If you still needed proof that selfies have taken over the Internet, here's a telling infographic about how brands went into pic-snapping overload in the past year.
To help promote the upcoming deadline for entries (Feb. 18) in The Shorty Awards' Best Facebook Campaign category, contest sponsor Unmetric decided to analyze how major businesses embraced the selfie in all its ego-stroking glory over the course of 2013. From Target and Samsung to Aflac and Beggin' Strips, all manner of brands created selfies or hosted selfie-centric promotions, with the numbers climbing steadily throughout the year.
While relatively few of the branded selfies are truly compelling, a few worth noting are GoPro's image from a fan atop Mount Everest, shown above, and Samsung's #TogetherWeRise campaign, which created a massive mosaic of LeBron James out of selfies submitted by fans.
You probably didn't know your Acura isn't really a car. It's actually a real live dark horse. In a world full of creepy and brutish mechanical horses.
It will catapult from the back of the pack to win, and wrench an existential scream from the depths of your soul. Because in this tortured journey down the racetrack of life, feelings can be so real—especially when you are driving an Acura horse. Also, because you are a three-piece-wearing fop, says a new commercial from ad agency Mullen and director Adam Berg.
It's painfully literal and beautifully produced, an unusual blend of posh emo dystopian leisure car porn. It's got horsepower! Up next, a Shia LeBeouf lookalike rides Acura Seabiscuit to defeat the evil horse Transformers in a game of Polo Tron.
Credits below.
CREDITS Client: Acura Senior Vice President, Automotive Operations, American Honda Motor Co.: Michael Accavitti Assistant Vice President, Advertising, Marketing, American Honda Motor Co.: Tom Peyton Manager, Acura Advertising, Brand: Gary Robinson Spot: "Let the Race Begin" Agency: Mullen, Los Angeles Chief Creative Officer: Mark Wenneker Executive Creative Director: Peter Rosch Art Director: Sean Stell Copywriter: Amir Farhang Executive Director of Integrated Production: Liza Near Director of Broadcast Production: Zeke Bowman Senior Producer: Trish Dowley Co-Director of Strategy: Kelsey Hodgkin Account Service: Jeff Prince, Alison Kaplan Product Information Manager: Scott King Product Specialist: Curtis Millward Associate Director of Business Affairs: Stephen Duncan Production Company: Smuggler Director: Adam Berg Founding Partners: Patrick Milling Smith, Brian Carmody Bidding Producer: Shannon Jones Line Producer: Karen O’Brien Director of Photography: Mattias Montero Production Supervisor: Pete Slowey Production Designer: Tino Schaedler Editorial: Cosmo Street Editor: Paul Hardcastle Assistant Editor: Hugo Jordan Producer: Jaclyn Paris Executive Producer: Yvette Cobarrubias-Sears Color Correction: MPC Colorist: Mark Gethin Visual Effects: MPC Executive Producer: Elexis Stearn Producer: Mike Wigart Visual Effects Supervisors: Andy Boyd (3-D), Benoit Mannequin (2-D) Graphics: Artjail Audio Post: Phase UK Sound Supervisor, Designer: Matthew Collinge Audio Post: Eleven Sound Mixer: Scott Burns Original Music: Bobby Tahouri Track Title: "I Was Set Up!" Casting Agency: Sonnenberg Casting Casting Agent: Jodi Sonnenberg
I just did a search for "working woman" on a popular stock photography site, and got photos of women in pantsuits wielding brick-sized cellphones, photos of women pouting sexily while adjusting their glasses, and not much else. Stock photography is easily accessible and way cheaper than hiring a photographer to produce images for a brochure or an ad or a website, but it is rife with stereotypes.
Getty Images and Sheryl Sandberg's LeanIn.org have partnered to produce a collection of images that represent women and families in more empowering ways. Sure, you've got the woman in the pantsuit, but there's also a tattooed mom holding her baby and typing on her laptop. There's a woman mountain climber, a dad holding his daughter in a baby carrier, and—get ready to clutch your pearls, stock photography users—a woman wearing jeans in the office.
The jointly curated Lean In Collection has more than 2,500 visuals "celebrating powerful images of women, girls and the communities who support them," Getty says in a statement. "The collection will serve as a resource for marketers, advertisers and media for use in their campaigns and communications. It arrives in time for Women's History Month and the one-year anniversary of the publication of Sandberg's best-selling book Lean In."
While stock photography may seem like a nonissue, Sandberg notes, "You can't be what you can't see. In an age where media are all around us, it is critical that images provide examples that both women and men can emulate."
More photos below. (Credits: Andreas Kuehn; Thomas Barwick; Betsie Van Der Meer; no credit; Cavan Images; Image Source.)
The Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago has employed scratch-off advertising on bus shelters around the city to hype its newest exhibition, The Way of the Shovel: Art as Archaeology. The ads were printed on backlit, clear plastic. Scratching off the opaque topcoat reveals cool artwork underneath.
Since an ad campaign requiring real digging with actual shovels would have been prohibitively costly, difficult and unsafe, this is probably the best way to reinforce the theme of the exhibition. (A scratch-off tip-in ad was also placed in the Chicago Reader newspaper.) I could see this idea working well in film and theater advertising, too.
From the peanut gallery at Reddit comes this amusing, fake Audi ad that plays off the four-rings snafu during the Opening Ceremony of the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia. An Audi rep confirms to Mashable: "This is not an official ad … it is most likely from an Audi fan." At least one other brand, though, did make fun of the technical glitch for real.
Classical paintings replace advertisements on Paris billboards in "OMG, Who Stole My Ads?"—a series of provocative photographs by French artist Etienne Lavie.
The project recalls last summer's "Art Everywhere" program in England, led by Innocent Drinks co-founder Richard Reed, which saw reproductions of 57 popular works replace ads on 22,000 out-of-home ad sites, including billboards, bus shelters, tube stations and office buildings. Lavie's initiative operates on a smaller scale, and since it lacks establishment support, can perhaps be more readily parsed as an artistic statement rather than a corporate project that just happens to involve paintings and ads.
Lavie's strikingly composed pictures achieve some amazing juxtapositions—the flowing lines and muted tones of the artwork contrasted against harsh urban geometry and vehicles in blurred motion. The images inspire all sorts of interpretations. On the one hand, they suggest the city and commerce are transient, in a state of flux, while the paintings (and by extension, the deeper concerns of the human spirit) are immutable. Conversely, one could argue that the city continues to live and evolve along with its ever-changing ads for Evian and Peugeot, while the artworks are anachronisms that leave no lasting impression, except perhaps in the images created by the artist.
One especially intriguing aspect of the photo series is whether Lavie actually replaced the billboards or created his images (solely or mainly) by digital means. It's not totally clear. Such debate makes the work more meta and esoteric. It playfully questions "reality," and makes media coverage of the project part of the artistic experience. (For most of us, the images are viewable exclusively online, so maybe their digital dissemination is the true raison d'être, the ultimate reality.)
In the end, Lavie achieves a stirring effect on the canvas of viewers' imaginations and sensibilities. And if my analysis sounds like over-thought "blah blah blah," well, judging from Lavie's website, I don't think the artist will mind.
Sitting right at the border between Sweden and Norway, the billboard displays comparative pricing for Big Macs in the two nations—egging on Norwegians to take advantage of Sweden's cheaper burgers. In other words, it's the rare fast-food ad that doubles as fodder for exchange-rate geeks.
The Economist's Big Mac Index has for decades used McD's staple burger as an international benchmark for measuring relative prices around the world. Norway's Big Mac was, in fact, recently declared the most expensive anywhere (and not for the first time). That's due to the country's oil-rich, inclusive economy, where generally high wages (even for burger flippers) help drive up prices. (Some observers, meanwhile, are claiming all the extra money is making the country's workforce too lazy.)
DDB points out that Norwegians are already crossing the border for bargains in droves. So really, the agency is just reminding them to stop for a more affordable heart-stopper.
How much will they save? In Norway, a Big Mac costs the equivalent of about $14.41, says the billboard. In Sweden, it's only about $9.08. Of course, that's still way too much for a Big Mac—especially if they're made in any way like the brand's Chicken McNuggets.
Here's a fantastic ad stunt orchestrated by media agency PHD on Britain's ITV. On Sunday night, the TV broadcaster devoted a whole commercial break during an episode of Dancing on Ice to airing remade versions, done entirely in Lego, of four well-known British ads—to promote The Lego Movie.
See the entire ad break here:
The first spot was an abbreviated version of the famous 2012 Vinnie Jones CPR ad for the British Heart Foundation. That was followed by 30-second ads, remade practically shot for shot, for Confused.com, BT and Premier Inn. Short promos for The Lego Movie aired in between each of the spots, followed by a proper trailer at the end.
Marketers are officially obsessed with trying to frighten the world-weary populace of New York City. Following the recent devil baby and zombie stunts, here's footage of the Chobani bear—an animatronic version of the real bear in the Super Bowl commercial—ambushing people in Manhattan, knocking over a hot dog stand and generally hamming it up. These videos are pretty funny, but I'd like to see New Yorkers fight instead of just whipping out their phones to take a picture.
If Instagram had been invented in the 1980s, your digital photos would have already been pixelated messes stored on cassettes or floppy disks.
To see them, you would have had to snail-mail your camera roll to Instagram, so it could send the files back to you with awful filters applied. You could have taken pictures of your salad, your cat and your thigh gap. In other words, it'd be just like Instagram now. Except your pictures would have been called "pitchers," because apparently people in the 1980s didn't know how to pronounce "pictures."
At least, so says this mock infomercial, which earns the honor of capturing the 1980s even better than Delta's super 1980s flight-safety video. The reimagined Instagram logo might be the best part, except for maybe the fact that the whole video proves real Instagram isn't so bad after all.
Once again, a snack-food brand learns why it should carefully stage-manage any attempts to crowdsource flavor ideas on the Internet.
The latest round of Lay's "Do Us a Flavor" campaign, which launched last month, has predictably brought out the trolls, who've suggested, among other things, flavor ideas like Disappointed Parents, Orange Juice 'N Toothpaste and Sinus Infection.
You might recall Mountain Dew going through something similar when their "Dub the Dew" campaign was hijacked by nerds who filled the online ballot with Gushin' Granny and Fapple, among other uncouth suggestions.
Say what you want about the immaturity of the Lay's trolls, but at least they aren't bringing out the Hitler jokes. Not yet, anyway.
Judging from FTD's Valentine's Day ads, maybe love does mean having to say you're sorry after all.
Four 60-second spots by Epsilon Chicago, designed to illustrate that "FTD says it best" for next week's holiday, put couples on a shiny red sofa that's more hot seat than love seat. They bicker about how the guys botched V-Day last year by giving the gals inappropriate gifts (or none at all), when a bouquet or basket from FTD would've worked wonders.
In the best of the bunch, feathers fly. "I got her a parrot," brags our would-be Romeo. "He got me a freaking parrot," his lady-love moans. The guy says, "Oh my gosh, it is so cool … it's majestic … it's regal." She replies, "It's dirty … it stinks … it bites."
These ads don't bite—they're amusing and well acted—but they do feel dated. The rhythm and style recall late-'90s/early-'00s sitcoms, with bird-brained guys and whiny women over-obsessing about their relationship woes. And why do we get youngish white hetero couples each time?
Despite not actually airing a commercial during the Super Bowl on Sunday, Esurance had an extraordinarily successful night, thanks to its #EsuranceSave30 sweepstakes on Twitter.
The company snagged the first ad slot after the game, and vowed to give away the difference in price—it went for $1.5 million less than an in-game slot—to one lucky viewer who tweeted the hashtag #EsuranceSave30 within 36 hours after the ad aired.
John Krasinski, the brand's spokesman, helped to announce the winner Wednesday night on Jimmy Kimmel Live. You can see that video below. But also check out the social stats from the campaign, provided by Esurance agency Leo Burnett:
• 5.4 million uses of the #EsuranceSave30 hashtag • More than 200,000 entries within the first minute of the Esurance commercial airing • 1.4 million hashtag uses in the first hour and 4.5 million in the first 24 hours • 2.6 billion social impressions on Twitter • 332,000 views of the Esurance commercial on YouTube • 261,000 new followers on the official Esurance Twitter account—an increase of nearly 3,000 percent • A 12x spike in visits to the Esurance website in the first hours of the sweepstakes
Safe to say it was a successful stunt. Cue the copycats.
All this talk about the TV commercials on the Super Bowl, but who could forget about the radio commercials? Well, almost everyone. But not WestwoodOne, which aired the game on Sunday and just released a list of the five best radio ads of the night.
The big winner was Motel 6, which placed the top spot—an amusing ad from The Richards Group called "Autocorrect," narrated by Tom Bodett, the chain's spokesman for going on 30 years. The ads that placed second, third and fourth—for Tilted Kilt restaurants, Subway and Exergen—are honestly pretty wretched. Coming in at No. 5 is Taco Bell, whose ad will elicit some chuckles as well.
Progressive spokeswoman Flo sat out the Super Bowl—"We're not trying to make the noise even noisier," the company's CMO, Jeff Charney, said late last week—but she's all over the whole Facebook Look Back thing.
Below, check out Flo's "Look Back" video, which is apparently a parody, unless Facebook approved the unicorn image at the end instead of the Like sign. In fact, Flo's whole video is about unicorns, which she's been associated with ever since a 2010 ad, when she exclaimed that homeowners and auto insurance, bundled together, is like "unicorns and glitter."
There's also a Unicorns & Glitter tab on her Facebook page, where you can get more intimately acquainted with all things Flo.
Using children in politically tinged advertising is often problematic. Some would say it's tantamount to propaganda. Still, the kids who sang "America the Beautiful" in other languages for Coca-Cola's Super Bowl ad are so charmingly innocent in these behind-the-scenes videos—and so optimistic about how the ad will be received—that it makes the whole ruckus seem extra ridiculous.
Of course, Coke isn't as innocent. It knew the ad, by Wieden + Kennedy, would be controversial. Even these clips from the recording sessions hint at that—why else would they ask the girls how people might react to the ad? And yet it's irresistible when Naomi, the girl who sings in Spanish, says: "They might feel joyful. They might feel like, 'Wow, America has all these different things.' And they might feel, like, really proud of their country, I hope. Cause I know I am pretty proud."
Coke released its own statement about the ad this week, saying in part: "For centuries America has opened its arms to people of many countries who have helped to build this great nation. 'It's Beautiful' provides a snapshot of the real lives of Americans representing diverse ethnicities, religions, races and families, all found in the United States. … We believe 'It's Beautiful' is a great example of the magic that makes our country so special, and a powerful message that spreads optimism, promotes inclusion and celebrates humanity—values that are core to Coca-Cola."
The ad's director, John Hillcoat of Skunk, has also spoken out this week. "We all know there are those kind of bigots out there, but I had no idea how deeply embedded it was. It seems that the divide in America has never been greater," he said in a statement.
Despite its optimism, Coke recognizes that divide, too. Tellingly, YouTube comments are disabled on all the videos featuring the girls—to protect them. Comments are enabled on the main ad, though, and are at 12,500 and counting. Wade into that debate at your own risk.
It's hard to say what we were expecting from reality TV star Clay Aiken's first campaign ad in his congressional campaign, but this certainly isn't it.
Instead of leveraging his fame or playing to the media circus around his decision to run for a House seat from North Carolina, he has created a political ad that's thoughtful, sincere and just an all-around example of great storytelling.
Filmed in one seamless five-minute shot, Aiken's ad was filmed in the home where he and his mother sought refuge from his abusive father. Aiken patiently unravels the story of his life and political awakening, gradually transitioning into his criticisms of his district's current legislator, U.S. Rep. Renee Ellmers.
Ellmers is a Republican and Aiken a Democrat, a fact he quickly shrugs off as if it's a mere technicality unrelated to the matters at hand. But of course it will matter. This ad is sure to have its critics, since we live in a political era that seems incapable of respecting any message that comes from a messenger on the other side of the aisle.
But politicians from both parties would be wise to watch Aiken's video and learn from his ability to come across as humble, informed and sincere. He may not have the "aw, shucks" everyman persona of Jimmy Stewart in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, but he's about as close as you're going to find in 2014.
Remember pink slime? McDonald's Canada continues its crusade for McFood transparency with a new video aimed at proving Chicken McNuggets are not made from the pastel meat goop seen in a frequently shared image from the Internet.
By taking viewers on a tour of the chain's meat supplier, Cargill, the video shows in some detail that, instead of pink slime (processed beef trimmings disinfected with ammonia), chicken nuggets are actually made of chicken breasts mixed with seasoning and skin. The result is a mix that looks a lot more like ground chicken than you might expect (until it's molded into the four cutesy shapes — "the ball, the bell, the boot, and the bow-tie").
In other words, it's not pink slime. It's beige mash. As for what seasoning actually goes into the nuggets recipe, HuffPo has the details.
When the pink slime controversy erupted in 2012, McDonald's U.S. claimed it had stopped using pink slime in its burgers in 2011, and McD's Canada denied ever having included the dubious ingredient in its food.
Nonetheless, the brand felt compelled to clear the air, given the frequent misconception among consumers. The Q&A format is now a familiar one for the brand's Canadian operation, though this clip does test the limits of how transparent the company can be without making things too unappetizing.
Brad Tuttle at Time is calling it "a smart, necessary step for McDonald's." Taylor Berman at Gawker thinks "it's still sort of disgusting." While it definitely doesn't sugar-coat the fact that the golden arches are serving up heavily processed food, at least now you'll know what goes into that process.
Since everyone I know is getting married and having children (and making sure Facebook stays informed about every step of those processes), this ad for a fake drug called Not Having Kids is rather timely.
Put together by Internet funny guy Jason A. Messina, the ad riffs on medication advertising's tone and imagery (lots of hikers in those ads) alongside the pervasive social pressure to settle down and procreate by the time one hits 30.
The temptation to be a smug, overbearing asshole about major life decisions cuts both ways, though, which Messina doesn't ignore. The side effects of Not Having Kids are pretty heavy on regret, and when it comes time to list them all in true pharma fashion, the video definitely takes a turn from reinforced selfishness to a downright dark level of self-reflection.
You're walking along the streets of New York City, earbuds firmly in place, texting furiously and doing your best to ignore the press of humanity as it swarms around you … when the monster-movie version of the very horror you're seeking to avoid erupts out of a street grate. It would be enough to make you drop your skinny latte on your skinny jeans.
Score another victory for prankvertising and AMC. For a moment there, I had forgotten about The Walking Dead, which shambles onward, entering its fifth season even as the zombie apocalypse genre is starting to feel like a rotten cliché. The stunt itself, orchestrated by ad agency Relevent, is simple and effective, but there's a surprisingly real and sweet moment when the zombies restrain themselves from scaring the bejesus out of a little girl who wanders up to the grate in curiosity.
Of course, they don't have any reticence about scaring their own cast. Norman Reedus was recently pranked by costar Andrew Lincoln and one-limbed Vine star Nick Santonastasso. They set him up with a fake interview in Tokyo and then sprung the undead on him.
Between those two incidents, and the even more aggressive "Devil Baby Attack" prank for the horror movie Devil's Due, it seems ambushing people in NYC with horrifying half-humans is the strategy of the season. If that's what it takes to breathe life into the zombie genre, then prank on.
Credits below.
CREDITS Client: AMC Agency: Relevent Executive Creative Director: Ian Cleary Executive Producer: Tony Berger Creative Director: Jody Feldman Producer: Bari Henderson Account Manager: Claire Annas
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
