Fifth and Final Commercial

The fifth and final commercial I will critique and the last thing I will write on this blog for this class is also a great commercial. The commercial is for Volkswagen’s VW passat in the car category. The agency that created the ad is Deutsch inc. Los Angeles, USA. I first saw this commercial during the Super Bowl and I knew after the very first time I saw it that this was going to be one to remember. Of course we talked about the ad in my advertising classes and knew the ad would be aware winning. The commercial shows a pint size Darth Vader trying to use the “force” to move objects in his house. Each time he is unsuccessful and gets disappointed. His dad then drives up in the driveway with a all-new 2012 VW Passat. His dad tries to give him a hug but he shrugs him off. He then looks at the car with complete determination to make the car start. The viewer then sees the boy’s dad automatically start the car just as the boy is using his “force”. The boy gets so excited and scared at the same time while the parents look lovingly on their precious pint sized Darth Vader. The commercial is one minute long and is shot so nicely with the star wars music in the background. The commercial tells a story an amazing story without the use of a single word. The commercial of course won a gold lion and has proven to be a very rewarding ad for not only the agency but also for VW.

Commercial number 4

The After Hours Athlete for Puma is my favorite commercial I saw at the festival by far. The type of entry is product and service, the category is clothing, footwear and accessories. The agency that created the campaign is DROGA5 New York, USA. The commercial is one minute and thirty seconds long. The commercial is shot very naturally using normal everyday people to show people in social settings catching cabs, playing pool and bowling. The camera shows close up shots of people’s hands, feet, and close up portrait shots. What I enjoy the most is the copy writing. The man’s voice is so relaxing and the script is very creative and relatable to the everyday person. The Social PUMA is a creative approach to an athletic shoe. It reminds us everyone can even be an athlete even if that is a pickup game of bowling, or trying to ring the back of a garbage can with a bottle. The campaign relates to a much wider target audience than the typical running shoe normally targets. This ad also won a Cannes Lions gold lion in the film category. When the commercial is over you feel warm inside as if your life was just played out on camera. It is a great campaign and is well deserving of a gold lion.

Commerical number 3

The Slo Mo campaign is in the product and service category. The client is Fosters Group and the product is Carlton Draught. The agency that created this brilliantly entertaining ad is Clemenger BBDO Melbourne, Australia. The ad won a gold lion for good reason. Slowing down the camera and showing how men interact in a pub is very relaxing and comical. The ad is done with a high precision camera and has several up close shots and pans away to show more of the pub and the men’s interactions with the women. I enjoyed the music and the drama it gave to the situation.  The Carlton Drought beer also looked very appealing in the campaign. Due to the creativity of this ad a consumer can relate the men, the beer, and the brand.

Commerical number 2

The Nike campaign “Write the Future” won Grand Prix in the Film category. The entry type was product and service for Nike football. The entrant company was Wieden and Kennedy Amsterdam, the Netherlands. The film was three minutes long and didn’t have the look for feel of a typical ad at all. The film was shot more like a movie than and advertisement. The commerical was shot in many different camera angles  using close up, mid range, and long shot ranges. Some parts of the film the lighting would be dark when the players were on the field at night or a player was in a bar at night and in other scenes the lighting would be brighter. The commercial showed football players in different stages of their life and then flash to them in the future playing soccer. It shines the light on the international elite soccer players who only have one shot to make the team or be forgotten. The goal was to weave the brand into the conversations about the tournament and engaged athletes and fans worldwide. The campaign proved to be effective of a creative level as well as producing a great outcome for Nike and raising their brand awareness. The film was beautifully done. Much time and effort was put into this film to make it so award winning and effective.

Final Day at Cannes Lions

I arrived at the festival with Mallory around ten thirty to meet a guy who said he had an extra gala ticket. I tweeted at him letting him know I was looking for him. During the mean time I sat through two seminars. The first Seminar was AICP Digital. The title was evolving content creators-innovation in advertising. The speakers included Justin Booth-Clibboran, president of PSYOP, Vic Palumbo for Deutsch, Heath Rudduck for Campbell Mithun, and Dustin Callif for Tool North America.

The board discussed the latest in the digital world. Introducing the new technology and how commercials can be a completely CGI production. The board showed the Voltswagen Beetle commercial that ran in the Super Bowl. Vic Palumbo took me through the steps from the idea, to the drawing board to the final productions. He also discussed how the video was played on YouTube and the response the video got from viewers.

The whole board harped on a few topics.  What got my attention the most was how the young film and production employees are so valuable in the new digital world. Vic Palumbo discussed that the young digital minds are not afraid to break the machines and are not afraid to dream big. The reasoning is partly because they are young but mostly because they grew up in a digital world.

The second seminar was called B-Reel, titled digital schmigital for 2012. The speakers consisted of Petter Westlund, Ben Tricklebank, Nicke Bergstrom, Seth Weisfeld, and Marci Ikeler.

This seminar was also talking about the new digital world and integrating social media into the mix. Marci Ikeler talked about the Ford-Gray group campaign giving people with a strong presence on YouTube and Twitter and new Ford Fiesta for a year. All they had to do was blog, tweet, or post videos about their experiences. The campaign was extremely successful and really expanded brand awareness of the Ford Fiesta.

The panel also talked about advertising implanting a Hacker mentality. Companies like whopper with the Whopper sacrifice campaign. For every person you deleted from your friend list on Facebook, the participate would receive a free Whopper. The campaign once again was extremely successful and won awards as Cannes.

By this time It was noon and I needed lunch and I still hadn’t heard back from the man about the Gala ticket. So figured he had left to return to Belgium. After lunch he of course had tweeted me back but by now he in fact has returned back to Belgium. If only I had internet connection everywhere I would have attended the Gala. Oh the power of social media.

The whole group dressed up and attended the Film, Film Craft, Creative Effectives, and Titanium and Integrated Lions Awards. The awards were so fun and very well produced. The television advertising campaigns that won top awards were incredible. After each one Colson and I literally would have chill bumps.

The awards were by far the best way to end this jam packed week of learning from and listening to amazing people in the advertising/public relations industry.

Cannes Lions day 6

Today I went to a master class with HP Graphic Arts & BBDO. The title of the master class was creative engineering: The digital and physical playground. The speaker was Marcos Medeiros the creative director of AlmapBBDO. He is extremely creative and has won 12 gold lions at the Cannes Lions festival. Medeiros and BBDO worked with HP Graphic Art software and Billboard magazine to create crazy portraits. He first would get pictures at thousands of different celebrities. He had to acquire the pictures from music videos of each individual artist to not infringe on any copy write laws. When he had a data base of artists, music fans could take a picture of themselves, pick their favorite artists, and create a picture of themselves made up of tiny pictures of their favorite artists. The concept is very hard to grasp in writing.

Mr. Medeiros was introduced as a rock star. He quickly shot back that he is not a rock star but just in a really great band. He stressed the importance of team work and collaboration to create an amazing product. Which leads me to the next speaker:

The group met with The BBDO CEO Chris Hall. He has been working in the Atlanta area for many years and his son actually attends UGA. He wanted to stress tree key points to us and then he wanted to answer our questions.

#1 why are we here?

Response- creative ads have been proven to be eleven times for effective than ads that aren’t considered to be creative. Being creative gives brands a competitive advantage in the industry. Brands have caught on to this concept and are re thinking the relationships between advertisers and clients.

# 2 This is the golden age of creativity.

Response-  Cannes use to have three categories: press, film, and outdoor. Now Cannes has several different categories to reflect the changes in the advertising industry which includes digital. The advertising industry has progressed more in the past five years that it has in the past twenty five years and it is all due to technology. He said “if you can dream it, you can do it”.

# 3 collaboration is the key to success.

Like Medeiros, Hall stressed the importance of collaboration. Meaning bringing people together with all types of backgrounds and specialties to come together a product a great outcome.

I really enjoyed hearing him speak. He is a great guy and is very approachable. I look up to him and all his great accomplishments.

Cannes Lions day 5

Each day the festival gets more and more crowded, but with this come more and more amazing advertising professionals. Today the group had to opportunity to talk to three people in three totally different jobs within the integrated advertising/ public relations/ marketing world.

Our first speaker was Jennifer Frommer SVP of client relations/branding SVP of Client Relations/Branding for interscope records. Listening to her impressive career path it is evident that women can and will succeed in the advertising industry. She is just a brilliant lady who founded the music industry’s first New Media division. She was very real with us and was very open to helping the group out in the future.

I then caught the tail end of the Time Warner seminar titled thinking inside the box, [The golden age of T.V everywhere.] The men on stage were very entertaining and were all highly trained and experienced in their field of work. Jeff Bewkes who is the chairman and CEO of Time Warner, Piers Morgan (who I love) is the host of CNNs Piers Morgan Tonight, David Simon (later spoke with the group) who is a journalist, author, and TV produce for HBO, and Aaron Sorkin who is a playwright and screenwriter.

The theme of today’s speakers were mostly involving the film and TV industry. The men discussed that social media is not taking audiences away from television but drawing more viewers into the television circuit.

David Simon talked to the group right after his presentation and was really interesting to listen to. He actually said that TV programming is maturing because it has broken the spell of advertising. Meaning consumers are willing to pay for TV programs that they know will be great shows with zero advertising interruptions. He then went to tangents about why the newspaper failed, why wall street is a terribly industry, and his very interesting political views. He admitted that he went to the wrong festival but I’m glad we were able to hear from him because he was so well read and entertaining.

The group then spoke with a really sweet lady Allison Arden. She is a publisher for Ad Age and was really interested in hearing from the students. She wanted to know what we thought of the trip so far and what trends we seem to be seeing in each seminar. Everyone that we have talked to has been very encouraging.

A very funny and Final thought from David Simon when asked to sum up life in 11 words this is what he came up with:

“Fuck the money, leave the world better than you found it.”

Pretty good message I would say!

Commercial number 1

When I was watching the commercials the set played about five Chicago Blackhawks ads in a row each one featuring a different player. The commercials were shot really well. The shot would be a close up on the player then the camera would pan out to a medium shot to show the player shooting a puck at the goal. The player would then say a catchy one liner sentence about how they play hockey.

Martin Havlet is a player for the team and his commercial struck me the most. I am pretty big into the sporting arena and I love competitive people and being competitive. The commercial was set up how I explained in the previous paragraph but his one liner was so clever it stuck in my head.

The quote Martin Havlet said was:

“Last year I lost seven teeth on the ice. I have still have 28.”

Cannes Lions day 4

Each day the festival gets more and more crowded, but with this come more and more amazing advertising professionals. Today the group had to opportunity to talk to three people in three totally different jobs within the integrated advertising/ public relations/ marketing world.

Our first speaker was Jennifer Frommer SVP of client relations/branding SVP of Client Relations/Branding for interscope records. Listening to her impressive career path it is evident that women can and will succeed in the advertising industry. She is just a brilliant lady who founded the music industry’s first New Media division. She was very real with us and was very open to helping the group out in the future.

I then caught the tail end of the Time Warner seminar titled thinking inside the box, [The golden age of T.V everywhere.] The men on stage were very entertaining and were all highly trained and experienced in their field of work. Jeff Bewkes who is the chairman and CEO of Time Warner, Piers Morgan (who I love) is the host of CNNs Piers Morgan Tonight, David Simon (later spoke with the group) who is a journalist, author, and TV produce for HBO, and Aaron Sorkin who is a playwright and screenwriter.

The theme of today’s speakers were mostly involving the film and TV industry. The men discussed that social media is not taking audiences away from television but drawing more viewers into the television circuit.

David Simon talked to the group right after his presentation and was really interesting to listen to. He actually said that TV programming is maturing because it has broken the spell of advertising. Meaning consumers are willing to pay for TV programs that they know will be great shows with zero advertising interruptions. He then went to tangents about why the newspaper failed, why wall street is a terribly industry, and his very interesting political views. He admitted that he went to the wrong festival but I’m glad we were able to hear from him because he was so well read and entertaining.

The group then spoke with a really sweet lady Allison Arden. She is a publisher for Ad Age and was really interested in hearing from the students. She wanted to know what we thought of the trip so far and what trends we seem to be seeing in each seminar. Everyone that we have talked to has been very encouraging.

A very funny and Final thought from David Simon when asked to sum up life in 11 words this is what he came up with:

“Fuck the money, leave the world better than you found it.”

Pretty good message I would say!

Cannes Lions day 3

Day three has been different for me than in many aspects. I have gotten a hang of the festival and felt really comfortable networking and learning valuable information about the advertising and public relations industry.

The IPG and Women’s Leadership Network seminar titled beyond mad men brought up issues about the advertising agency as well as top agency’s not having women in the top positions. Statics reported that only 3% of women hold top ranking jobs in their industry. Why is this? Especially when women are the have the largest buying power and ear more college level degrees than men. Martha Stewart did not impress me at all with her commentary. She spoke as if there is no such thing as a glass wall and she don’t understand at all why the statistic for women at the top is so low.

On the other hand Kimberly Kadlec the worldwide vice-president for the global marketing group Johnson and Johnson was very inspiring and represent women in the industry extremely well.  She talked about how women need to work on their swagger. Meaning they need to own their beliefs and make a presence in their industry. She stressed having a clear direction about what you want out of your career. She also advised that having male mentors along the way really benefited her because they are wired differently and they play a different game than women. She also discussed work life balanced and that women can absolutely have it all with a family life and a work life. She is a powerful women and I look up her because of her confidence and conviction being a women.

The Yahoo seminar was also awesome. Robert Redford absolutely rocked it. He has diffidently has the male swag that women need to work on. His grace and humbleness captured the audience and had them hanging on to every work. For me just his story was inspiring. He told the story of how in 16 years he went from sleeping on the beach in Cannes to winning and award in Cannes. Through all of his success he never lost sight of himself and who he was a person. When you sacrifice what you believe in as a person, no amount of success will be satisfying.

I also loved loved speaking with Portner Novelli. I missed most of Julie Winskie, Jeff Melton, and Erin Osher’s presentation. Not because I was late but because Nick Charles with Porter Novelli wanted to interview me about my experiences so far at Cannes Lions. It was such a fun an great experience. He is an awesome guy! Oh and don’t worry I mentioned all of the key words including: University of Georgia and Grady College of Journalism. I have met other PR employees before and I am obsessed with their work. I also got to talk to Julie Winskie after her presentation and realized she likes camp counselers!! This is great news for me because I was one last year and I will be again when I get back to the states.

I watched the Digitas and Vevo presentation in from a screen outside of the auditorium. I loved the simenar and I think Rio Caraeff and Pharrell Williams are both brilliant people.

But on that note: This is where my venting begins.

I know for a fact now in my life I want to pursue a career in Public Relations. Which means anyone and all in the industry I can network with I will run them down do what it takes to talk to them. If you haven’t heard yet….IT IS ALL ABOUT WHO YOU KNOW. So networking and meeting people is absolutely crucial. I understand that Pharrell Williams is very famous and cool but unless you have a passion for the music industry…not much can be gained listening him talk about music and branding. So my point is a brilliant, and extremely tall advertising professional named Noelle Cottrell talked to the group today. When he was done speaking all of these advertising students ran off to go to the Pharrell seminar. This is not a bad thing at all because we are all here for different learning experiences and everyone should do exactly what they want to do in that moment. But personally, if I had advertising ambitions in the future I would have at least asked for his business card for future reference. I think this is a rant and I am not trying to ruffle and feathers but as a rising senor my future in a career is all that I can concentrate on and if that means missing a seminar with a famous rapper is my only sacrifice…I will take it anytime.

Cannes Lions Day 2

Day two of the festival once again blew me away. I can already tell everyday will get better and better. First of all I think the number of people in attendance has already doubled.

I found myself throughout the day hearing the most creative and inspiring ads that I actually got chill bumps on numerous occasions. Some of the most inspiring was BBDO’s campaign to raise awareness of global warming where 1 billion people turned off their lights for an house to show their support for global warming efforts.

The capacity of the creative thinking and innovation that I saw today takes away all of my initial hesitations about the advertising industry. From what I saw advertising is evolving to meet the consumer on a personal level. Advertising is raising awareness for serious issues, giving back to the communities, and making a difference in the world. I think the perception of advertisers will dramatically change and advertisers will lose the negative connotations of being untrustworthy, arrogant, assholes into a very approachable industry that is looking to better themselves and the products they promote.

This way of thinking came from all of the seminars, workshops, and award shows I attended today:

The first seminar I went to today was the BBDO worldwide with Richard Dunmall and Simon Bond called Your Next Billion. It was awesome of course!

The lecture was extremely organized and easy to follow. The speakers talked about how to capitalize in a multi screen world breaking them down by TV, PC, Mobile, and tablet. They discussed how each screen has a personality and connects to people in different ways. A TV is a realiable friend, A PC is a sage that guides you and answers all your questions like an older sibling, a mobile is your lover you can’t live without, and the tablet is a wizard that brings all other screens together.

They showed different ads with content relevant to each screen emphasizing that if you use the screens content wisely your next billion dollars.

The Kraft foods with Malcolm Gladwell was interesting and thought provoking but had nothing to do with Kraft foods as a brand which was disappointing. His message was all about military taticts and how being third is the best position to succeed. His theory is that number one in the innovator, number two is the developer, and number three is the implementer. He was an excellent speaker and a very brilliant man.

I went to my first workshop today! The mindscapes workshop was very intense and I met a guy from Czech and a lady from Austria. They were both CEO’s in their advertising company’s and very interesting people. He discussed very creative ways of thinking including cause to brand awareness in a Doritos and slow dancing campaign in Argentina which was awesome.

His way of thinking and discussing advertising will for sure shape the future of advertising in the future.

The Microsoft advertising tour was awesome my favorite was the Samsung touch screen table that is completely interactive will change the way companies do business in stores dramatically. It will also allow collaborative thinking to be so fun and easy.

I also went to an awards show for the PR, Promo and Activation, and Direct. The awards show was so awesome and every ad they showed gave me chill bumps. I loved the experience and I can not wait for more Cannes Lions experiences the rest of the week!!

Cannes Lions Day 1

I woke up this morning so excited and anxious for the first day of the festival. When I got to the Cannes Lions festival door it finally hit me; this is really happening. The first place I went was the young lions zone to get an iced coffee from youtube and check out all the graffiti the UGA crew had created at the hp station.

The first seminar I attended was the goviral, the long idea, with Jimmy Maymann and Martin Lindstrom. For me this was the most thought provoking seminar I heard the whole day. Martin Lindstrom is a brand expert and the author of brandwashed. He discussed his seven million dollar neuroscience experiment on brand power. His hypothesis is that brands hold power in the same way religion holds power over the human psyche. Lindstrom traveled around the world talking to different religious leaders and compiled a list of ten emotions that makes a religion appealing to humans. The two Lindstrom discussed were having a vision and a sense of belonging. He explained that when people are presented with a brand in the experiment they “felt” the brand in the same way people feel the presence of religion in their lives.  He said this concept goes far beyond brand recognition and can really change the future of how advertisers connect with their target audience on a personal level.

He also discussed the power of word of mouth. We have the same belief that word of mouth advertising is very powerful and it is the driving force behind social media. He launched a word of mouth experiment where a family was put in real life totally candid experiment to see if they could change the brand buying habits of their fellows neighbors by introducing them to specific brands. The experiment showed first hand that people will listen and react to word of mouth from people they know and trust 50% more of the time than traditional advertising. The results are astounding.

The second seminar that I thoroughly enjoyed was thenetworkone which was an independent agency showcase. What I love the most about the group of people who spoke is their down to earth and raw approach to advertising. Just by looking at the group of guys I got vibe of their creativity that radiated off of them.

Rob Jack, the Co-founder and creative director of Special Group expressed his passion for his independent agency by saying, “You can beat the pay, but you can’t beat the feeling of being independent.”

He discussed his Smirnoff campaigns discussion how his company took feedback from their consumers and created three thirty minute short stories that shook up the company’s typical form of advertising.

I also loved thenetworkone’s motto of approaching advertising by these key points:

“If it looks like an ad, start again.”

“If it makes you nervous, good it should”

“Great work is driven by curiosity and failure”

“Present one idea and one believe in one idea wholeheartedly”

Julian Boulding, Ali Ali, Rob Jack, and John Matejczyk all have the same vision which leads them to their great success. The agency prides themselves on not identifying with one trend of advertising and cracking a brands code.  Also, never shoot down a creative idea for fear that it won’t sell to the client.

I was so impressed by these young inspiring men. They are for sure up and comming stars in the advertising industry and people should and will take note.

Apart from being locked in the bathroom with Colson, Claire, and Suzanne for twenty minutes while Anna has to leave the (boring) imc sqared seminar to save us; today was a great day!