Meme: ‘A self-propagating unit of social imitation; something that people repeat and pass along’. Or, ‘Memes replicate data. And just as genes replicate genetic data, memes replicate cultural ideas’. Or, ‘lolcats’.

However you describe them, everyone loves a good meme. And, since the term was popularised by Richard Dawkins in his 1976 book ‘The selfish gene’, advertising has been responsible for generating many well-known examples. (Here’s one, oops sorry…no, two examples (in one): ‘Will it blend?’ for Blendtec.) And with the connectedness and social media channels offered by the web for brands to spread and share content, you would have thought that conditions were perfect for many more… Read More »

New ad for Samsung Galaxy S II shows urban scene kids with delusions of creative greatness (who are actually baristas, apparently) queuing for the latest iPhone. It goes on to show people outside the queue who already have a great phone with 4G and a big, bright screen. Read More »

If Sherlock Holmes were around today, he’d often be found chillaxing around the cafes of Baker Street, necking cups of espresso by the bucketload, muttering under his breath about the price of Madame Tussauds tickets, tinkering with his iPad – and, despite himself, instinctively sensing which brands felt ‘right’.

Being Sherlock Holmes, and therefore the authority on everything, he’d know that tone of voice and personality used to be qualities mainly associated with copy and art direction, but now they could be attributed to the way a brand ‘feels’ using digital touchpoints too.

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A new generation of tweeting “celebrities” (indeed, a begrudging use of the term) is having their pockets filled at the rate of $10,000 (£6,256) per tweet by awkwardly endorsing brands and, often, their ill-fitting products.

If the absurdity of Snopp Dogg hawking Toyota’s new line of minivans, or swagger waggons (sic) as he puts it, is lost on his 4.7m followers, is certainly isn’t on the likes of Ad.ly, the social marketers setting up these celebrity endorsement deals. Read More »

Despite some recent success enjoyed by big brand advertisers—like Ford’s spokespuppet ‘Doug’ campaign—Facebook is forecast to capture only 6.4% of total online ad spending this year.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Ford spent more than $95m promoting its ‘Doug’ campaign on TV and print, but less than 5% of that was spent on Facebook, which garnered 43,000 “likes”. Of ‘Doug’s’ Facebook fans, 61% said they were more likely to consider buying a Ford Focus, the car it was advertising. Read More »

I was chatting with our Innovation Director, Rob Meldrum, the other day about what might happen if Google decides to officially make a play for developing a brain implant. As I tore an almond croissant into miniature chunks to enjoy with my yummington hot beverage, I began to wonder what the implications would be for digital advertising and permission-based marketing.

The Google brain implant is something that Eric Schmidt has spoken about before (or, at least, been asked about, to which he replied: ‘there’s what I call the creepy line. And the Google policy about a lot of these things is to get right up to the creepy line, but not cross it. I would argue that implanting things in your brain is beyond the creepy line…at least for the moment, until the technology gets better’.  He has to say that, doesn’t he, especially with things around such as H+, a new web series on a similar theme, produced by Brian Singer). Have a gander at the trailer here.
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Chatting to my good friend Jo recently, who is a primary school teacher, about methods of learning, it struck me that there are some clear parallels between classroom teaching methods and digital marketing.

As I took another gazzolop of sweet tea, I considered the fact that as education continues to gravitate towards increasingly stimulatory learning techniques, so digital advertising – whether it be online ads, social media campaigns or mobile marketing – also calls for similar measures to cut through and resonate. After all, success in both professions is essentially determined by how well you have inspired your audience to engage with the points you are trying to get across. Read More »

Seven months ago I reported Google was taking aim and Adobe and IBM with the launch a paid-for enterprise analytics tool, which would compete directly with Omniture and CoreMetrics.

Indications from the web are that this tool will be rolled out later today. Read More »

Brands should be careful not to fall off the balcony of cool – broadening the debate surrounding memes and whether brands should engage with consumers whilst being on-trend.

This is an ambitious blog post. I am aim to identify some things brands and marketers should be aware of when placing a brand at the very apex of cool, I aim to tell you a little bit about memes and I aim to inform you of why my theory of the balcony of being on-trend should be constantly at the forefront of all of our minds(!). Read More »

The updated Linked in iPhone app

For obvious reasons Google has long-trumpeted the notion that brands should create a mobile optimised site first before developing a costly iPhone app.

While Google now offers a free way of doing so with its recently launched Mobilize tool, brands are looking to create more sophisticated mobile sites as they start to realise that the only way isn’t necessarily Apple. Read More »