Marketing?

Indeed, many Fortune 500 companies use t-shirts as marketing tools. This has created a verdant landscape for the customized apparel industry. These days, custom t-shirts play a huge role in everything from social media campaigns to in-house branding.

Color in T-Shirt Marketing

The importance of color in marketing cannot be stressed enough, as humans often make mental associations based upon shading and hue. Athletic team uniforms, national flags, road signs and even gang attire all have either a certain meaning or uniting factor that appeals to the audience on a subconscious level with near permanent effects.

One of the most successful users of clothing and color to create an image is coffee giant Starbucks. Even without t-shirts, the company uses color in a way that is consistent with its logo and image. Store employees must wear green aprons when on duty. Normally they must also wear a white or black shirt with khaki or black pants or shorts that meet company specifications.

For years, the round Starbucks logo with the iconic siren and the ‘Starbucks Coffee’ wording was a combination of green, black and white. Employees’ attire matched this color scheme. The power of this brand turned out to be so great that the current green and white logo consists only of the siren, and no longer includes the company name because it’s no longer necessary. Store employees may still wear black shirts with the green aprons as the neutral shirt color does not detract from the green color and the association the public has with it.

Starbucks does not stop there; the world’s largest coffee company applies the same use of color to many of its promotional campaigns. During the Christmas season, the company sells seasonal pastries, drinks, memorabilia and gift sets. Employees have worn red company-issued t-shirts, a color scheme that effectively lets the public know that it’s the holiday season and Starbucks has new product to offer. An interesting irony of these seasonal campaigns is that strategically allowing deviation from the normal color scheme that helped strengthen the company’s brand can be just as effective as adherence is.

Keep in mind that there are thousands of places one can go to for a cup of coffee, but none are in the same ballpark as Starbucks. All because of a bold, yet simple design and memorable colors.

Where Do Companies Use T-Shirts?

One of the most common venues companies use for t-shirts is at trade conventions, which may best be described as ‘commoditization under one roof.’ As companies promote their products, many wear knit or tees of the same color to promote unity under a brand and differentiate from competitors. These same shirts may be given as freebies to convention goers as well. Compared to many types of advertising, t-shirts continue to send a message as long as someone wears one out in public, exist longer than a billboard or print ad and usually cost much less.

One important thing to remember is that colors, marketing and brand awareness don’t mean much if offset by negatives. Poor service and inferior quality can demolish a business’ image faster than it was built.

A good example of both of these is the Kony story. Invisible Children made a video and promoted their t-shirt, stating proceeds would be donated toward the capturing of Joseph Kony. Invisible Children sold millions of t-shirts. However, Invisible Children was then revealed to be a huge scam, which ended their profits fast. To this day though, people still wear the t-shirts in support of children’s rights – which is great as t-shirts still continue to carry that message and create awareness.

What Can Small Businesses Do?

Nevertheless, the power of colors and imagery are undeniable and effective. T-shirt marketing can help a business harness this power to create a long-lasting customer base. If interested in trying this campaign, purchase a mass amount of custom t-shirts from Ooshirts and use a company logo that is bold, creative and colorful. With memorable t-shirts, future customers will know your brand and business as soon as they see someone wear it.

Combining a custom t-shirt campaign with various others (such as social media, SEO marketing, television commercials, billboard advertising, etc) will maximize the chances of your business being seen, which will likely improve foot traffic. Make sure to research and do every possible venture you can and make your profits multiply!

John Walker is a community manager for ooShirts, a custom t-shirt design company focused on creativity and design for custom shirts. Jim has been involved in the marketing, design, and printing of shirts for quite some time as his interest in the business of fashion led him into the personalized shirt business.

This is a guest post

The post How Using T-Shirts Causes the Market to Take Notice appeared first on AdPulp.

(TrendHunter.com) These zombie-specialized assault weapons are just what you’ll need in a zombie apocalypse. 

Nowadays it is fairly common to cross people who talk about an upcoming zombie apocalypse,…