Our Royal Baby Media Snapshot

The Royal Baby has finally arrived!

And as to be expected, the media are all over it like a rash .........

We've picked out a handful of our favourite, tactical press ads and custom made print media offerings. Starting with the front page of The Sun today:

They have published possibly the most momentous front page adaptation of all the dailies; no plugs, no ads and no editorial. The issue has gained huge traction within social media and other top media platforms: 

Our weird, little friend #BrianTheRobot is also making the most of the birth with a unique creative execution in the papers this morning. Often associated with creating awkward situations, here Brian harmlessly holds a "Baby on Board" placard and a patriotic flag and asks in regal speak - How he might save us pounds?

No controversy caused this time as another footnote in the Life of Brian is executed. Just a simple tactical ad idea, planned to feature in print in a very timely fashion.

The flexibility of the #ShareACoke campaign enables Coke to adapt the names on the bottles shown to take advantage of situations. 

We have seen Coke execute similar tactical ads a number of times since the #ShareACoke campaign started and each time it works incredibly well! Let's see how quickly they publish another tactical ad (or produce a limited edition bottle) featuring the name of the 3rd in line to the throne.

We love Jelly. We really love clever, sweet and thoughtful Jelly!

Over the past few weeks Bassetts Jelly Babies have been executing a series of small fractionals within newspapers, eagerly awaiting the arrival of the Royal newborn.

This was finally topped off with a larger page dominant fractional ad this morning - Celebrating the new arrival.

A great example of how a bespoke smaller budget campaign can be created to deliver tactical associated messaging and make the most of positive news events!

Plenty more examples running online ... where the flexibility of the digital space allows for quicker turnarounds and greater opportunties for multiple executions and updated creative.

From the team here at Pure Media, congratulations to the Royal Family!

#PurePoint

Supermouse and Rory: Unfortunate Ads

It is extremely difficult to predict negative PR, especially as daily papers such as The Metro and The Telegraph give advertisers little or no time to react to issues. Added to this is the issue of avoiding placing ads near brand-deterring features, which in itself is a challenging feat.

Here at Pure we’re massive ad geeks; we don’t miss a thing! And every now and then we’ll empathise with advertisers who have been incredibly unfortunate with their ad placements.

Today there has been two cringe-worthy mis-haps:

1) Supermouse vs. Picnic Club

On page 9 of today's Metro reads an article about Tesco's apparent "Supermouse" issue with the headline: Tesco failed to clean up droppings, grease and filth after failing three inspections.

With a Tesco “Picnic” ad on the following page:

Ouch! A perfect example of why it is important to liaise with editors around current issues to avoid this situation.

2) Terrible round...Great watch nonetheless!

Poor Rory McIlroy had a "miserable" opening round at the Open yesterday, finishing 13 shots behind the lead. The Telegraph did not let him off lightly with a series of unflattering photographs and write-up which evokes a cringe of sympathy:

To add insult to injury, an abject post-feature Omega ad endorsed by, you guessed it, Rory McIlroy.

It is incredibly unfortunate to have an ad placed so closely to a feature which achieves the absolute opposite to the brand goals. Using celebrities as brand ambassadors increases the risk, another example is our Sharapova-Evian #PurePoint. 

It's just one of those things all of us in the industry have nightmares about!

Round 3....

...Ding Ding!! .....There is seemingly no end to the exhaustive budgets and sporting rivalry between BT Sport and SKY Sports ... with SKY producing a power punch in the latest round by introducing David Beckham to front their current advertising campaign.

Probably the most recognisable British sportsman, certainly in the world of football, a mass ad campaign launched this week across Sky and terrestrial TV channels as well as outdoor, print and digital activity.

WPP agencies Maxus and MediaCom must be loving the ongoing battle as the budgets continue to get ploughed in to multi media campaigns.... Just how many rounds can they afford to go??

Initial contender for #PureAdOfTheWeek

A Kick in the Teethgate

As a direct, competitive reaction to Colgate's "brush hour" at Waterloo Station this week which saw thousands of angry commuters causing mayhem with old toothbrushes in hand expecting a direct free swap for a newer model, Philips decided to capitalise on the situation with the following full-page ad in yesterday's Evening Standard:

The idea was generated, the ad produced, media space bought, ad was signed off by the client and supplied to publication in less than 24 hours after inception - not a bad turnaround at all! Especially considering that Philips usually have a long-term brand vision as opposed to the quick-turnaround, tactical approach.

The tagline; "the best things in life aren't free" adds insult to injury and something else for Colgate to worry about after dealing with the dirty-mouthed comments from customers and recovering from the embarrassing  fiasco.

#PureAdOfTheWeek

Brimful of Ashes

The recent KIA campaign has grabbed our attention with the execution of a small series of neat and tactical tongue-in-cheek ads running in the build up towards the Ashes.

 

These three print ads ran on consecutive pages in Sport magazine last week around an exclusive feature about Matt Prior. This implies an impressive level of attention to detail towards media planning with the placements in a highly relevant creatively synergistic editorial feature, which can often be overlooked with big budget campaigns.

An outdoor campaign is also running, where multi format activity can be seen dominating Vauxhall Station - the home of  'The KIA Oval' which will be hosting the final test of the series next month.

Whilst the placement of activity is timely and is highly relevant in terms of targeting and proximity, it would appear that the cretive team have made an uncharacteristic wrong-turn by including the name of one of KIA's main competitors "SEAT" in the creative.

 

 

 

 

Which 'SEAT' is it ??

 

 

 

Apart from this apparent creative slip-up, the campaign's timing and execution has been very well thought-out.   #PurePoint

Whose Sponsor is it Anyway?

Following the Sharapova/Evian sporting blunder another supposed brand ambassador who hasn’t quite lived up to expectation is Mario Götze, who completed his £31.5 million transfer from Borussia Dortmund to Bayern Munich today.

Unfortunately, he didn’t really think through his outfit, given that his new employers are sponsored by Adidas and indeed hold a 9% stake in the club.

#PurePoint

Live Young With Ageing Creative

Evian’s offering in the annual Wimbledon tactical ad-fest is a neat iteration of the Baby and Me campaign, seeking to highlight the rejuvenating effects of water by showing the delightful Maria Sharapova and an infant version of herself, as seen in the following half-page DPS in the latest issue of Time Out mag:

The media strategy has been executed nicely, with impact being achieved through strong OOH placements (**London Bridge posters**) and some neat 1/2 DPS strips in Metro and the Standard, but the fact that Maria literally tumbled out of the tournament in the second round surely evaporates the impact? Surely just securing the ad space with one creative execution is letting the brand down in this instance as they haven’t covered the eventuality of her being knocked out so early.

The APP they have produced, where you can take a headshot on your camera-phone/ tablet and see what your infant equivalent looks like, would probably have greater uptake if Sharapova was still grunting and screaming her way through the tournament at SW19.

We’ll take a large PIMM's with some strawberries and cream – they never get old!

Wheelie good viral ad!

Red Bull's latest viral film starring Danny MacAskill is an extremely late contender for this week's #PureAdOfTheWeek (albeit tenuous as it's not really an ad ... just 7 minutes of great footage).

The video is executed in such a captivating way that it has accumulated over three million views in less than ten days!

As we say, although it's not an "advertisment" per se, the video has generated such popularity that this week we have selected it as an extremely strong contender  for the title of #PureAdOfTheWeek.

 

#Red Bull

Life of Brian (the robot)

Since Confused.com decided to scrap Cara, the scruffy haired cartoon karaoke singer, Brian the robot has been introduced to spearhead the price comparison website's re-positioning with a backing of approximately £28million, according to CampaignLive.

Although Brian has been programmed with a lack of social skills, his charming nature adds to what is unfolding to be an extremely clever multimedia integrated campaign.

The campaign first started with the inception of Brian, who we saw being brought to life in a 40" TV spot called 'Lab', during the semi-final of Britain's Got Talent earlier this month.

The campaign then unfolded across other media - with simple and impactful ads running in print, outdoor, on the radio and across multi digital routes.

The outdoor campaign appears to be dominating key cities with heavy presence by running a generic money saving ad on T-sides across the bus network ....

.... as well as location specific large format ads tailored to the area and audience they are placed in.

A further TV execution is now running - where we get to see and hear more of Brian's personality and sound effects as he traverses around a car boot sale, conversing with some slightly bemused folk.

This adds impact and association to the radio ads now running, due to the immediate (robotic) voice recognition of the audio.

Added to all of this there is digital activity running across the piece, with some virals, Facebook and Twitter profiles - inviting us to find out more about the Life of Brian.

So how effective is a socially inept, fictional character in the world of social media? 

Answer: extremely effective so far. Aided by the interactive elements and the #BrianTheRobot hashtag running across other elements of the campaign.

Could this be the start of a battle for FB friends and Twitter followers; Brian the Robot vs. Aleksandr the Meerkat in a price comparison, fictional, loveable character war?

We hope so - but it will take some time (and more marketing investment) for Brian to catch up given he has only received 302 likes for his Facebook page and 1,068 Twitter followers to date vs the plethora of likes Aleksander has amassed - a meer 797,000 as well as 60,519 Twitter followers to date.

#PurePoint

Bus advertising reaches new heights!

Early contender for this weeks #PureAdOfTheWeek ... Pepsi Max, who launched a campaign over the weekend announcing their new brand ambassador - magician 'Dynamo' suspended (quite literally) from a the bus superside ad with the hash tag #LIVEFORNOW

#PureAdOfTheWeek

Sky vs. BT Sport

There can be no ignoring the current battle between SKY and BT Sport for Premier League fixtures and we've been following how this war has evolved in the media, especially advertising tactics.

"BT sparked a price war with Sky last month when it launched free live Premier League action to football fans for the first time - if they buy its broadband starting at £10 a month" (The Independent). This came just days after BT launched its excessive £100m+ campaign which bought ubiquity within commuter press.

But now it seems as though Sky isn't going to sit back and let this happen. In today's Metro, ads from both BT and SKY attempt to have a pop at the rival:

The big broadcaster rivalry can only be a good thing for media owners. But in the long-term, will this be just as beneficial for consumers or are we just paying for excessive advertising budgets to fund media spats?

#PurePoint

Cover Up?

Another contender for #PureAdOfTheWeek .... we've just noticed this rather clever press ad for AIG Direct - Female Cancer Cover - in the Classified section of the Daily Mail.

Subtle, sensitive, smart and creative use of press ... without incurring any incremental costs.

Buy a Proper Cola!

Fentiman's cheeky attempt of a #ShareACoke parody has earned a place among the contenders for this week's #PureAdOfTheWeek:

This simple and creatively impactful ad was snapped in today's issue of The Metro and although the ad sits within a modest quarter-page positioning in the middle of the paper, we fully appreciate Fentiman's audacity of attempting to hi-jack a global campaign executed by one of the world's largest brands, Coca-Cola:

Fingers crossed for Fentiman that the ad can spark nationwide curiosity to try out its Cola alternative!

#PureAdOfTheWeek

Big Blue Cactus.

We are wondering how many members of the agency team were holding back giggles in the meeting room after the creative / account director got the go ahead from the client to run the following ad currently running on Bus supersides for Boots 'inhibitif' ... hair removal brand.

The answer? Not nearly as many people as those who have had to double-take at this 'large blue thing' flying around London.

For comedy value and for interesting, phallic use of "shock messaging", we're considering this as a #PureAdOfTheWeek.

#BigBlueCactus.

That's a lot of wonga

Despite the fact we are confused by the campaign messaging wonga are currently running ....they have at least got us talking about it.

Primarily because we can't get away from the campaign ... which is currently dominating the streets of London with highly visible multi executional activity running on bus supersides.

This really was a case of 3 buses all turning up at once, with different creative running on each.

It's a bit like playing bus Bingo - in this shot we have got; Straight Talking Money, No Hidden charges and Cash loans you can control .... the aim now is to get a shot of four in a row to include the £154 creative too.

#PurePoint

ARGGHH!! ZOMBIES!! Wait.....What?

During our weekly meeting, we all decided it would be a great idea to get our own Pure Media office zombie.

Yep, you guessed it. But not just any zombie, a giffgaff zombie from its latest ad campaign and this week's #PureAdOfTheWeek.

The Don't Be Scared campaign kick-started on 5th June with a series of short teaser TV ads showing a rotten foot and a chicken with #DontBeScared written beside them. Following the teasers, giffgaff purchased entire commercial breaks on E4 and a number other channels perfect for targeting its younger audiences.

Why is this in contention for our #PureAdOfTheWeek? Well, giffgaff has done a fantastic job of subverting horror to deliver its messaging; "Not everything unusual is scary". Plus, the mobile network has changed our perception of zombies. They only want to help out!

Congratulations giffgaff. #PureAdOfTheWeek ??  #DontBeScared

BT Sport: Putting the B and T in 'ubiquity'

Fact:

BT Sport have run 1,132 press ads in the UK since activity launched on May 9th (33 days ago).

The £100m+  campaign launched with a nationwide press takeover in the nationals and regionals, running multiple consecutive ads in main news as well as the sports sections.

Added to this is TV, radio, outdoor and digital activity, delivering a truly ubiquitous multi media campaign across the piece.


How much is too much?

Taking a London commuter as an example - If you had picked up and flicked through The Metro and The Evening Standard on your way to and from work every day between May 9th and today, you would have come across an astonishing 82  BT Sport print ads ranging from strips to 1/2 pages and pages in these 2 titles alone.

Using one day as an example - the following ads were all in the Metro on the 23rd May, well in to the launch :

But how effective is this?

There's impact, ownership and brand building, tactical and synergistic placements ...and detail...now the ads have started to include more information relating to the pricing, packages and proposition ...but how many times do we need to be targeted to get the message?

Too many!! It certainly makes a relative mockery of the the average campaign planning coverage and frequency measures and caps...as well as considerations re. the laws of diminishing returns etc.

Just how long can the BT Sport advertising omnipresence continue for??  Too Long!!

#PurePoint

wonga's irony

The recent wonga campaign which can be caught moving around London on bus supersides has a huge connotation of irony in our opinion.

At first it appears the creative has suffered a bit of a posting blunder, with the panel obscuring the line .... but surely by hiding the words "no hidden charges", this suggests that actually, there are?

Other creative executions include the line "straight talking money" - which doesn't mean anything.... as well as "£154 loan for £154" which is equally as confusing!?!?

#PurePoint

Magnifying Glass anyone??

Highly impactful use of colour and visuals for this new outdoor campaign running on 48 sheet posters targeting commuters on station platforms.

So confident is the TV Channel promoting the new drama that starts next week - that they have omitted to highlight what channel the programme will be aired on ... oh, unless you can see the microscopic URL in the bottom left hand corner.

Given there are currently 250+ stations available to view in the UK - this clearly is a brand that believes in itself.

#PurePoint

Eagles!!

Topical ad and tactical placement for Barclays; running 48 sheet posters across the South East congratulating Crystal Palace FC for the team's recent victory in the Play-Offs and their resultant promotion to the Barclays Premier League.

We're sure all the local Palace supporters will be very proud!

#PurePoint